Plastic Politics of Delay: How Political Corporate Social Responsibility Discourses Produce and Reinforce Inequality in Plastic Waste Governance

Jessica Vandenberg

Global Environmental Politics, 2024, vol. 24, issue 2, 122-145

Abstract: As the global plastics pollution crisis grows in severity and complexity, diverse solutions are being proposed across the public and private sectors. Notably, multinational corporations (MNCs) from the petrochemical and consumer goods sectors have become increasingly involved. From providing recycling infrastructure to directly participating in drafting action plans and policies, MNCs are engaging as political actors in plastics waste governance, influencing discourses and actions globally, a process referred to as political corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this article, I examine Coca-Cola’s World Without Waste initiative as a case study of this process. I evaluate how Coca-Cola frames the problems of plastics waste, their solutions, and the roles that Coca-Cola asserts within this complex, transboundary environmental governance issue. Borrowing from literature on corporate climate delay tactics, I demonstrate how the initiative implements discourses and practices of delayed action, hindering comprehensive governance strategies. Through this analysis, I argue that political CSR actions can exacerbate the global plastics pollution crisis through ineffective and inequitable waste governance approaches that perpetuate uneven plastics pollution burdens.

Keywords: corporate social responsibility; equity; marine plastics pollution; environmental justice; plastics delay discourse (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1162/glep_a_00745
Access to PDF is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tpr:glenvp:v:24:y:2024:i:2:p:122-145

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://mitpressjour ... rnal/?issn=1526-3800

Access Statistics for this article

Global Environmental Politics is currently edited by Steven Bernstein, Matthew Hoffmann and Erika Weinthal

More articles in Global Environmental Politics from MIT Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by The MIT Press ().