ABSTRACT
Our assignment for this chapter is to summarize key developments in sustainability reporting and make some prognostications for the future of the fi eld. However, despite thousands of sustainability reports so labelled, any presumption that we currently have of sustainability reporting is painfully naive. Sure enough, the term ‘sustainability’ is bandied around in the business community with ever more regularity – sustainability reporting, sustainable business, sustainable performance, sustainable fi nance, sustainable consumption, sustainable supply chain management and so on. And what was once a potentially threatening concept to business (IUCN, 1980 ; Laine, 2010 ; WCED, 1987 ) now seems to be plied by business organizations with some comfort. But what do organizations, or more properly their managers, mean when they report on or utter the term sustainability?
