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The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the development of a biodiversity reporting and evaluation framework. The application of the framework to an exemplar organisation identifies biodiversity-related annual report disclosures and analyses changes in the nature and levels of these over time. Finally, the paper aims to establish whether the disclosures made by the exemplar are consistent with a deep ecological perspective, as exemplified by New Zealand conservation legislation.

Viewing the framework developed by the paper through a deep ecological lens, the study involves a detailed content analysis of the biodiversity disclosures contained within the annual reports of a conservation organisation over a 23-year period. Using the framework developed in this paper, the biodiversity-related text units were identified and allocated to one of three major categories, 13 subcategories, and then into deep, intermediate and shallow ecology.

Biodiversity disclosures enable stakeholders to determine the goals, assess their implementation, and evaluate the performance of an organisation. Applying the framework to the exemplar revealed the majority of annual report disclosures focused on presenting performance/implementation information. The study also found that the majority of disclosures reflect a deep ecological approach. A deep/shallow ecological tension was apparent in a number of disclosures, especially those relating to the exploitation of the conservation estate.

This paper is the first to develop a framework that can be used as both a biodiversity reporting assessment tool and a reporting guide. The framework will be particularly useful for those studying reporting by conservation departments and stakeholders of organisations whose operations impact biodiversity.

To those concerned with challenges and challengers to conventional wisdom, the entirely credible perception of ours as a planet in the midst of a deep environmental crisis offers fruitful grounds for analysis. Crises stimulate those who have, in the existence of the crisis, firm proof that the wisdom which girds the status quo is deficient and/or those who apply it are. This is particularly true when the crisis is perceived to be grave and dread‐laden. Skin cancer due to the depletion of the ozone layer is on the increase. Large, at times devastating, climate changes are loose upon the planet. Whether given quasi‐ scientific names like the “greenhouse effect” or lumped together in a melange of “acid rain”, “toxic waste” and “industrial cancers”, the result is the same. Rational citizens of the everyday‐person‐on‐the‐street sort feel threatened. The threat is given shape and substance by the mass media. The environmental crisis is a credible crisis. One need not list radical political activism as one's vocation to list the environmental crisis as one of one's fears as we enter the 1990's.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the use of narratives in biodiversity reports as a mechanism to raise the awareness of biodiversity’s importance. By classifying biodiversity narratives into 14 categories of biodiversity values this paper investigates whether the explanations for biodiversity conservation used by UK local councils are line with shallow, intermediate or deep philosophies.

This study used content analysis to examine the disclosures on biodiversity’s importance in the biodiversity action plans published by UK local councils. The narratives were first identified and then allocated into 14 categories of biodiversity value. Then, they were ascribed to either shallow (resource conservation, human welfare ecology and preservationism), intermediate (environmental stewardship and moral extensionism) or deep philosophies.

UK local councils explained biodiversity’s importance mainly in terms of its instrumental value, in line with shallow philosophies such as human welfare ecology and resource conservation. UK local councils sought to raise awareness of biodiversity’ importance by highlighting values that are important for the stakeholders that are able to contribute towards biodiversity conservation such as landowners, residents, visitors, business and industries. The authors also found that local councils’ biodiversity strategies were strongly influenced by 2010, the International Year of Biodiversity.

This paper is one of the few accounting studies that engages with the literature on environmental ethics to investigate biodiversity. In line with stakeholder theory, it indicates that explanations on biodiversity’s importance based on anthropocentric philosophies are considered more effective in informing those stakeholders whose behaviour needs to be changed to improve biodiversity conservation.

The purpose of this paper is to enhance awareness and foment the concept of “eco‐citizenship” within today's students in higher education.

The paper takes the form of a literature review on environmental issues and spiritual thinking, student reports, discussion.

The paper's three main findings are: the need to develop educational methodologies that allow students to become advocates of a new society and way of thinking is insufficiently addressed so far; exposing students to such learning triggers a factual mindset change; and faculty and student engagement on matters of spirituality and environmental issues is becoming pivotal in a period where natural resource limitations in conjunction with overpopulation are stressing ecological systems to a threshold where it cannot be sustainable any further.

Further implementation of similar courses, and monitoring of students' long‐term behavioral changes are suggested to verify if such courses trigger a domino effect in terms of the emergence of the “eco‐citizen”.

This was the first time that such an educational approach was employed, where students not only critically investigated the course material in respect to environmental science and spirituality but also became facilitators to their own community, assisting in the development of good citizenship and enhancement of responsibility. It is clear to the authors that community interaction is very important in the curriculum design as the working ground to bring real world experience to the classroom as well as for the development of environmental and spiritual awareness. Based on the students' community activities and personal comments, in regard to the course focus and its effectiveness in changing their attitudes towards a more sustainable way of living, it was demonstrated that the course was successful.

This paper aims to explore how Andean knowledge and culture have shaped mountain ecosystems by building cultural landscapes where agrobiodiversity is created and recreated, water is domesticated (seeded and harvested), and where a harmonious relationship with the Earth and the Universe is kept.

Through the use of primary and secondary sources, the information is then organized detailing a synthesis of thoughts and joint research studies conducted by various authors regarding the valuable contributions made by the Andean culture.

This paper finds that strategies for facing the ecological crisis affecting planet Earth are being developed: the Pleiades and the Andean Cross continue to be observed in order to predict the weather and climate and make decisions related to traditional agricultural systems; cultural landscapes are being created and maintained; and water continues to be domesticated.

The tropical Andes of Peru would be in the third country most affected by global climate change worldwide. The severe impacts of the global phenomenon on mountain ecosystems and cultural landscapes are many, all of which are affecting food security of large human groups and traditional lifestyles of communities and farmers.

The built environment is responsible for around half of total greenhouse gas emissions and the majority of emissions are produced during building lifecycles. As such the property sector has considerable potential to reduce lifecycle emissions and can contribute in mitigating global warming. However our existing conceptual understanding of sustainability is variable to the point of being disjointed and ambiguous and this could imply our efforts to realise reductions may not reach their potential. This paper seeks to address these issues.

Adopting a qualitative paradigm, this study used published information on property company websites regarding sustainability in a content analysis to address the questions: What is the conceptual understanding of sustainability within the ten leading Australian property firms? and What is the implication of this level of conceptual understanding with regards to delivering sustainability?

There are distinct differences between the conceptual understanding of sustainability within the firms, indicating a different worldview exists across these firms. It is probable that this information is published without a conscious decision to represent a technocentric or ecocentric worldview, and as such it reflects the lack of breadth and depth of understanding in the current discourse regarding sustainable development in some property firms. Some elements of the sustainability discourse are omitted from their conceptual understanding. Academics have a responsibility and an opportunity to widen the discourse so that current and future generations are able to make informed decisions in respect of the degree of sustainability it is necessary to adopt.

The limitation of a content analysis approach is that there is no opportunity to explore the underlying reasons for what is found. Thus the researcher is unable to ascertain whether omissions regarding the discourse of sustainability issues are conscious or sub‐conscious.

There is now a growing body of work around property and sustainability. Most of this work is focused on ways in which to implement sustainability or how sustainability is being integrated in the built environment. Little work is centred on the fundamentals of sustainability and understanding of the principles and how this impacts on the degree of sustainability practiced by those firms. The underlying hypothesis is that a weak conceptual understanding will only ever deliver weak sustainability at best. Weak sustainability is insufficient to avert the project climate change outcomes forecast by the United Nations.

The future beckons … a new millennium …

The study aims to shed light on the historical and contemporary trends of biodiversity accounting literature, while simultaneously offering insights into the future of research in this sector. The paper also aims to raise awareness among accounting researchers about their role in preserving biodiversity and informing improvements in policy and practice in this area.

The Bibliometrix R-package is used to carry out an algorithmic historiography. The reference publication year spectroscopy (RPYS) methodology is implemented. It is a unique approach to bibliometric analysis that allows researchers to identify and examine historical patterns in scientific literature.

The work provides a distinct and comprehensive discussion of the four distinct periods demarcating the progression of scientific discourse regarding biodiversity accounting. These periods are identified as Origins (1767–1864), Awareness (1865–1961), Consolidation (1962–1995) and Acceleration (1996–2021). The study offers an insightful analysis of the main thematic advancements, interpretative paradigm shifts and theoretical developments that occurred during these periods.

The paper offers a significant contribution to the existing academic debate on the prospects for accounting scholars to concentrate their research efforts on biodiversity and thereby promote advancements in policy and practice in this sector.

The article represents the first example of using an algorithmic historiography approach to examine the corpus of literature dealing with biodiversity accounting. The value of this study comes from the fusion of historical methodology and perspective. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is also the first scientific investigation applying RPYS in the accounting sector.

The purpose of this conceptual‐theoretical review article is to examine two claims made by critical management studies (CMS): that CMS is emancipatory and that it has critical theory (CT) as its origin and prime theoretical base.

Two theories are contrasted: CT and CMS. The paper analyses one of CMS' newest key publications: the Oxford Handbook of Critical Management Studies in great detail focusing on epidemiology and philosophy.

The main finding is that CMS is a critical representation of mainstream MS. CT focuses on emancipation while CMS provides a system‐conforming interpretation of traditional MS that rarely presents alternatives to mainstream MS.

The key implication is that CMS assists mainstream MS as a corrective but, in general, does not enhance emancipation.

The paper assists researchers in the field of management studies (MS) and its “critical” offspring of CMS in understanding the role CMS plays for traditional MS.

It makes scholars aware that research conducted from within CMS provides system‐conforming solution to issues such as corporate social responsibility (CSR) and environmental issues. CMS scholarship is not a critical evaluation of, for example, CSR and environmental issues directed towards emancipation from present structures of managerial domination.

The value of the paper is threefold: for the first time, CMS has been measured against its own claims; the article provides clarity on three issues: MS, CMS and CT; and it assists research in the area of CMS and CT because it shows that the former is about improving mainstream MS while the latter is about emancipation.