ABSTRACT
Sustainability is most associated with environmental concerns and with good reason. The inclusion of sustainability values into the decision-making process asks for a triple return on investment, or a financial, social, and environmental return. Short-term, long-term, empathic, and self-interested needs are also shown to help relate Maslow’s hierarchy to earlier discussions on the motivations of sustainable design. The Triple Bottom Line (TBL) is an accounting framework applied to sustainability by John Elkington in 1994 in his book Cannibals with Forks. Many organizations, governments, and corporations have adopted the TBL framework to evaluate their performance and guide decision-making towards a sustainable future. The principle of well-being is woven through all the values in the TBL – social well-being, environmental well-being including physical health, and economic well-being or prosperity – and it includes a longer-term view of profit in the form of security, both for an individual and for an entire society.
