Pergamon S0956-5221 (96)00007-3 Scand. J. Mgmt, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 243-254, 1996 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved 0956-5221/96 $15.00 + 0.00 GREEN NEW WORLD: A CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL BUSINESS PERSPECTIVE J. P. ULHOI,* H. MADSENt and S. HILDEBRANDT* *Department of Organization & Management; tDepartment of Information Science; The Aarhus School of Business, Aarhus V, Denmark (First received December 1992; accepted in revisedform May 1994) Abstract -- Interest in the relationship between business and the environment has grown significantly during the second half of the 1980s. During the 1970s and at the start of the 1980s environmental concern was mainly confined to a narrow group of environmental and political extremists. This is no longer true, however. With leading newspapers, journals, professional associations, etc., devoting more and more attention to this important relationship, the issue of environmental concern now increasingly finds its way into the boardrooms of a growing number of corporations. This paper discusses the concept of sustainable development and attempts to place it in a corporate context, not in the form of the "ten golden rules of industrial sustainability" but in an analysis and subsequent discussion of the way mainstream economists have handled the environment to date. Special attention is given to the interdependence between Corporate Strategic Environmental and Resource Management and Total Quality Management, and, in addition, to the importance of the measuring and controlling of environmental and resource management. Due to the fact that there appears to be only very limited industrial "greening" experiences in Scandinavia, this article closes with with an outline of the present situation in Denmark where this situation is beginning to change. Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd Keywords: Corporate environmental management, CEM and TQM, measurement, monitoring, control. INTRODUCTION One of the fastest-growing problems facing international society today is that of environmental degradation. All the evidence points to the fact that the carrying capacity of the natural environment is close to breaking point. This now not only threatens to erode the possibility of future development in dynamic industries, but also seriously threatens to undermine the economic development of society as a whole. Accordingly, public concern over environmental issues is growing. Media coverage of such environmental catastrophes as the Love Canal, Three Mile Island, Bhopal, Seveso, Tjernobyl, the Sandoz Rhine pollution, and the Exxon Valdez oil spill has inflamed public opinion. Not surprisingly, there are definite signs of increasing environmental concern at all levels of society. One of the conclusions in an OECD report (1991) was to emphasize the need to "integrate environmental considerations into the formulations of business strategies--concerning research, investment, the choice of products and raw materials, siting policies -- at the earliest possible stage. If we take a closer look at the firm-environment relationship, a number of characteristic features spring to mind: there is insufficient knowledge of the toxic effects of pollutants on both people and the environment; not enough is known about the possibilities of limiting, or totally eliminating, harmful pollutants, e.g. by replacing them with environmentally friendly and 243