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August 07, 2002
Book Review: The Ecology of the New Economy
by William Baue
A collection of essays identifies how the new digital economy both upgrades and downgrades the
environment without predicting which trend will prevail.
SocialFunds.com --
In their introduction to The Ecology of the New Economy, editors Jacob Park and Nigel Roome
propose four distinctions between the information, communications, computing and electronic (ICCE)
technologies and more mature technologies. However, they number only three of these distinctions,
leaving readers to guess whether or not they deliver a fourth, and what exactly that fourth
distinction might be.
 This phenomenon neatly encapsulates the
dynamic of the entire collection of essays. The collection acts as a tour guide through the jungle
of conflicting information about the environmental impacts of the new digital economy. However,
when it comes time to end the tour, the collection leaves us stranded.
The book’s
incomplete status mirrors the current state of research. The book’s subtitle, Sustainable
Transformation of Global Information, Communications and Electronics Industries, with its
emphasis on transition, suggests as much. Simply stated, our culture has yet to arrive at any
conclusive assessment of the ecology of the new economy.
“There is no general
answer to the question of whether the use of new media will lead to increased or decreased
environmental impacts,” writes Klaus Fichter, director of the Berlin-based Borderstep
Institute for Innovation and Sustainability, in the first chapter.
Readers seeking to
understand the myriad factors that influence the debate over the environmental and social
sustainability of ICCE technologies stand to gain insight. The book consists of 18 chapters
written by nearly 30 academic, corporate, and independent researchers from Europe, Asia, and the
U.S. A sample of the arguments regarding the sustainability of the new economy gives a sense of
the book’s breadth.
James Wilsdon is the head of strategy at Demos, a UK-based
independent think-tank. He cites a Forum for the Future survey of dot.com entrepreneurs’
attitudes toward environmental and social responsibility in his chapter, “Dot.Com Ethics:
E-business and Sustainability.” The survey reveals a disjunction between ideology and
practice. The majority of these new economy executives believe in the value of sustainability,
but most of them fail to ensure that their businesses measure or manage environmental and social
impacts. Instead of condemning these executives, Mr. Wilsdon explains that the reasons behind this
disjunction are a lack of perceived impacts, time, expertise, and resources. Solutions to this
dilemma remain largely hypothetical, as Mr. Wilsdon documents very few examples of business
activities that meet the ideal of sustainability.
In another chapter, “The Internet
and Sustainability Reporting: Improving communication with stakeholders” William B. Weil and
Barbara Winter-Watson of Environmental Resources Management discuss the benefits and liabilities of
corporate sustainability reports. The authors explain that social investors’ demands for
greater transparency regarding corporate environmental practices have helped drive the increase in
corporate sustainability reporting. Unfortunately, corporate obfuscation of environmental
performance persists.
The chapter’s final section, “Future reporting
trends,” ends abruptly with a statistical comparison of FTSE 100 firms that contract
third-party verification of sustainability reports (65 percent) and Fortune 100 companies
that do (12 percent). Although this is an interesting fact, it is not a chapter conclusion.
The collection similarly lacks a conclusion or an afterword, though the introduction does end
with a summary of the conclusions that arise from the collection.
“What we can say
conclusively is that both sides are right and wrong, and the answer almost always depends on the
context and circumstances surrounding the use of ICCE technologies,” the editors state.
This vague language, which sounds as if it were borrowed from a corporate annual report,
accurately conveys the inconclusive status of the debate over the ecology of the new economy.
The Ecology of the New Economy: Sustainable Transformation of Global Information,
Communications and Electronics Industries edited by Jacob Park and Nigel Roome. Greenleaf Publishing, Sheffield,
England: 2002.
©
SRI World Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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