trends and future of sustainable development - TransEco

Finnish company had ever made, and, secondly, because the pulp mill project was the biggest industrialinvestment in the history of Uruguay. According to the World Bank, the mill’s completion would increaseUruguay’s GDP by 1.6% and create 8,000 jobs for the nation. The government of Uruguay supported theproject by granting the pulp mill a free trade area.The company put a lot of effort in planning in the spirit sustainability. Prior to the decision to invest,during 2003–2004, Botnia carried out studies on pulp production in Uruguay and paid close attentionto the environmental and social impact of the mill. The company arranged conferences and meetings tobring together media, local communities and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). It held localinformation dissemination sessions in both Uruguay and Argentina, and invited Uruguayan reportersand politicians to visit Finland. Despite of good planning, disagreement about the location of plant arose.There were concerns about the mill polluting the Uruguay River and about the negative influence onrevenues from tourism. At first, there was some disagreement between Uruguay and Argentina, but thesituation soon erupted into an open political conflict between the two nations. Argentina decided to takethe case to the Hague International Court of Justice (ICJ). The conflict burgeoned into a public issue,which attracted various sets of stakeholders, such as civic and environmental organisations, local people,workers, financiers, and the governments of Uruguay, Argentina and Finland.The investment process has gained a lot of research interest and previous research has coveredcorporate responsibility activities and stakeholder relations (Kujala, Toikka & Heikkinen, 2009),stakeholder salience and strategies (Aaltonen et al., 2008), legitimacy in corporate social responsibility(Joutsenvirta & Vaara, 2009), the role of media in cultural conflict resolution (Pakkasvirta, 2008),relationships between multinational firms, host governments and NGOs (Skippari & Pajunen, 2010),and corporate responsiveness to social pressure (Lotila, 2010). By looking at the case through theanalysis of local media texts, we contribute to the request for further research on discursive strategiesemployed by the various parties in conflict situations (Walton, 2007).The remaining of the paper is organised as follows. First, the case under scrutiny is described briefly.This is followed by illustration of the data collection and methods. After that the case analysis ispresented and the findings of the research explained and discussed. The paper concludes with asummary of the major findings and implications of the study.2. Case OverviewThe empirical study is conducted on a case where a Finnish forest industry company Botnia invested in apulp mill in South America, in Western Uruguay. Soon after the investment decision by Botnia, in March2005, Argentina claimed that the Uruguayan government had not asked its permission to build the planton the border river, as the use of the Uruguay River is protected by a 1975 bilateral agreement. Inaddition, members of environmentalist groups and Argentineans living in Gualeguaychu, a city acrossthe river from the plant, protested against it, saying that it would, among other things, pollute the river,foul the area, and ruin the fishing and tourist industries of the area. The Argentine activist group, theArgentinian Citizens Environmental Assembly of Gualeguaychú (hereafter referred to as CEAG),organized massive anti-pulp mill protests and road blocks on the border bridge during spring andsummer 2005. Botnia reported, throughout the construction works, that the environmental impact ofthe mill was being minimized by taking advantage of the best available technology.361