Is It Good that Big Businesses Are Going Green?

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"The test of a first-rate intelligence," F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, "is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function."

If so, then the growth of the green economy -- embraced by corporations, heralded by politicians -- marks something of an IQ test for the progressive movement. How can we at once celebrate companies that move toward better practices while acknowledging how much farther they need to go?

The signs of change are everywhere. General Electric and BP are ramping up their renewable energy as wind becomes price competitive with coal power. Prominent architects are using recycled and reused materials, and the market for non-residential green building is at $43 billion a year. More than $2 trillion in assets are invested in socially responsible funds. Sales of organically grown food are skyrocketing at 20 percent a year growth. Sustainable living has gone from granola fringe to glossy fashion.

This poses a real dilemma for those of us who have long advocated for a cleaner, more humane way of doing business. Of course, it's a tangible benefit to reduce the amount of toxic substances in the air we breathe, the food we eat, the clothes we wear, and the homes that surround us. But are megacorporations -- the same companies that sold us the toxics in the first place -- really the best vehicles for lasting reform?

As this quandary proves, victories are rarely ever clean-cut. Success almost always comes with compromises and contradictions. Progress is, in a word, messy.

Is it a victory when Wal-Mart is the No. 1 seller of organic milk and organic cotton? Should we applaud when Ford offers a hybrid SUV? In short: What does success look like? How will an ecologically sustainable and socially responsible economy take shape?

After careful consideration, our response is a cagey "Yes, but." Yes, it's progress when big companies take steps to lessen their environmental impact. But it's not quite victory yet.

There are real advantages to the Fortune 500's adoption of more environmentally sound business practices. More organic food and clothing means less poisons in our soil and water. More solar energy means less greenhouse-gas emissions. More hybrid vehicles mean fewer gallons of gas burned.

At its most basic, the green economy movement -- which has been spearheaded by small entrepreneurs and is only now being embraced by giant corporations -- is merely the takeover of the very simple act of buying and selling. We all need some stuff, after all: food, clothing, shelter, and maybe an iPod for kicks. The trick is how to produce that stuff in a way that doesn't destroy the planet or abuse workers.

For too long we've allowed corporations to co-opt our social movements through greenwashing and phony charities. It's about time that we started co-opting the corporations. Let's use what businesses are good at -- marketing, distribution, retail sales -- and make it work for us. This is the idea of the "triple bottom line" economy: balancing financial sustainability, social justice, and environmental restoration. It's an idea that's increasingly popular, as the 3,000 green enterprises that are members of the Co-op America's Business Network prove.

Yet the dangers of a big-business takeover of the local, green economy movement are equally real. Will transnational corporations use green practices to more effectively wipe out their mom-and-pop competitors? Will organic standards be weakened by the power of large corporations? Will Americans retain their bad habits of overconsumption but simply switch to earth-friendly products?