Journal article
A social licence to operate legitimacy test: Enhancing sustainability through contact quality
Journal of Cleaner Production, Vol.293, Article 126080
2021
Abstract
The social licence to operate is a notoriously ambiguous concept that encompasses a patent normative heterogeneity, making the emergence of a widely accepted standard capable of settling controversies on its legitimate use seem unlikely. To cope with this issue, the article builds a model (adapted from Arnstein’s ladder of public participation) to measure “contact quality,” used here as a proxy for gauging the legitimacy of the social licence to operate. This model is tested on a case study from the minerals and energy sector (Base Titanium Mine in Kenya). Our findings show that a company can move up and down on the legitimacy scale, depending on the contact quality with company stakeholders. The interest of providing a social licence heuristic is to make sense of the theoretical controversies surrounding this concept and to offer also realistic guidance to practitioners searching to understand where a firm sits on the legitimacy scale, to enhance transparency and accountability of its social licence to operate and ultimately improve business practice.
Details
- Title
- A social licence to operate legitimacy test: Enhancing sustainability through contact quality
- Authors/Creators
- M. Eabrasu (Author/Creator) - EM Normandie Business School, ParisM. Brueckner (Author/Creator) - Murdoch UniversityR. Spencer (Author/Creator) - Murdoch University
- Publication Details
- Journal of Cleaner Production, Vol.293, Article 126080
- Publisher
- Elsevier Limited
- Identifiers
- 991005540578007891
- Copyright
- © 2021 Elsevier Ltd.
- Murdoch Affiliation
- Centre for Responsible Citizenship and Sustainability
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Journal article
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- Collaboration types
- International collaboration
- Citation topics
- 6 Social Sciences
- 6.3 Management
- 6.3.385 Corporate Social Responsibility
- Web Of Science research areas
- Engineering, Environmental
- Environmental Sciences
- Green & Sustainable Science & Technology
- ESI research areas
- Engineering