UN SDGs were designed “for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future”. It is now clearly understood that achieving sustainability is essential before we can enjoy peace and prosperity.

Are we truly searching for peace and prosperity? Are we genuinely attempting to sustain? Let us take an objectively critical look.

Take the case of Iceland. Until around the year 2000, the “Nordic Tiger”, as it was called, had a population of 320,000 people with a GDP of $13 billion. The people enjoyed a high standard of living, a low unemployment rate, a low crime rate, a clean environment, clean air, good healthcare, and a high standard of education. Then the business interest took over. In 2000, a policy of deregulation was implemented, with disastrous effects on the environment. Banks, which had been running in profit until then, were privatised, resulting in severe implications and consequences for the economy. By 2008, the banks had loans amounting to $100 billion, nearly seven times their country’s GDP, and were in a deep financial crisis. From being the 10th richest country in the world in 2007, Iceland dropped to the 21st in 2010. What caused the “Nordic Tiger” to lose its peace, prosperity, and sustainability? The SDGs have hardly any impact except for goals 12, 13, 14, and 15 to some extent. Globally speaking, the SDGs may bring about some improvements, but the answer does not lie solely in them.

Consider another case: India vs. the US. India has evolved over the past few years, both in its economic and global standings. It is emphatically insisting on things that are good for its people. It is no longer being bullied into signing deals that are asymmetric and not fair to Indians. On one side, we have a strong India with a sense of sovereignty, and on the other side, Donald Trump’s MAGA. The Trump administration is no longer seeking compromise or goodwill; instead, it wants to remove tariff barriers, open up sensitive sectors, and secure digital and regulatory commitments that align with corporate America’s interests. The US wants cross-border data flows that compromise Indian digital sovereignty. It would endanger India’s digital public infrastructure, including UPI, Aadhaar, DigiLocker, and ONDC. Another area is intellectual property rights, where the US wants India to adopt TRIPS-plus, which would only increase the cost of medicines for Indian citizens and damage India’s global standing. Next, the US is insisting on greater market access in agriculture for genetically modified crops, chlorine-washed poultry and hormone-treated dairy products. All the above are unsuitable for India and its farmers, as they would damage soil health, displace small-scale farmers, and compromise Indian food sovereignty. The US genetically modified corn, soy and dairy products would open floodgates for unsustainable imports and threaten food security (Mahajan, 2024). In addition to the main issues discussed above, there are several other smaller but important concerns.

Where is the sustainability in all these activities? Will we be able to achieve peace and prosperity with the above baggage? My answer is no. If one were to discern the root cause, it is profit-making.

Presently, the business models are based on profit-making and gaining a competitive advantage. One man’s gain is another man’s loss. This leads to bitterness and rivalry – the root cause of all our problems today.

In my earlier blog, I had talked about business without profit. In my opinion, two conditions should be met by the business.

1. Start a business only if the business can provide something substantially different from the incumbent ones.  The intention should not be to gain profit by creating something differently for the sake of being different. The new business or product should provide benefits to customers that the existing ones do not.
2. Do not make a profit. Price the product just enough to run the business continuously. In other words, do not price the product in a way that results in huge profits and surplus. What is the point in minting huge profits and doing philanthropy? All I am saying is build philanthropy into the price itself.

I want to call the business with the above two conditions as a service to mankind. This is the service that I alluded to in my last blog.

For a lasting “peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future”, besides the service as interpreted above, we should care about Society and Sustainability. Thus, Service, Society and Sustainability are the key to our existence.

 No, the words are not arranged in alphabetical order; it is in order of importance. However, let us discuss sustainability first, and then move on to society.

Sustainability

In 1987, the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) published a report entitled “Our common future”, wherein sustainability is defined as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” This document is also known as the “Brundtland Report” after the Commission’s chairwoman, Gro Harlem Brundtland. Sustainable development requires a holistic approach that takes into consideration both environmental concerns and economic development.  

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which preceded the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), achieved some success in reducing global hunger and improving access to healthcare (Griggs et al., 2013). However, to achieve further success, the UN moved from the MDGs’ seven goals to the SDGs’ 17 goals by being more inclusive. What is noteworthy is that the SDGs not only include countries but also the societal actors, including civil society organisations. This amply demonstrates the importance of society or people in shaping sustainability. A closer look at the SDGs shows that four goals out of 17, i.e. about 24% (see Table 1), focus on human beings or society.

Table 1 SDGs and their primary focus

In the context of sustainability, scholars have historically focused primarily on environmental management (e.g., Klassen & McLaughlin, 1996), environmental strategies (e.g., Russo, 2003), and ecological sustainability (e.g., Shrivastava, 1995). Later it was realised that one needs to include social, economic, and ecological factors also (Valente, 2012, p. 586) and now it is accepted that sustainability is a three factor phenomenon based on economic integrity, social equity, and environmental concern (Bansal, 2005), which is also referred to as the 3Ps approach (i.e., profit, people, planet) or the “triple bottom line” (Elkington, 1997; Hart & Milstein, 2003). This implies that the meaning of sustainability is those acts that do not negatively affect society or human beings. Based on the above facts, it can be said that society plays a central role in sustainability.

Society

Most commonly, society is understood as an aggregation of individuals. Technically speaking, according to sociology and anthropology, “Society” refers to a group of people and a complex pattern of norms of interaction that exist among them; it exists only when they possess common interests. Society is necessary for human life to continue. It is built on trust and interdependence and thrives on organised economic interactions.

It is intuitive that for a society to sustain itself, it has to be a good and caring one.  A good and caring society is that where everyone is cared for equally.  According to Evelyn Nakano Glenn (2000), the definition of care as a practice has three features. First, everyone needs care, not just the weak and needy.  The second aspect is that giving care is seen as creating a relationship between the caregiver and the cared, and the third aspect is that care can be organised in multitudes of ways. Further, Glenn (2000) continues and accordingly, a caring society is where i) Caring is recognised as “real work”, ii) Those who are cared for are recognised as equal members of the society, and iii) Those who do caring work are fully recognised with wages.

Unfortunately, the above idea is currently utopian, and we live in a society where indifference prevails—a society that is profit-incentive-based and fails to reward charity (Michel, 2023). Organizations and businesses bypass bona fide environmental activities and focus on profit maximisation (Sidhu & Gibbon, 2021). This is because corporate success is often equated with profit, with little scope for considering other ethical considerations. Supporting the above argument, Logan et al. (2023) show how organisations target vulnerable populations in the name of strategic marketing for profit maximisation. More severely, organisations fixated on profit maximisation can cause serious harm as they ignore ethical considerations for the sake of financial gains (Friedman & Clarke, 2022 ).  This necessitates a serious look at how organisations are run. However, sustainability and taking care of society isn’t the responsibility of the government, and businesses have no say in it.  Since businesses responsible for creating negative externalities in society and degrading ecology (Montiel et al., 2021) they are the prime and major players for societal development.

Another disturbing phenomenon is the growing culture of displaying personal success with consumerism that leads to “aggressive and violent behaviours’ during competitive consumption events such as sales (Miles, 2023). This vitiates the social environment and sets in a pattern in society where social recognition is based on one’s material wealth and consumption.  Furthermore, consumerism also affects people psychologically and may lead to unintended consequences (Muris & Ollendick, 2023).   

“Sustainable development requires an economy directed at improving the quality of life, decoupled from quantity of consumer resources.” (Schmuck & Schultz, 2002, p. 6). I would go one step further and say that “sustainable development requires an economy directed at improving the quality of life, decoupled from profit making and coupled with service motives”.

I understand the above idea is utopic and radical in the modern world. Nevertheless, we have to make a beginning somewhere and let this be our guiding principle for a better world.

Works Cited

Bansal, P. (2005). Evolving sustainably: A longitudinal study of corporate sustainable development. Strategic Management Journal,, 26(3), 197–218. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.441

Elkington, J. (1997). Cannibals with forks: The triple bottom line of 21st century business. . New Society Publishers.

Friedman, H. H., & Clarke, C. (2022 ). Deadly consequences of emphasizing profits over human life: how corporate greed has caused the death of millions. . Journal of Intercultural Management and Ethics, , 5(3), 19-35. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.35478/jime.2022.3.03

Griggs, D., Stafford-Smith, M., Gaffney, O., Rockstrom, J., Ohman, M. C., Shyamsundar, P., . . . Noble, I. (2013, March 21). Sustainable development goals for people and planet. Nature, , 495(7441), 305–307. https://doi.org/ https://doi.org/10.1038/495

Hart, S. L., & Milstein, M. B. (2003, May). Creating sustainable value. Academy of Management Executive,, 17(2), 56–67 . https://doi.org/DOI: 10.5465/AME.2003.10025194

Mahajan, A. S. (2024, June 17). Deal or No Deal? Inside India’s high-stakes trade gamble with the US. Retrieved from India Today: https://www.indiatoday.in/india-today-insight/story/deal-or-no-deal-inside-indias-high-stakes-trade-gamble-with-the-us-2741992-2025-06-17

Michel, M. (2023, December 1). EDITORIAL: How to create a caring society. The Maroon. Retrieved from https://loyolamaroon.com/10040464/showcase/editorial-how-to-create-a-caring-society/

Miles, L. (2023). Understanding violence on british university campuses through the lens of the deviant leisure perspective. Journal of Consumer Culture,, 24(1), 64-81. . https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405231186471

Montiel, I., Cuervo-Cazurra, A., Park, J., Antolín-López, R., & Husted, B. W. (2021). Implementing the United Nations’ sustainable development goals in international business. . Journal of International Business Studies,, 52(5), 999–1030. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1057/s41267-021-00445-y

Muris, P., & Ollendick, T. (2023). Contemporary hermits: a developmental psychopathology account of extreme social withdrawal (hikikomori) in young people. . Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review,, 26(2), 459-481. . https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1007/s10567-023-00

Schmuck, P., & Schultz, W. P. (2002). Psychology of Sustainable Development. Springer Nature.

Sidhu, A. M., & Gibbon, J. (2021). Institutionalisation of weak conceptions of sustainability in the united nations clean development mechanism: empirical evidence from malaysian organisations. Accounting Auditing & Accountability Journal, , 34(5), 1220-1245. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-07-2019-4108

Valente, M. (2012, April 13). Theorizing firm adoption of sustaincentrism. Organization Studies,, 33(4). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840612443455

Class Assignments:

1. Two conditions for starting a business has been mentioned above. Take a position and argue your case.

“sustainable development requires an economy directed at improving the quality of life, decoupled from profit making and coupled with service motives”. Discuss.