“The seeds we grow will always need people to water them”: A study of strong sustainability management in an energy cooperative

Abstract

This article examines an organization’s attempts to manage strong sustainability with management control devices – i.e., indicators, budgets, and tools for reporting, deliberating, and decision-making. Our study is based on interviews and non-participant observations conducted in a cooperative engaged in sustainable energy production. We show that the cooperative faces difficulties pursuing its conflicting objectives when using management control devices to manage its strong sustainability activity. In particular, its management is hampered by the difficulty of articulating economic growth with the energy restraint needed to minimize its environmental impact. Our results provide an empirical illustration of bricolage attempts to adapt control devices in order to (1) translate the raison d’être of a strong sustainability activity into practice, and (2) represent and (3) deliberate on the resulting short- and long-term consequences. We explore the consequences of imperfect and layered control devices on the management of strong sustainability. Our study makes an original contribution by highlighting the situations and challenges faced by militant and engaged actors in their attempts to support a more sustainable type of development.