Rulifson, G., & Smith, J. M. (2021, July), Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement  Paper presented at 2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual Conference. 10.18260/1-2--36747

\bibitem{asee_peer_36747}
  Rulifson, G., \& Smith, J. M. (2021, July), \emph{Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement}
  Paper presented at 2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual Conference.
  10.18260/1-2--36747

Greg Rulifson P.E. and Jessica Mary Smith.  "Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement".  2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual Conference, 2021, July.  ASEE Conferences, 2021.  https://peer.asee.org/36747 Internet.  07 Jan, 2025

\bibitem{asee_peer_36747}
  Greg Rulifson P.E. and Jessica Mary Smith.
  "Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement".
  \emph{2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual Conference, 2021, July}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2021.
  https://peer.asee.org/36747 Internet.  07 Jan, 2025

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_36747
author = "Greg Rulifson P.E. and Jessica Mary Smith"
title = "Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement"
booktitle = "2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access"
year = "2021"
month = "July"
address = "Virtual Conference"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/36747}
number = {10.18260/1-2--36747}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - The “social license to operate” (SLO) has emerged as a key industry framework for conceptualizing the need to responsibly engage communities. The social license loosely refers to public acceptance, but the term is usually invoked without clear definition [1]. Advocates for the SLO define it as “the level of tolerance, acceptance, or approval of an organization’s activities by the stakeholders with the greatest concern about the activity” [2]. From its original use in the pulp/paper and mining industries in the 1990s, the term has since migrated to chemical manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, construction, and biotechnology. One review found that “social license to operate” appeared in about 10 articles each year from 1997-2002, but in more than 2,000 articles in 2016 [3]. Yet scholars raise strident critiques of the SLO. First, it can treat communities as manageable risks, precluding more trusting and collaborative partnerships necessary for sustainable development [4]. Second, private forms of governance can detract from rights-based community engagement frameworks, such as the United Nations mandated Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC), for projects involving indigenous peoples. Third, it provides no guidance on “navigating power inequalities, divergent interests, and diverse cultures of communication and governance” [5].

We investigate how a critical take on corporate social responsibility shapes the ways in which engineering students conceptualize and critique the SLO. Drawing on pre- and post-surveys of 172 students who participated in our research, we explore: 1) how they defined the SLO; 2) whether and how those definitions changed through their course learning; and 3) the extent to which they recognized that the SLO can hinder a company’s overall social responsibility goals. We conclude by providing recommendations for engineering educators who seek to contrast industry models for community engagement with those that are grounded in justice-based frameworks. 

[1] Martin Brueckner and Marian Eabrasu, “Pinning down the Social License to Operate (SLO): The Problem of Normative Complexity,” Resources Policy, July 1, 2018, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2018.07.004.Brueckner and Eabrasu; Owen and Kemp, Extractive Relations.
[2] Robert Boutilier and Ian Thomson, The Social License: The Story of the San Cristobal Mine (Routledge, 2018). For an earlier iteration see Ian Thomson and Robert Boutilier, “The Social Licence to Operate,” SME Mining Engineering Handbook, January 1, 2011, 1779–96.
[3] Gehman, J., L. Lefsrud, and S. Fast . (2017).  “Social License to Operate: Legitimacy by Another Name?,” Canadian Public Administration 60(2): 293–317. https://doi.org/10.1111/capa.12218.
[4] Owen, J. R., & Kemp, D. (2013). Social licence and mining: A critical perspective. Resources Policy, 38(1), 29–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2012.06.016
[5] Delborne, J. A., Kokotovich, A. E., & Lunshof, J. E. (2020). Social license and synthetic biology: The trouble with mining terms. Journal of Responsible Innovation, 0(0), 1–18. In press. https://doi.org/10.1080/23299460.2020.1738023
AU  - Greg Rulifson P.E.
AU  - Jessica Mary Smith
CY  - Virtual Conference
DA  - 2021/07/26
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Beyond the Social License to Operate: Training Socially Responsible Engineers to Contend with Corporate Frameworks for Community Engagement
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/36747
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--36747
ER  -