Sustainability Risk Management: A Survey of the Literature

Introduction: Looking at the risks faced by enterprises in recent years, we see that the risks have shifted radically from traditional economic and financial risks to those posed by environmental and social factors. Developments in the field of activity of enterprises (climate change, the increasing relationship between the society and enterprises through shareholders and partners) have led to an increase in the number and diversity of risks faced by enterprises. It is only possible for enterprises to cope with these increasing risks by adopting a proactive and contemporary management approach. One of these contemporary management approaches that businesses should adopt is sustainability. Many researches have shown that the integration of sustainability into risk management has proved successful in risk management.Purpose: Looking at previous literature, this study sets forth what financial (economic), environmental and social risks businesses may face today, explains with a few examples what measures companies can implement to eliminate these risks, and a future perspective is presented to companies. In addition, this study makes recommendations on how to successfully manage the risks that companies may face and emphasizes what the positive results of sustainable risk management can be (increasing the business value, ensuring sustainability and increasing the shareholder value). Mention was made about the fact that the ability of enterprises to successfully manage sustainability risks depends on their ability to prevent, identify, mitigate and manage risks, and it was emphasized that the environmental, social and governance risks must, to a large extent, be taken into account by many circles (regulators and customers), mainly investors. In addition, this study aims to identify and evaluate the current and possible future risks and to serve as a guide for actions to be taken to minimize risks or keep them at an optimum level.Methodology: In this section, a compilation study on sustainability risk management (SRM) was done in the light of information obtained from various reports, scientific articles and books. In other words, in this section, information from various scientific sources on SRM was systematically collected, analyzed, interpreted and evaluated, and effort was made to present an up-to-date, extensive conceptual framework related to SRM. In addition, the scientific literature – especially in the historical development process of the last decade – on the debate of SRM was examined in this study, and the highest point reached in this debate today is revealed. Thus, the positioning of different views on the sustainability issue and the latest developments in the literature were also evaluated properly.Findings: As a result of the examination of the scientific literature on SRM in the last decade, it has been determined that SRM has led to many other favorable outcomes, from the sustainability of the enterprise to gaining competitive advantage, increasing its goodwill, reputation and efficiency.