Green Accolades and Oil-Soaked Mermaids: A Sociology of Worth Perspective on BP's Sustainability Reporting and the Deepwater Horizon Disaster*

Abstract

Sustainability reporting was originally intended to improve accountability by providing more transparency around the ecological impact of organizational action. However, as sustainability reports are increasingly used as a tool for legitimacy and a source of information by financial stakeholders, environmental concerns are being framed in economic terms. This paper draws on Boltanski and Thévenot's (2006, On Justification: Economies of Worth, Princeton University Press) sociology of worth framework to explore how the prioritization of market values facilitates the disconnect between sustainability reporting and the environment. We use the Deepwater Horizon disaster as an extreme case to illustrate how the one-sided “compromises” with market values subjugate the values associated with social and environmental stewardship. We suggest that the integration of different conceptions of the common good can provide a more nuanced understanding of the relations between economic and environmental values.