The Handbook of Ethical Purchasing

Principles and Practice

Rob Harrison

• Editorial: Routledge
• Año: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000456592
• Edición: 1
• Categoría: Business
• Categoría: Etica aziendale

From boycotts of plastics and palm oil by consumers, to the tracking of carbon footprints and modern slavery in their supply chains by businesses, buying ethically has now fully captured the public interest. The Handbook of Ethical Purchasing is designed to help both ordinary people and industry professionals to understand this new movement, its political background and, most importantly, how to become involved more effectively

By looking in turn at sustainable supply chain management by companies, green public procurement by governments, and the ethical choices made by consumers, this book operates as a practical handbook for people across all industries and sectors to become involved in the important changes that need to be made. It provides the key principles, language, and techniques that companies, campaigners, certification schemes, and regulators are beginning to use to address the moral, practical, and political problems that commonly occur in this transition to more ethical economies.

Written by a leading authority on ethical consumption, Rob Harrison, the book provides the reader with the tools to operate with confidence and effectiveness in an easy-to-access format. It also provides a useful structure to understand this new subject area for students of marketing, supply chain management, and business studies generally.

1

Understanding the basic principles

DOI: 10.4324/9781003200185-1

1.1 The language of ethics has evolved to look at good, or right or moral choices

Ethics is a word used to describe that area of human activity whereby moral or good or right choices are discussed. Ethics has a long history of serious study from Greek philosophers such as Aristotle to modern ethicists such as Professor Peter Singer – an Australian proponent of the idea that animals should have rights.

Although it is taught as a subject in many universities, it is not normally covered in schools, and is not therefore a word which many people use with much confidence. This applies equally to teenagers out shopping on Saturday and chief executives of multinational oil companies.

Nevertheless, most people’s lives – when examined in detail – contain many discussions and assumptions about ethical or moral choices both within and outside markets. Most people act ethically sometimes without even thinking of it as ethical: when they are kind to neighbours, for example, or when they hold a door open for someone carrying a baby.

The notion of ethics, though, generally focuses on the question of how humans should live together, and therefore concerns itself with ideas of ‘civil society’ or ‘community’ or of the ‘common good’. Ethical choices are, therefore, normally those that consider the impact of our decisions not only on ourselves but also on other people around us.

1.1.1 It covers both religious and political ideas of what is good

Ethics is a very broad subject area which includes discussion of religious rules, such as you shall not kill, as well as political propositions, such as richer people should pay more tax to help people who don’t have enough. Although some political and religious conversations may concern ethics, not all will do. ‘Vote for me because I’ll make you richer’ is not normally seen as an ethical proposition, whereas the statement ‘vote for me because I support free universal healthcare’ is more likely to be an ethically motivated statement.

1.1.2 What is ethical isn’t always agreed by everyone

It is useful to recognise that from a sociological point of view, we can be observed as often having different ethical standpoints. Some people, for example, think that eating animals is wrong, whilst others do not. Some people think that building nuclear weapons is wrong. Other people think that it’s a necessary activity in a dangerous world. In most complex societies, we have learned to rub along with people with different ethical standpoints most of the time.

Ethical discussions can also get tricky in the real world because when we think we agree, we might not. Is unethical child labour anyone working under 16 years of age or 15 (as it is in some countries)? Are children working at weekends on family farms OK? If it is safe?

1.1.3 There are some areas however where there is quite a lot of agreement

In most societies, core areas of ethical agreement exist. Killing humans for personal gain, for example, is normally outlawed. In addition, purchasing, because it is commonly concerned with manufactured goods, also tends to have core areas of ethical agreement around manufacturing processes. A majority of people in all societies, for example, agree that factories should not poison local rivers with effluent or employ children on a full-time basis. The notion of ‘socially responsible business behaviour’ has emerged in this space to try to specifically understand some elements of business ethics. Many companies have claimed to be socially responsible when it is obvious to most people that they are not. This has not helped the credibility of the idea of socially responsible business much, and we cover this and the idea of greenwash in more detail in Section 2.3.1 and elsewhere.

Some philosophers have suggested that globalisation has brought with it some emerging global ethical values. The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals – which include eradicating hunger and providing universal primary education – are an example of this kind of emergence. These appear with some other broad ethical frameworks in Appendix 1.

We also look at other general principles such as ‘do no harm’ in Section 7.1.3 and elsewhere.

1.2 Purchasing is a word which can be used for both big and small economic actors

Purchasing is a word used to describe the exchange of money for a product or service. The word purchasing, used in its broadest sense, can cover everything from the buying of a packet of sweets by a child at the corner shop to the ‘procurement’ of a road-building programme by a government with all its attendant rules and temptations for corruption.

1.2.1 Purchasing is increasing because of economic growth and the current popularity of markets

The encroachment and refinement of market ideas on ever-broader areas of society mean that a wider range of goods and services can be purchased than previously. For example, private home care visits for elderly relatives and a range of on-line educational choices are two of many such recent innovations. Marxists, who tend to quite like long words, call this process commodification.

In addition, economic growth, globalisation of markets, and rising incomes also mean that quantitatively more people are buying many more things than they might have done just 40 years ago. In China, for example, the idea of choice in markets has gone from an unacceptable bourgeoisie fixation to an idealised collective goal.

We also look at the increase in purchasing by multinational corporations across national borders in Chapter 4.

1.3 Ethical purchasing is an observable phenomenon

Whatever we think of it, ethical purchasing is something which we can observe taking place around us in the 21st century. People are buying free-range eggs, Fairtrade coffees and organic juices in the UK, for example. There was a big increase in this type of activity in the last two decades of the 20th century in Western Europe and North America particularly (see Chapter 2).

1.3.1 It can be observed being practised by a wide range of actors

Looking at the wider phenomenon of ‘ethical purchasing’ allows this book to explain that it is not something that just individuals do. Ethical purchasing can be observed in clubs, societies, businesses, charities, local authorities, governments, and even supranational institutions. Some of the complex internal developments within institutions around ethical purchasing are discussed in more detail in Chapters 4–6 and demonstrate how collective this kind of activity can be.

This book is designed to act as a useful guide to available principles for all types of economic actor.

1.3.2 In can be observed happening all around the world

For an ethical purchase to take place, all that is required is choice (more than one product to choose from) and information about ethical impacts. There are few countries which do not have these elements in at least some markets. Although the UK has probably some of the most developed ‘ethical markets’, ethical purchase activity has been identified in Hungary, Chile, Japan, Australia, South Africa, Canada, India, Brazil, the USA, and China, to name but ten.

1.3.3 Ethical purchasers are looking at ethics in addition to price and quality

One of the most common misunderstandings about ethical purchasing is that ethics is the primary concern when this kind of purchasing takes place. Although this is the case in some circumstances, in the majority of cases ethics is a third factor once information on price (what is affordable) and quality (what works) has been weighed up. This has led some misguided manufacturers to produce either very expensive ethical products or less effective ethical products, and then wonder why they are not very successful (see Section 9.3).

1.3.4 On occasions ethics has grown to become an important concern for the majority of purchasers in a market

Although at first ethical buying behaviours were marginal, they are fast becoming a mainstream concern in many markets. Buying ethically is now recognised as one of the most frequently practised political activities across Europe (after voting and petitions), and in some specific cases as many as 75% of people have become involved (Figure 1.1).

Figure 1.1 Consolidated survey data on consumer ethical buying intentions 1989–2018.

The table below uses data amalgamated from more than 100 opinion surveys from consumers around the world which ask them about their ethical buying habits. This pattern, showing a small core of activists but a majority of people occasionally active, is repeated in most countries in the world, including emerging economies such as Brazil, China, and India.

And although there are problems with the accuracy of surveys generally, in ‘mature ethical markets’ which have been around for more than ten years, we can see ethical products sometimes growing to take a majority market share. The examples most commonly used are Fairtrade bananas in Switzerland (56% of the market) and tea brands in the UK (more than 80% of sales labelled ‘ethical’ in some way). It is no longer ridiculous to suggest that in the future, most consumer markets could look something like this.

It is possible that a spectrum of this kind – with a few very ethical and a majority sometimes ethical – might also look similar if applied to companies or other institutions discussed in this book.

1.3.5 Sometimes ethical purchasing may be given different names like sustainable procurement or green shopping

Although many thousands of people now talk about ethical purchasing on a daily basis, they may use different names for it. We come across all these terms in later chapters of this book and they include political consumption (10.5.4), green procurement (4.3, 6.4), and sustainable supply chain management (4.3.1). I have chosen to use the term ethical purchasing here because it appears to cast the net most broadly. ‘Green’ sometimes just means environmental and may not look at social issues. Sustainable usually embraces both environmental and social issues these days, but rarely covers animal welfare or animal rights concerns. ‘Ethical’ can not only draw in all these areas but can also include ideas of socially responsible approaches to more financial matters like pricing, marketing, remuneration, tax payment, and political lobbying.

Section 10.5.2 discusses how language in this field is developing more generally.

1.3.6 By identifying ethical purchasing as a single phenomenon, it is possible to both study it and advocate for its wider encouragement

The purpose of this book is to describe the phenomenon of ethical purchasing and in doing so, to draw boundaries around it. Whilst there are many books on fair trade or boycotts or sustainable procurement by governments, these rarely try to situate them within what might be seen as a broader movement for economic change. It is in identifying this broader movement that the main usefulness of the idea of ethical purchasing is found.

First, it is a useful idea because the different elements can be studied together. This means that learning from one area can be carried across to another. For example, campaigners can learn that researching and publishing regular rankings of the performance of consumer brands against a certain ethical issue is a good way of driving change because it simultaneously shames the worst performers while congratulating the best (see Section 3.5).

Secon...