The Difference Between a Mirage and a Lie

When I began my career, I wanted to become an environmentalist (thanks to Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring). I studied forestry, earned an engineering degree, and spent the first years of my professional life in forests — first in Canada, then in Central Africa. My work involved ecosystems, wildlife, soils, rivers, and the people who depended on them. Environmental issues were tangible. They had a place, a smell, and often a pair of muddy boots.

Over time, my work gradually evolved. Like many others, I became involved in environmental impact assessment, international development, sustainability, entrepreneurship, and global supply chains. My perspective widened, but so did the questions.

One of them has stayed with me.

If sustainability is struggling to achieve the outcomes we hope for, what does that actually mean?

For many people, the answer seems straightforward.

Some conclude that sustainability has failed. Others argue that it has become little more than greenwashing.

I find both explanations unsatisfying.

They assume that someone, somewhere, must be deliberately misleading us.

But what if the reality is more complicated?

A lie requires someone who intends to deceive.

A mirage does not.

A mirage appears because the conditions are right for it to appear. It can look remarkably real, even to experienced observers. Seeing a mirage does not mean someone has been dishonest. It means perception and reality have gradually drifted apart.

Perhaps sustainability deserves to be viewed through that lens.

Throughout my career, I have worked with hundreds of sustainability professionals. Many became colleagues. Some became friends.

I have rarely questioned their commitment.

Most care deeply about the environment, about people, and about the future. They work hard. They collect data, improve reporting, develop policies, engage suppliers, reduce emissions, strengthen governance, and help organizations make better decisions.

Their work matters.

This is why I hesitate when I hear sustainability dismissed as a fraud.

It is not.

At least, not in the way the word is commonly understood.

The people I have met are not participating in a conspiracy. They are not trying to deceive investors, governments, or the public. On the contrary, most are genuinely trying to improve the organizations they serve.

So where does the unease come from?

Perhaps it comes from something we rarely question.

Over the past three decades, sustainability has increasingly become a profession.

Today, organizations employ chief sustainability officers, vice-presidents, directors, managers, advisors, analysts, consultants, auditors, and reporting specialists. Universities offer degrees. Professional associations publish frameworks. New regulations continue to emerge.

None of this is inherently problematic.

In many ways, it reflects genuine progress.

Yet I sometimes wonder whether our attention has gradually shifted.

When I began my career, much of the work happened in forests, wetlands, farms, rivers, and communities. Today, much of it happens in meeting rooms, spreadsheets, reporting platforms, disclosure frameworks, and ESG dashboards.

Both forms of work are necessary.

But they are not the same.

One seeks to understand the condition of ecosystems.

The other increasingly seeks to understand the condition of organizations.

That distinction has stayed with me.

Not because one is right and the other wrong.

But because they answer different questions.

Perhaps that is why so many sustainability professionals experience a quiet frustration.

They work harder than ever. Organizations publish more information than ever. Frameworks become more sophisticated every year.

Yet many of the global trends that originally gave rise to sustainability continue to move in the wrong direction.

This is not necessarily evidence that sustainability professionals are doing the wrong work.

It may simply mean that the work they have been asked to do is not, by itself, sufficient.

That possibility deserves careful reflection.

Because if sustainability is a mirage, it is not because millions of dedicated people have been deceiving us.

It may be because we have collectively become very good at improving the way we manage the system, while asking less often whether the system itself can produce the future we hope for.

The distinction may seem subtle. I no longer believe it is.