A Survey of SustainAbility’s Compass Network: Opinion Research from GlobeScan

This survey of SustainAbility’s Compass Network presents findings from the SustainAbility/GlobalScan research on "drivers, limiting factors, and responsibilities for global sustainability". SustainAbility is a firm that advises clients on the risks and opportunities associated with corporate responsibility and sustainable development. SustainAbility's Compass Network consists of the people who sign on when accessing key resources on their website.

First, the research results review the profile of the network respondents:
By profession - 34% from the corporate sector, 25% consultants or journalists, 12% non-governmental organisation (NGO), 6% government.
By region - 40% Western Europe, 32% United States and Canada, 17% Asia/Pacific, and 1% Eastern Europe. Senior managers, middle managers, or professionals working in sustainability, environment, energy, finance, information technology, infrastructure/construction were the dominant levels and fields of the respondents.

Among the results are the following:

Combined sustainability efforts were judged to be inadequate to very inadequate.

Major barriers to sustainability in order of magnitude were the following: lack of political will, culture of consumption, lack of awareness, lack of business commitment, nature of capitalism, and lack of public support.

On leadership in advancing sustainability: Nationally elected government leaders received the poorest rating followed by corporate leaders, with NGO leaders ranked as good performers.

Opinions of the recent increase in corporate communications about sustainability and the environment indicated the authenticity of the communications on a #1 - #5 scale (#5 indicating “authentic change” and #1 indicating “strategic and temporary change”): 3% indicated a #5, 23% indicated a #4, 30% indicated a #3, 23% indicated a #2, and 10% indicated a #1. These opinions were reasonably uniform across the geographic regions, with the United States (US) and Latin America rating authenticity of communications higher than average and the Asia/ Pacific, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East and Africa rating them lower than average. Among the professions surveyed, corporate and consultant/journalists rated the efforts as somewhat more authentic, while government and NGO representatives rated them somewhat lower than the average. The average of the opinion ratings on the 1 -5 scale was 2.87.

The impact of market capitalism on progress towards sustainability was rated on a 1 - 5 scale, #1 representing "Significantly inhibits progress" and #5 representing "Significantly contributes to progress". Results were: #1 - 14%, #2 - 27%, #3 - 26%, #4 - 18%, and #5 - 5%. Africa/Middle East was the region which indicated a much higher belief that market capitalism significantly inhibits progress. Indications of academicians/researchers also weighed more heavily than other professions on the ranking of inhibiting progress.

The next question reviewed opinion on the impact of US dominance on global progress towards sustainability on a 1 - 5 scale (#5 being “Significantly contributes to progress”, #1 being “Significantly inhibits progress”). Results were: #1 - 38%, #2 - 36%, #3 - 21%, #4 - 4%, and #5 - 1%.

The survey ranked groups providing the most important sustainable development leadership in this order: companies, governments, NGOs, international agencies, and religious groups.