(book review) Ecological Intelligence -Daniel Goleman

Sooner or later I’ll write about which Megatrends you need to take into account to sharpen your strategy, and how to structure them in order to be of maximal use to you. But before doing this I decided to spend some time reading ‘Future’-oriented books on the subject, as a cross-check to my own thoughts, and to complete my initial ideas on it.

First one on the list is ‘Ecological Intelligence’ by Daniel Goleman. Why start with this one? Well, no doubt the move towards sustainability and ‘green ‘behavior is a Megatrend that took shape in recent years, only to grow in the next decades, both for companies and individuals. But, apart from my own efforts in reducing my family’s carbon footprint, I must admit that I know very little about the subject.

So choosing an author who takes a psychological approach to the subject –after all he was also the author of Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can Matter More Than IQ
and Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships
- would make sense. And it does, but in a way that I didn’t imagine at first.

I was expecting a roundup of new ecological ideas and trends, do’s and don’ts, examples of what works and what doesn’t. Instead I read a book about just one single idea. But what an idea !

The central theme of the book is ‘Radical Transparency’. In Goleman’s ideal world, all buyers from any goods or service would be informed about the complete impact (not only ecological, but also social and human) the good has initiated, before making his choice. This knowledge would not be limited to the impact the good has when in use, but also throughout the whole ‘life cycle’, so including in the management of the raw materials, the production process, and after the product’s ‘life’.

Radical enough, but is it feasible? The latter 2/3d of Goleman’s book are spent highlighting initial efforts to obtain such a Radical Transparency, through concrete examples and discussions with business and thought leaders. The most striking example is probably ‘Goodguide’, a company that is now piloting the ability for customers to scan the barcode of products in a shop with their mobile, and have immediate access to the full Life Cycle Assessment of the product and its alternatives next to it in the shop. Surely that would change customers’ behavior, at least those that are sensible to ecology, ethics or just their personal health?

How exactly does it change buying behavior? 

Goleman provides some striking examples.

Would people who buy a bottle of red wine in New York better buy a Californian wine instead of a French one, based on the fact that the French wine has to travel further? Not really, the French wine is transported by boat, which emits much less CO2 than a truck, while the Californian wine would have to cross the whole country in a truck.

Should you buy your tomatoes locally for the same reason? Perhaps, but the seeds with which they were grown might as well come from a Chinese farm with less than human labor conditions.

Goleman provides plenty of such examples. What they tell us is that even a sound buying decision based on ecological, moral or health standards can completely miss the point if you are not aware of the full life cycle of the good. For sure this would change my own buying habits…

Why would that be beneficiary?

As the economist and Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz showed, an economy can only be efficient if there is an equal access to information. This has not happened for the last decades, where suppliers of goods had access to much more information (sometimes keeping it secret) than the buyers. ‘Radical Transparency’ would reestablish this equilibrium.

To put it more clearly: if a sufficient amount of buyers would base their buying decisions on the same ecological, social or security parameters, and be knowledgeable of the impact of the ‘life cycle’ of the goods they buy, this would force suppliers to take these into account and  adapt their behavior.

A sustainable, green, moral way of doing business cannot be imposed by government, but can only be imposed by (a sufficient amount of) buyers.

Will it make a difference?

Well obviously not every consumer would want to base their buying decision on moral or ecological arguments –price is still the major drive for most of them. But some surveys show that a little difference in price would drive a substantial amount of people towards the ‘ethical’ products. The ‘price elasticity’ of these products is not so steep after all.

As Goleman shows, a number of very promising initiatives are being taken to provide this ‘Life Cycle Assessment’ to the customers. In a way the success of the early experiments might feed itself, with a growing number of people basing their consumption patterns on this knowledge as it becomes more easily available and more easy to understand (sometimes a green or red label might do).


No doubt a trend to be tracked closely, and a book absolutely worth reading !