1st Edition

A New Psychology for Sustainability Leadership The Hidden Power of Ecological Worldviews

By Steve Schein Copyright 2015
    244 Pages
    by Routledge

    244 Pages
    by Routledge

    During the last decade, the sustainability position in multinational corporations has grown in influence. Much literature has explored how corporations can play an important role in solving the environmental challenges facing the planet. However, until now, there has been little research on sustainability leadership at the individual level. In this book, Schein explores the deeper psychological motivations of sustainability leaders.

    He shows how these motivations relate to overall effectiveness and capacity to lead transformational change and he explores the ways in which the complexity of sustainability is driving new approaches to leadership.Drawing on interviews with 75 leaders from over 40 multinational corporations and NGOs, Schein explores how ecological worldviews are developed and expressed in global sustainability practice. By applying key theories from developmental psychology, integral ecology and eco-psychology to sustainability practice, Schein encourages us to think about leadership in a different way.

    A New Psychology for Sustainability Leadership will be of interest to an interdisciplinary audience of social scientists, educators, corporate executives, and social entrepreneurs. The insights from this book can be usefully integrated into leadership curriculum and development programs to help the next generation of leaders respond to global challenges.

    Part 1: Introduction

    1. Ecologically awake

    2. The limits of “sustainability”

    Part 2: Exploring the corporate eco-psyche

    3. Perspectives on ecological worldviews

    4. Life experiences that shape ecological worldviews

    5. Anthropocentric blindness

    6. The ecological self

    7. Expressions of ecocentricism and ecological self in the corporate world

    Part 3: How sustainability leaders think

    8. Interior dimensions of leadership

    9. Human development

    10. Expressions of post-conventional worldviews

    Part 4: The future of sustainability leadership

    11. The collaborator-in-chief (with an ecologicalworldview)

    12. Cultivating a new psychology for sustainability leadership

    13. Multinational executives as human trim tabs

    Appendix A: Ecological Sustainability Worldview Assessment Tool (E-SWAT)

    Appendix B: Research methodology and description of participants

    Biography

    Steve Schein