Introduction

There is mounting evidence that humanity is exceeding the boundaries of the Earth system within which a sustainable future is possible (Richardson et al., 2023). Transgressing the biophysical boundaries of the Earth system has already exposed millions in the global south to acute food and water insecurity (IPCC, 2022). This makes plain that overshooting Earth system boundaries is a question of justice. Gupta et al., (2023, p. 632) define Earth system justice as the “equitable sharing of nature’s benefits, risks and related responsibilities among all people in the world, within safe and just Earth system boundaries to provide universal life support”. Economic activity is the main driver of the current transgression of Earth system boundaries (Steffen et al., 2015; Wright & Nyberg, 2017), and therefore, business ethics research, which is essentially concerned with questions of justice in the context of business (Böhm et al., 2022), should explicitly consider planetary biophysical boundaries (Nilsen, 2023) and focus on the role of business for Earth system justice.

Up to now most research in business ethics focuses on firm-level phenomena. As a result, we have no clear understanding of how to address the problematic role of business in the current Earth system changes. In contrast, taking a system-level perspective, sustainability science is concerned with the ecological and societal-level preconditions for keeping the Earth system within stable and just boundaries, but does not pay sufficient attention to the firm level, even if economic dynamics are acknowledged as a crucial driver of changes in the Earth system (see, e.g. Steffen et al., 2015).

In this commentary, we aim to explore the links between business and the Earth system. In order to do this, we turn to the theory of metabolic rift (Clark & York, 2005; Foster, 1999, 2020) as a common framework for integrating business ethics research and sustainability science. The theory of metabolic rift explains the destruction of the natural environment in the course of the dialectical interchange between human productive activities and the natural environment (Böhm et al., 2012). By setting out how capitalist production is embedded in the natural environment, the theory of metabolic rift underscores how capitalist production reduces the reproductive capacity of nature. Specifically, this theory considers how capitalism in general, and the pursuit of profit as a core organizing principle of capitalism in particular, contributes to the systematic degradation of the natural environment (Clark & York, 2005). Thus, the theory of metabolic rift allows us to simultaneously consider economic and ecological processes and their interactions.

Against the backdrop of the metabolic rift, we explore the system-level constraints for business firms’ contributions to Earth system justice. We argue that profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth, which are among the central organizing principles of capitalism, are connected through a mutually reinforcing relationship: on the one hand, profit maximising behaviour on the firm level drives economic growth on the level of the economy. On the other hand, the centrality of economic growth in contemporary society drives profit maximising behaviour on the level of the firm. We refer to this relationship as the loop of unsustainability. This loop perpetuates the metabolic rift and consequently the destruction of the natural environment, and decisively limits firm-level attempts to contribute to Earth system justice.

For business ethics research, our argument implies that an explicit consideration of the systemic dynamics of capitalism and a critical reconsideration of profit as a central driver of imbalances in the Earth system are crucial in order to better understand the potential and limits of business to contribute to Earth system justice. For system-oriented sustainability science, our argument highlights the need to explicitly and systematically consider the level of the business firm, which is largely treated as a black box in this stream of research.

Our commentary is structured as follows. In the next section, we briefly review firm-level perspectives and system-level perspectives as complementary viewpoints on the crossing of Earth system boundaries and therefore on Earth system justice. We then introduce the theory of metabolic rift as a common framework for integrating business ethics and sustainability science. On this basis, we show how the mutually reinforcing relationship between the principles of profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth keep business from contributing to Earth system justice. We then discuss the implications of this perspective for both business ethics research and sustainability science, and sketch essential avenues for further research.

Firm-Level and System-Level Perspectives as Complementary Viewpoints on the Causes and Consequences of Earth System Change

There is extensive research on the impact of business firms on the natural environment in areas such as organization theory, corporate sustainability, and business ethics. Many works in this field focus on the firm level and build on the common assumption that modifying business practices can reduce the negative impact of business on the natural environment and even make business a central force in enabling environmental restoration, ideally translating “social and environmental value creation into economic profit and competitive advantage for the firm” (Bocken et al., 2014, p. 54–55). As a result of this firm-level focus, these streams of research tend to neglect system-level dynamics (Bansal & Song, 2017), and business ethics researchers in particular do not specify the ways in which “corporate activity intersects with even widely recognized thresholds” (Hockerts & Searcy, 2023, p. 230).

A growing stream of critical research in organization theory argues that this firm-level focus is overly myopic, and highlights the fundamental links between unsustainable business practices and the dynamics of contemporary capitalism (Adler, 2022; Böhm et al., 2012; Ergene et al., 2020; Schneider, 2020; Wright & Nyberg, 2017). Organization theorists have identified trade-offs that impede corporate sustainability on different levels of analysis (Hahn et al., 2010), explored how multi-level dynamics cause organizational inaction in the face of climate change (Slawinski et al., 2017), and pointed out that the profit motive as an instantiation of the logic of capitalist growth is a source of unsustainability (Chertkovskaya & Paulsson, 2021; Jones, 2011). This literature highlights the persistence of unsustainable practices as a consequence of capitalism, as well as the broader link between capitalism and natural environment, which we take as inspiration for specifying how the business ethics literature can consider Earth systems dynamics. To extend these arguments and consider how business might contribute to Earth system justice, it is essential to explore the broader economic and social processes that constrain the role of businesses in Earth system dynamics.

In contrast to the firm-level focus of corporate sustainability and business ethics research, sustainability science is primarily concerned with natural science and the macro-economic drivers of Earth system change. In support of the critical stream of research summarised above, many studies in sustainability science show that current patterns of economic activity result in a disastrous disruption of the Earth system (Rockström et al., 2023; Steffen et al., 2018). With respect to the interactions between economy and ecology, researchers increasingly acknowledge that so-called green growth is impossible and that it is therefore necessary to renounce the pursuit of unbridled economic growth in order to make society more sustainable (Hickel & Kallis, 2020; Tilsted et al., 2021). In a similar vein, Steffen et al., (2018, p. 8258) argue that “a deep transformation based on a fundamental reorientation of human values, equity, behavior, institutions, economies, and technologies is required” to prevent the natural environment from becoming irreversibly “inhospitable to current human societies and to many other contemporary species”. Based on the insight that a transition to a more sustainable society and economy is urgently needed, many works have explored the institutional changes required to achieve a transition to a more sustainable form of societal organization (see, e.g. Otto et al., 2020). When business is mentioned in this stream of research, firms are assumed to automatically adapt to changing environmental and economic conditions (e.g. Geels et al., 2017) or to even act as agents of a sustainable transformation of society (Folke et al., 2019). However, some researchers in sustainability science have started to problematise the role of business and question “whether there are deeper structural lock-ins” (Hinton, 2021, p. 2) that keep business firms from becoming more sustainable—and thus from helping attain Earth system justice.

In sum, both firm- and system-level perspectives offer complementary viewpoints for understanding the causes and consequences of damage to the natural environment that originates from economic activity and impedes Earth system justice. However, both domains currently lack a common language that enables them to consider the other domain. The lack of such a common language is problematic because it impedes an exploration of the ways in which firm-level dynamics (the domain of organization theory and business ethics research) and system-level dynamics (the domain of economics and sustainability science) interact.

The Theory of Metabolic Rift as a Common Framework for Integrating the Perspectives of Business Ethics and Sustainability Science

The idea of understanding the interaction between society, economy, and the natural environment by drawing on the metaphor of metabolism originates in the work of Marx (Böhm et al., 2012; Clark & York, 2005; Foster, 1999). In pre-capitalist society, the metabolic relationship between nature and society was balanced, with society consuming resources from the natural environment and returning essential nutrients to the soil, thus operating within a safe and just space for humanity within planetary boundaries. The emergence of capitalist agriculture entailed the transfer of these nutrients to urban areas where they ended up as waste (Clark & York, 2005; Foster, 1999), and the resulting nutrient loss caused a “rift” in the natural conditions of reproduction (Böhm et al., 2012). The adoption of increasingly intensive methods of agriculture followed as the depletion of nutrients reduced the productive capacity of the soil, further exacerbating rather than solving the rift (Clark & York, 2005; Foster, 1999). Drawing on metabolism as a metaphor for the capacity of society to reproduce itself, Marx theorised that human interchange with the natural environment under capitalism would deepen and extend this rift over time (Clark & York, 2005; Foster, 1999). In essence, the theory of metabolic rift argues that capitalist production builds on an exploitation of resources, transforms raw materials into pollution and waste, and, by interrupting natural processes, undermines the capacity of the natural environment to support life on earth. Thus, the theory of metabolic rift explains the ways in which society interacts with the natural environment in increasingly unsustainable ways (Clark & York, 2005; Foster & Clark, 2020).

In this commentary, we use the theory of metabolic rift as a framework for integrating the level of the business firm and the macro level of the economy, and for connecting economic processes with environmental dynamics. With respect to the former, scholars emphasise perpetual growth on the level of the economy and the continuous pursuit of profit on the firm level as core organizing principles of capitalism (Clark & York, 2005). With respect to the latter, it is shown that capitalism can only operate through a continuous exploitation of the natural environment, thus creating a rift in the metabolic relationship between society and the natural environment. In sum, the theory of metabolic rift provides a common framework for analysing how the interaction of firm-level factors and systemic conditions results in the crossing of Earth system boundaries (Foster, 2013, 2020). By providing connecting points between the firm level, the systems level of capitalism, and the natural environment, it can serve as a foundation for exploring how efforts to prevent the destruction of the natural environment under capitalism are constrained at the firm level.

Explaining the Role of Business in the Metabolic Rift Through the Loop of Unsustainability

In order to better understand the role of business in the metabolic rift, we bring together insights from system-oriented sustainability science, ecological economics, and critical economic theory. We connect these insights through the central contradiction in metabolic rift theory, that capitalist expansion depends on drawing more resources from the natural environment at the same time as capitalism depletes and pollutes the natural environment (Clark & York, 2005, 2008). Specifically, we refer to the claim that both the continuous maximisation of profits on the level of the business firm and perpetual economic growth on the level of society require the exploitation and subsequent waste of resources which results in the degradation of the environment (Foster & Clark, 2020).

Given the centrality of both the principle of profit maximisation and the principle of perpetual economic growth as causes of the metabolic rift, we need to better understand and problematise the role that these principles play for businesses. In the following, we therefore explore the persistence of the principles of maximising profit and maintaining economic growth, which in turn will help explain the influence of individual business on the deepening of the metabolic rift. We argue that the principles of profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth are stabilised in normative, cognitive and material respect (see the left side of Table 1), which explains the persistence of these principles. We then show that the mutually reinforcing relationship between these two principles (see the right side of Table 1) serves as an additional stabilising factor. The persistence of the principles of profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth explains the inability of firms to avoid complicity in the metabolic rift, and the mutually reinforcing relationship between the two principles implies that revising only one of the two principles is unlikely to be sufficient for addressing the metabolic rift and attaining Earth system justice.

Table 1 How the organizing principles of maintaining economic growth and maximising profit are stabilised and how they reinforce each other in the current loop of unsustainability
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The principle of profit maximisation derives its normative stability from its centrality in mainstream economics. Early thinkers in classical economic theory such as Adam Smith argued that the maximisation of operational profit would result in maximal social welfare (Smith, 1776). The conviction that this mechanism is universally valid permeates both theory (in economics, business administration and political science) and practice. Generating or maximising profit is generally regarded as a central principle in corporations (Mair & Rathert, 2019). In cognitive respect, the conviction that maximising profit is the sole or main purpose of a business and may even be a business manager’s legal responsibility (Stout, 2012; Wade & Griffiths, 2022) serves as a source of stability for the principle of profit maximisation. In a material sense, businesses have no choice but to follow the logic of profit maximisation, given that profitability is the primary condition for the survival of business firms in contemporary competitive capitalist markets. Different types of organizations are exposed to profit pressures in different ways. Corporations, for instance, are subject to material pressures to maximise profits via the price of shares bought and sold in financial markets (Davis, 2021). Although material pressures in other forms of business such as family-owned firms or social enterprises may vary in intensity, normative and cognitive pressures remain. This is perhaps best illustrated with the phenomenon of mission drift in social enterprises, where organizations that initially focus on social objectives progressively adopt financial objectives at the expense of their initial social objectives (Cornforth, 2014). That is, in contemporary capitalism business firms seem to be under a continuous pressure to generate and even maximise profits.

The principle of perpetual economic growth with GDP as a core measure has become a hegemonic idea in Western societies, anchored both in material practices and discourses (Schmelzer, 2016). As a result, in contemporary societies, most actors in the political and economic spheres share a commitment to growth. All these actors are “united by the normative belief that growth serves the common good” (Ferguson, 2018, p. 102). Economic growth is the cornerstone of the governmental policies and political agendas of almost all parties across the political spectrum. Besides these normative and cognitive sources, the pursuit of economic growth currently derives its stability from its role as the unquestioned material basis of contemporary global society. Funding for education, pension systems, and infrastructure all rely heavily on continued economic growth. Therefore, due to a fear of social and political instability, nation states are subject to a “growth imperative” (Richters & Siemoneit, 2019; see also Binswanger, 2013; Schmelzer, 2016).

In addition to their individual perseverance, we argue that profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth are stabilised through a relationship of mutual reinforcement. In line with the social mechanisms approach in social science (see, e.g. Bunge, 1997) which aims at explaining social phenomena through underlying causal mechanisms, we regard this relationship as a self-reinforcing feedback loop and therefore call it the loop of unsustainability (see the right side of Table 1). In essence, this loop explains why “limitless rewards drive limitless growth, which in turn underwrites limitless rewards” (as described by Streeck, 2011, p. 148, in his critical analysis of the dynamics of capitalism). Conceptualising the relationship between profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth as a feedback loop helps understand both the stability of these principles and the difficulty of decoupling them which would be necessary to avoid a deepening of the metabolic rift. Profits and economic growth are intertwined through investment, as profits are typically either reinvested in productive capacity within the same firm or returned to the owners to invest in other firms (Davis, 2009). Economic growth has long been acknowledged as a driver for firms to continuously increase profit (Marx, 1962). Within a growing economy “owners of capital are propelled to accumulate wealth” (Kallis et al., 2018, p. 300). That is, the growth imperative requires steady capital accumulation, which in turn gives rise to a constant search for profit. If companies fail to engage in continuous profit seeking, the economy will shrink and a crisis will ensue (Binswanger, 2013).

Some previous studies have contested the nature of this close connection between profit and economic growth. For example, Lawn (2005) posited that profit maximisation could but does not necessarily have a positive effect on economic growth. Jackson and Victor (2015) accepted that this connection exists but argued that it is indirect. They argued that profit maximisation on the firm level leads to mass unemployment due to productivity gains and that this can only be avoided by perpetual economic growth. However, even if a strict causal relationship between profit and economic growth is contested, there is evidence for a mutually reinforcing relationship between profit seeking by individual firms and economic growth which, in addition to the individual perseverance of both principles, serves as an important stabilising factor for these principles—and for their negative impact on the natural environment.

The loop of unsustainability explains the perseverance of the principles of profit maximisation and perpetual economic growth. Specifically, the loop of unsustainability explains how business firms in a capitalist system are bound to pursue profit, sustaining the link between profit and economic growth, and, in turn, undermine the capacity of the natural environment to support human life. There is considerable evidence that both elements of the loop of unsustainability are among the major causes of the metabolic rift, pushing humanity beyond a safe and just operating space beyond planetary boundaries. Multiple environmental problems that humanity faces are positively correlated with increases in production—which are a precondition for maximising profits—and economic growth (Steffen et al., 2015). Even if these correlations are not treated as evidence for a causal connection, there is broad agreement that, overall, economic activity is a driver of the current destructive environmental dynamics (Angus, 2016; Göpel, 2016; Malm, 2016; Steffen et al., 2015). On the macro-economic level, economic growth has been identified as the root cause of climate change (Canadell et al., 2007; Knight & Schor, 2014; Parrique et al., 2019). On the level of the business firm, the increasing production of goods, services (Davis & Caldeira, 2010) and energy (von Stechow et al., 2016) are directly related to CO2 emissions. More generally, profit seeking has been shown to cause various negative effects on the natural environment (Clark & York, 2005; Wright & Nyberg, 2017), for instance through increased resource extraction and expanding consumption (Hinton, 2020). In Fig. 1, we summarise our argumentation above, contrasting the metabolic rift caused by the loop of unsustainability (dotted circle and arrows) with a balanced nature-society metabolism within a safe and just operating space for humanity (solid circle and arrows).

Fig. 1
figure 1

Contrasting a balanced nature-society metabolism within a just and safe operating space for humanity with the metabolic rift caused by the loop of unsustainability beyond a just and safe operating space for humanity

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Implications of Our Argument

We believe that business ethics research can make an important contribution to Earth system justice. Researchers increasingly acknowledge the relevance of profit seeking behaviour of business as a main cause of the crossing of Earth system boundaries, and also highlight overcoming the current fixation on economic growth as a precondition for bringing society back on a sustainable trajectory (see, e.g. Johnsen et al., 2017). For instance, Chertkovskaya and Paulsson (2021) provide a detailed analysis of how the pursuit of profit results in ecological crisis. These authors present de-growth as a solution to this problem, and convincingly argue for simultaneous reform on the firm and system level in order to counter the destructive nature of corporations and mend the metabolic rift (Chertkovskaya & Paulsson, 2021, p. 416).

Hinton and Macluran (2017) go one step further in this direction, and indicate that there is a systemic relationship between profit and growth. They claim that “[t]he extractive nature of the for-profit system requires an ever-growing economy” (Hinton & Macluran, 2017, p. 148). Hinton and Macluran suggest that an economic system composed of not-for-profit firms would not require perpetual growth.

We agree with these views, and complement them with the argumentation above, in which we unpack the systemic dynamics that make businesses central causal agents of the metabolic rift. We show that both the principle of profit maximisation and the principle of perpetual economic growth are persistent due to their stabilisation in normative, cognitive, and material respect. In addition, these principles and therefore their negative impact on the Earth system are stabilised through a relationship of reciprocal reinforcement within the loop of unsustainability. These multiple forms of stabilisation make it difficult for actors to conceptualise alternatives to capitalism and its core organizing principles, which is a precondition for mending the metabolic rift (Clark & York, 2005). As business practices are largely shaped by the principle of profit maximisation, businesses continuously reinforce the loop of unsustainability, thus precluding the possibility of sustained change in business practices and societal dynamics. For business firms, this means that voluntary attempts to limit the problematic role of business in Earth system dynamics are severely limited by a multiplicity of constraints, and that these constraints cannot be avoided within capitalism and its fixation on perpetual economic growth. For business ethics research, these considerations imply that in order to understand the capacity of firms to contribute to Earth system justice, it is not sufficient to focus on the firm level exclusively. Instead, a careful analysis of the entanglement of firms with system-level dynamics is essential.

For system-oriented sustainability science, our argumentation above implies that in the quest for sustainable forms of organizing society within Earth system boundaries, it is essential to explicitly consider the level of the business firm, which is largely treated as a black box in the overarching part of current research. While the system-oriented literatures that we have drawn on are crucial for understanding the role of business in Earth system dynamics, they either overlook the role of business and focus on technical and macro-economic considerations (see, e.g. Rockström et al., 2023) or are vague about the specific implications of a transition towards a more sustainable society for business. For example, Geels et al., (2017, p. 1234) argue that supporting businesses is essential for “deep decarbonisation” and dependent on low-carbon market opportunities. However, the authors neither analyse nor problematise the role of business in sufficient detail, even though the business firm is a central actor in the dynamics that lead to imbalances in the Earth system and impede the attainment of Earth system justice. More generally, even in studies that acknowledge the central role of the economic system in achieving societal sustainability (see, e.g. Göpel, 2016), the implications for the level of the business firm are neglected.

Research in sustainability science that explicitly focuses on the relationship between profit and unsustainability (Hinton, 2020) suggests that certain business models, even if they are for-profit, might contribute to the emergence of a post-growth society which avoids the negative implications of economic growth on the natural environment. Our argumentation suggests that a more fundamental re-thinking of the role of profit in different business models is a necessary step towards a post-growth economy, and thus towards Earth system justice. However, overcoming the fixation on profits on the level of the business firm is unlikely to be successful in the absence of a renunciation of the growth paradigm on the level of society, which continuously pushes business firms towards a focus on profit maximisation, continuously deepening the metabolic rift and forestalling Earth system justice. That is, we believe that simultaneous changes on the firm level and on the societal level are essential in order to attain Earth system justice.

Avenues for Business Ethics Research

There is an increasing number of calls in sustainability science for a fundamental transformation of society to prevent crossing Earth system boundaries and attain Earth system justice. In contrast to these calls, research in business ethics and neighbouring disciplines largely takes for granted the current forms of organizing firms and society, which continuously deepen the metabolic rift and are therefore a threat to Earth system justice. In order to contribute to Earth system justice, business ethics research should contribute to a transformation of current forms or organizing, both on the level of the business firm, but also on the level of society. As argued in this commentary, renouncing the principle of profit maximisation on the level of the firm and overcoming the principle of perpetual economic growth on the societal level are central and complementary elements of such a transformation.

While it is beyond the scope of this commentary to sketch how a post-growth society conducive to Earth system justice might look, current research suggests several essential building blocks that can inspire business ethics researchers in the quest for a new role of business in a post-growth society. A post-growth economy is likely to be focussed on values other than productivity (Schmelzer et al., 2021). It is likely to be more democratic (Kallis et al., 2018). And a post-growth economy is likely to be diverse, encompassing different forms of economic organization (Banerjee et al., 2021). We believe that business ethics research is most suited to contribute to the quest for such diverse forms of organizing firms. Extant research on alternative forms of organizing firms highlights three features that distinguish more sustainable forms of business from traditional profit-oriented business models (see Luyckx et al., 2022 for an overview): purpose, participation, and ownership. While alternative approaches to participation and ownership “do not necessarily entail a degrowth agenda” (Banerjee et al., 2021, p. 346), these features might guide future research on post-growth firms that can escape the loop of unsustainability.

First, with respect to purpose, the majority of current research (see, e.g. Battilana et al., 2022) does not fundamentally problematise the role of profit as a primary purpose of business, but rather argues for the consideration of social and environmental purpose in addition to profit. We believe that business ethics research needs to explicitly explore and problematise the role of profit seeking behaviour in business as a main driver of the metabolic rift. While there is increasing realisation that the pursuit of profit is a source of environmental crisis (Hinton, 2021; Yu et al., 2023), the majority of research still takes the profit motive for granted. As argued in this commentary, firm-level attempts to maximise profit are among the main causes of the metabolic rift. This implies that, in order to understand the role that business might play for attaining Earth system justice, a much more fine-grained understanding of the role of profit in business firms is necessary: how do profit considerations permeate organizational decision processes? How do such processes result in unsustainable choices? Is there a sustainable level of profits (see Hinton, 2021 for important first steps in this direction)?

Second, and in line with recent calls for a democratic organization of a post-growth society, business ethics researchers might join the emergent movement that calls for a democratisation of work and organizations (Ferreras et al., 2022) and explore democratic forms of decision-making within business firms. While some researchers in the field of business ethics have started to explore the connections between democracy and firms’ impact on the natural environment (see, e.g. Barthold & Bloom, 2020), many questions remain open. How to transform the inherently undemocratic decision processes within existing firms? What specific forms of intra-organizational democracy are conducive to sustainability? How to integrate firm-external stakeholders into organizational decision processes to attain Earth system justice?

Third, research on post-growth argues that current patterns of firm ownership are among the causes of many ecological and social problems (see, e.g. Hinton, 2021; Schmelzer et al., 2021). Socialised ownership of firms might increase the accountability of firms vis-á-vis society (Adler, 2022). Business ethics researchers might turn their attention to different forms of firm ownership, e.g. by families, cooperatives, and communities (Pansera & Fressoli, 2021) in order to explore how these enable different forms of participation and a purpose beyond profit.

In sum, we believe that business ethics research can and should address the questions above, and investigate their relevance in connection to business firms’ complicity in the metabolic rift, in order to support the re-design of business firms for a post-growth society. In doing so, it can serve as an essential complement to the system-oriented quest for organizing society and economy within the boundaries of the Earth system in order to attain Earth system justice.