 |
[email protected] |
 |
3275638434 |
 |
 |
| Paper Publishing WeChat |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
A Company Presents Itself to the World
Richard J. Alexander
Full-Text PDF
XML 258 Views
DOI:10.17265/2159-5836/2023.10.013
Vienna University of Business and Economics, Vienna, Austria
As we all know, environmental breakdown is rooted in capitalism’s quest for perpetual growth. According to O’Connor (quoted in Büscher et al 2010/2013, p. 3) the “environmental crisis has given liberal capitalist society a new lease on life.” He continues: “Now, through purporting to take in hand the saving of the environment, capitalism invents a new legitimation for itself: the sustainable and rational use of nature”. “Those who hold the power and they are not all heads of state, see themselves as saviours of the world, and offer the population the opportunity of becoming their clients” is how John Berger has referred to such cognitive dissonance. Critical discourse analysis and corpus linguistics are employed to scrutinize a powerful corporation’s website. This company produces and distributes food globally. The story it presents to the world maintains that it protects animal welfare, the environment and people, among other things, in all its operations. The language it employs on its corporate websites will be subjected to close analysis.
agribusiness, discourse analysis, ecolinguistics, greenwashing, sustainability
Journal of Literature and Art Studies, October 2023, Vol. 13, No. 10, 803-811
Alexander, R. J. (2009.) Framing discourse on the environment. A critical discourse approach. New York and London: Routledge.
Alexander, R. J., & Stibbe, A. (2014). From the analysis of ecological discourse to the ecological analysis of discourse. Language Sciences, 41, 104-110.
Berger, J. (1982). The production of the world. New society 15 August. Reprinted in (1985). The white bird (pp. 276-281). (Essays) London: Chatto & Windus.
Berger, J. (2011). Bento’s Sketchbook. London: Verso.
Büscher, B., Sullivan, S., Neves, K., Igoe, J., & Brockington, D. (2010/2013). Towards a synthesized critique of neoliberal biodiversity conservation. Capitalism, Nature, Socialism, 23(2), 4-40.
Business Roundtable. (2019). Our commitment. Retrieved from https://opportunity.businessroundtable.org/ourcommitment
Cargill. (2020a). Putting people first: Standing up against racial violence, hatred and discrimination. Retrieved from https://www.cargill.com/story/putting-people-first-standing-up-against-racial-violence
Cargill. (2020b). Land use and forest sustainability advisory panel—November 2020 Meeting held virtually on 16 November, 2020. Retrieved from https://www.cargill.com/doc/1432177779051/november-2020-meeting-forest-advisory-panel.pdf
Cargill. (2020c). Annual report. Retrieved from https://www.cargill.com/page/annual-report-2020
Cargill. (2021). Annual Report. Retrieved from https://www.cargill.com/page/annual-report-2021
Dunn, W. (2021). The goodness business: how woke capitalism turned virtue into profit. Long Read. The New Statesman
Fink, L. (2018). Larry Fink’s 2018 letter to CEOs: A sense of purpose. Retrieved from www.blackrock.com/corporate/ investor-relations/2018-larry-fink-ceo-letter
Fink,
L. (2019). Larry Fink’s 2019 letter to CEOs: profit & purpose. Retrieved from
www.blackrock.com/americas-offshore/2019-larry-fink-ceo-letter
Jordan,
L., Wasley, A., Mendonça, E., Slattery, L., Dallabrida, P., & Campos, A. (2022).
Agribusiness giant again linked to Amazon deforestation. 14.01.2022. Retrieved from
https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2022/01/14/agribusiness-giant-cargill-amazon-deforestation/
Junqueira, G. de O., Ramos, L. P., Schramm, F. P.,& Martins, P. S. V. (2021). No license for destruction. Cargill and its false solutions for the climate crisis. Terra de direitos. Retrieved from 10-11-2021-CARGILL-E-CLIMA_-ingles.pdf
Mighty Earth. (n.d.). Retrieved from stories.mightyearth.org/cargill-worst-company-in-the-world/
Rhodes, C. (2022). Woke capitalism: Democracy under threat in the age of corporate righteousness. Bristol: Bristol University Press.
Simon,
B. (2019) Heroes & Zeros: Business roundtable evolves, while Cargill named worst
company on earth. Corporate Knights, The Voice for Clean Capitalism. Fall 2019.
Retrieved from
https://www.corporateknights.com/leadership/heroes-zeroes-business-roundtable-evolves-carglil-named-worst-company-earth/
Unearthed.
Greenpeace. (2020). Retrieved from
https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2020/11/25/cargill-deforestation-agriculture-history-pollution/
Vergunst, F., & Savulescu, J. (April 26, 2017). Five ways the meat on your plate is killing the planet. The Conversation. Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/five-ways-the-meat-on-your-plate-is-killing-the-planet-76128#:~:text=1.,coral%20reef%20degeneration%20and%20deforestation
Wright, G., Olenick, L., & Westervelt, A. (2021). The dirty dozen: Meet America’s top climate villains. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/27/climate-crisis-villains-americas-dirty-dozen