Triple Bottom Line toward a Holistic Framework for Sustainability: A Systematic Review

Triple Bottom Line em Direção a um Quadro Holístico para a Sustentabilidade: Uma Revisão Sistemática

Vittoria Loviscek^a

Fundação Getulio Vargas, Brazil

In 1994, the concept of triple bottom line was introduced into the business world as the new sustainability taxonomy embracing new guidelines for industries to undertake and address the set of sustainable development goals (SDGs) established in the United Nations Rio+20 summit and the following Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) from 2015 on. The concept was introduced as a new challenge for businesses to include security of people and the planet in the strategic business model and to develop new instruments and taxonomies to assess the prejudices that are being caused to society and environment (Griggs et al., 2013).

In Cannibals with forks: The triple bottom line of 21st century business, Elkington (1997) postulates the 3Ps designation for people, planet, and profits as a triple goal toward true sustainability. By his definition, industries should assess the three segments when planning their strategies as all three of them are characterized by the same importance, not only accounting for the financial returns (Moneva, Archel, & Correa, 2006). To be successful in a truthful triple bottom line development, a company should consider having all three aspects with positive returns. Decreasing the level of negative outcomes is not considered by Elkington (1998) a solution to the environmental and societal problems we have been facing, as settled and established in the MDGs.

25 years after the term was coined, the author comes back analyzing the current situation and the use of the term as companies wield the approach erroneously. The win-win assumption is replaced by the constant alternative of trade-offs as either people or planet dimensions are set apart as not being as important as profit (Banerjee, 2003; Hahn, Figge, Pinkse, & Preuss, 2010). Also, it was made accountable that the academia has been using the term positively from 1998 until today, having its pick in 2017 and 2018, considering it still an up-to-date approach for sustainable development.

On the other side of the coin, companies have found its use troublesome as a reporting tool, as in the problem of measuring and labeling the impacts of non-financial repercussion in reports (Norman & MacDonald, 2004), enhancing its use as a legitimate solution to the government and public pressures (Moneva et al., 2006; Sridhar, 2012).

In that regard, this paper depicts a literature review of the triple bottom line concept, its underlying assumptions, and its association to other sustainability concepts along these 25 years in the research field since its formulation, considering an operations management and sustainability literature focus. With this aim, the purpose of the study is to verify the use of the framework in the sustainable operations area, whether its use has increased or decreased in the last few years, and its association to other capabilities and/or sustainability concepts that might be necessary to be applied for a successful real case scenario.

The first part of the study consists of an overview of the main concepts of TBL, going back to its origins, reassessing the importance Elkington was trying to convey and highlighting concepts that Elkington considered essential for the framework. Following, the methods include a thorough review of two noted databases, considering main journals of the area, cross-citations, and topics-objectives of the considered researches. The main steps for literature review, extraction, and selection will be detailed in this section. The third part presents the evidence found during the analysis, providing an up-to-date glance at how the academia represents the term positively against its own author’s contradiction considering it a downfall.

The results express still an indiscriminate acknowledgement of the TBL, resulting in a general acceptance of the approach, notwithstanding the intentions its author was trying to fulfill delivering the framework, which rely on having positive returns in all three aspects. We finally propose and highlight the urgency of developing a holistic framework, with the purpose of including emerging elements and concepts identified during the review. The conclusion is set to reevaluate the TBL stating points and initial associated concepts to what is expected after 25 years of development, and propose some guidelines for future researches, considering new capabilities and business models depending on the area of influence, expressing the values and benefits that the framework could grant.

This methodology was useful to achieve the results as it considers an extensive reference related to the field and allows connections and positioning among sources, identifying new problems and literature gaps that need attention (Finn, 2005). The main motivation of this study considers a topic that needs explanation and a deeper generation of understanding, rationalizing the significance of a potential framework of sustainability in the operations field. As regarded, the sustainability area in relation to operations management literature and theories is still scarce, and a holistic framework in the field is even rarer. Despite an increased interest in TBL, very few studies have been conducted criticizing its applicability and reliability.

Dating back from 1997, Elkington’s concept has been constantly applied and reformulated in several contexts. In the next sections, it is first presented the original formulation of the concept and its desired objectives, representing the historical background. Next, the second part proposes the current context, new developments of the concept, and the author’s reading 25 years after the term was coined.

In order to provide evidence for the development of the triple bottom line concept, this paper presents a look at how academic articles are using the concept. To this end, this study proposes a literature review based only on the framework introduced by Elkington.

Literature review is an important step for allowing a broad understanding of a concept and to start a research toward an unnoticed problem that needs attention. It also promotes the possibility for new knowledge creation, frameworks and theory development, and open suggestions for future researches (Meredith, 1993). The data collection and selection were conducted following three main steps of identification, screening (selection and extraction), and evaluation (Agrawal, Singh, & Murtaza, 2015; Reim Parida, & Örtqvist, 2015), but also considering the four-phase flow diagram as a guideline for a more vigorous analysis (Moher, Liberati, Tetzlaff, Altman, & The Prisma Group, 2009).

The first step, identification, was made including the title “triple bottom line” in two bibliographical databases, Scopus and Web of Science, which are two main databases that cover big amounts of titles and publishers, peer-reviewed journals in top-level subject fields, are easy to navigate and provide an in-depth coverage, both multidisciplinary and time-spanning (Burnham, 2006). The purpose was finding literature related to our topic. The research tracked a total of 220 articles in the database Web of Science, and 355 in the database Scopus, spanning from 1998-1999 until 2019. Even supposing that the choice of only including researches with the TBL appearing solely in the title might be superfluous, it was later noticed (in the following step) that even in the articles with these characteristics, the concept of TBL was not a central topic, these studies being, therefore, irrelevant to our aim.

The second step, screening, consists on selecting the articles we are going to analyze, which target the literature of TBL, and eliminating the ones that only invoked the TBL as a brief mention, or as a secondary topic. At this point, we inspected the abstracts, keywords and, if we still dubious about the relevance of the article, intensified the analysis reading through the literature bases. Since the focus was still too vast, we decided to include a keyword for the research: “triple bottom line” (title), and “literature” (title, abstract, keywords). The outcome resulted in 35 articles for Web of Science and 49 articles for Scopus.

In the third step, evaluation, we focused on the articles with strong or direct links to TBL. As Bolderston (2008)suggests, we speculated on whether the article relates to the focus proposed by this literature review, if the scope of the article included the TBL concept, and if the literature in the article fairly relates to TBL. The focus was directed to: (a) the development of the framework and its association with other sustainability concepts and capabilities; (b) literature updates; and (c) positioning for or against the concept. Figure 1 presents a representation of the data collection and analysis phases.

Figure 1
Flow chart of phases for selecting articles.
Source: elaborated by the author.

In the following section, we discuss the results obtained from the analyses of the 84 articles from Scopus and Web of Science, present a framework for the study, and discuss a research gap that gives possibilities for the development of a future holistic framework.

To verify our purpose on whether the concept of TBL has been in use along 25 years of studies, if the framework has been considered relevant and useful in the sustainable operations literature, we count on the selected articles to shed some light on state-of-the-art studies on TBL and consider some factors that have been included in the sustainability literature along the years. Figure 2 presents the framework of the study, how it was conducted and its logical reasoning. The analysis is based on the frequency of publications by year in each database and a qualitative overview of how authors are evaluating Elkington’s concept throughout the years. The results will clarify the current gaps and future directions for research.

Figure 2
Framework of the study.
Source: elaborated by the author.

Considering the frequency of publications, results, and evidence brought from the selected articles, and contradicting Elkington’s observation about his own concept, TBL has not been losing credibility along the years, considering the overwhelming acceptance of the TBL with an increase of publications from 2015 to 2019 in both databases (Figure 3). This evaluation was made considering the first phase of data identification. It is set to consider all articles in the area of operations management and sustainability that mention the TBL, even if it is not a central point to the discussion. The following qualitative overview relies on the 84 articles selected after the screening process.

Figure 3
Frequency of triple bottom line in publications by year.
Source: elaborated by the author. Collected in November 8, 2019.

Besides the frequency of occurrences, TBL is also relevant in theoretical discussions on sustainability. Svensson et al. (2016; 2018) have conducted two literature reviews about sustainability framing the triple bottom line approach in 2016 and 2018, respectively. From their studies, it was possible to notice that there is a strong association between the TBL and other business sustainability efforts involving either one or two of the bottom lines (Svensson et al., 2016). It seems hard to separate the framework from other sustainability strategies and approaches, and the concept was considered as an enhancement of other sustainability efforts, concurrently incrementing the shareholder value stimulating a competitive advantage (Svensson et al., 2016).

Figure 4 reflects the main journals that have been publishing most articles about TBL along the years. It is possible to notice that the concept has been addressed by top journals of different areas, since the framework can (and must) be applied to all business segments, even so still directing the focus to sustainable operations management. The journals in Figure 4 represent the ones with most publications since a total of 118 journals have been publishing one or more articles about TBL. The data suggests that, after 25 years, it is still a hot topic and useful theoretical framework, conveying reliability and validity to the subject of sustainability.

Figure 4
Documents framing triple bottom line and sustainability.
Source: Scopus database. Collected in November 8, 2019.

Aiming to investigate if scholars have been evaluating TBL positively or negatively throughout the years, we analyzed articles from two perspectives: (a) development of the initial TBL paradigm; and (b) shifting of TBL paradigms in sustainability discussions, as we depict in the next lines.

Triple bottom line as a paradigm for sustainable development

TBL was used as a sustainability paradigm in operations management and a classification system for research of sustainable supply chain management. As Winter and Knemeyer (2013) pointed in their literature review, the concept has gained suggestive preeminence in research, but it is also worrisome how the term has been used controversially to denote only the economic and either the social or the environmental bottom line, despite Elkington holistic-based idea. Also, Walker, Seuring, Sarkis, and Klassen (2014) perceived from their review that the majority of sustainable supply chain management researches from 2002 to 2014 did not mention the social bottom line. Table 1, below, presents a few statements that reinforce this view (chronologically).

Table 1
Criticism for the misinterpretation of triple bottom line concept.

Note.

A sustainable development is a phenomenon involving all aspects of human activities, encompassing the triple bottom line and considering the system and the chain’s performance as an integrative process (Montabon, Pagell, & Wu, 2016). The problem we are facing nowadays is described by Beck (1992) as a lack of institutions to control and limit the negative impacts that industries and human activities are causing to the environment and the society. There is no legitimate body higher that the main government to demand conformity to environmental and societal requirements, as at the same time, there is no metrics or general standards to impose positive returns along the supply chain (Montabon et al., 2016). These considerations relate to the need for some type of theoretical inclusion in the framework to enable its progress and hope to be considered as a holistic method for sustainable development.

The concept of triple bottom line has been gaining attention along the sustainability business path for sustainable development, even if mentioned inappropriately, not attending all the bottom lines proposed by the author. The paper considered a first overview of the framework, its association to other capabilities and/or strategies to implement to reach sustainable development, its use in academic researches, and its implementation in business models, investigating its propriety and usefulness. The reality of nowadays does not leave any more space to set one or more negative impacts aside, and encompassing the TBL as part of the corporate strategy to run managerial operations has become and imperative, not only due to the growing pressures imposed by society but also to the uncertainties related to the stakeholders’ heterogeneity and aggravating environmental situations we are facing (Høgevold & Svensson, 2012; Schaltegger & Buritt, 2010).

Through the analysis, it was possible to notice that the concept of TBL has not lost its importance since its development; on the contrary, it has been a much-considered topic having its zenith in the last five years. It has been denoted repeatedly in an unmannered way, contradicting Elkington disappointment as the framework has been used erroneously, considering two and not all three of the bottom lines. The literature of sustainable operations recognizes the principles of reaching win-win approaches and coopetition posed by the concept. The main problem of the framework not evolving into practice and obtaining positive results is an indicator signaling the need for other conditions or characteristics that could promote implementation.

It was possible to understand that to reach development in three different dimensions, an additional capability approach should be included in the framework. There is a necessity to implement different capabilities to a general context framework, each associated with its area of interest. This means that if my objectives are to solve problems related to the social sphere, I would need to investigate which capabilities and strategies are associated with the social area that, if implemented in the TBL framework, can help me reach a sustainable environment.

The qualitative overview helped identifying, in the operations management and sustainability literature of these past two decades, the necessary ingredients to be added to the model: integration with stakeholders, transparency, and a strategic and cultural change. For these reasons, the concept of triple bottom line and the literature of sustainable operations management still lack theories, models, and frameworks for the development of win-win business models, design of supply networks, and strategic initiatives.

There is a need for future researches involving quantitative methods, investigating how these capabilities can be implemented in the framework successfully, with the subsequent result of a theory building that finally considers all TBL dimensions (Svensson et al., 2016). Eskandarpour, Dejax, Miemczyk, and Péton (2015) also consider the urgency to involve the social bottom line to the equation to formulate multi-purpose models that consider all the aspects previously discussed: risk assessment, transparency, strategy and culture.

This study contributes to clarify the state-of-the-art of the TBL concept and to shed some light on the need for future research and how to implement a holistic framework to fulfill sustainable development in all the three elements conjointly, extending the current knowledge and structure of sustainability of supply chain management. It is set to take a step forward, with the intention of guiding future studies and assessing elements and characteristics that can help make the transition needed to attend the three spheres.