Beyond the Post-Principles Narrative: Morality and Discourse in Sustainability and Strategy from a Social Systems Perspective

Abstract

This paper addresses backlash against embedding sustainability and moral concerns into policymakers’ and business organisations’ strategies and priorities. Sceptical voices claim that a “principled world order” has ended, leading businesses to dismiss ethics and sustainability as subjective, low-priority, or not the responsibility of business actors. Deprioritising sustainability and moral considerations is a significant problem because it weakens the legitimacy and governance of organisations and institutions to contribute to, and places the well-being of households and people at risk vis-à-vis systemic sustainability risks and impacts. This problem is well-suited to investigation from a systems science perspective, as it enables reflection on aspects of order-constituting communication and action in organisations, and on the place of morality and sustainability therein. The study applies a theoretical and integrative systems inquiry, drawing from Jürgen Habermas’ theory of communicative action, and discourse ethics and from Niklas Luhmann’s theory of autopoietic social systems and ecological communication. It extends this framework by integrating Anna-Verena Nosthoff’s recent critique of cybernetics and digital forms of governance control. We argue that calls to exclude principle and value frameworks from organisational identity and management ignore that ethical or legal validity of norms, and the decisions to apply or not apply them in managing organisations (Habermas, 1983) constitute two distinct categories. However, moral communication, for example, on ecological issues, sometimes has limited power to survive in functionally differentiated systems (Luhmann, 1998: 396ff; 2008). It further shows that cybernetic systems control may pose barriers to sustainability and moral considerations on risks and impacts in organisational strategy, behaviour, and communication (Nosthoff, 2026). This paper reframes sustainability concerns in organisations as a problem of legitimacy and complexity management. It proposes a dual strategy to overcome this problem: to strengthen discursive infrastructure to factor in sustainability and moral considerations in business and strategy, translating social and ecological risks and impacts into organisational decision premises, complemented by cybernetic governance safeguards that preserve transparency and accountability of the organisational discourse.