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Social life cycle assessment of biofuel production 261

the field of science social). The disciplinary and scientific heritage of SLCA
has been discussed and tracked in sociology and administration science.
According to Zhou et al. (2018), life cycle assessment is usually adopted
to assess the environmental burden associated with energy wastage initia-
tives. From a life cycle perspective, it is possible to attribute the SLCA to
the disciplinary field of management sciences, since it can help organizations
make decisions about how to organize their processes according to the social
impacts of their products or services. This is confirmed in many SLCA stud-
ies, emphasizing the role of supporting management practices for sustainabil-
ity at different levels: operational decisions, strategic decisions, and
communication purposes.
Stakeholder theory proposes a rewriting of the traditional corporate pur-
pose of providing dividends to shareholders and postulates that companies
should address all stakeholder interests, such as “individuals and voters
who voluntarily or involuntarily contribute to the capacity and wealth cre-
ation activities and thus are potential beneficiaries and/or risk-takers.”
Despite extensive research, stakeholders show a weakness in terms of apply-
ing an integrated vision for the analysis of environmental and social issues.
Practical examples of the use of stakeholder theory to propose holistic solu-
tions related to poverty and environmental deterioration are scarce. An
interpretation of stakeholder theory is that any company will have a series
of explicit or implicit claims from its many stakeholders. Emphasizing the
importance of long-term success, stakeholder theory suggests that firms cul-
tivate relationships with their stakeholders and integrate those relationships
into a comprehensive management strategy. However, there are limits on
the financial resources available to companies to meet the implicit claims
of stakeholders (De-Burgos-Jim enez et al., 2011).
Stakeholder theory is a body of research that has emerged in the last
20 years through scholars in management, business and society, and business
ethics in which stakeholder thinking plays a crucial role. Two basic assump-
tions are discussed by stakeholder theorists:
i. For good performance, managers need to pay attention to a wide variety
of stakeholders.
ii. Managers are obligated to stakeholders, which include but go beyond
shareholders.
The assessment of social impacts is very complicated and easily overlaps with
environmental impacts (impacts on human health, for example) and eco-
nomic impacts (job creation and income from work). Stakeholders in the
SLCA can be workers /employees, local communities (national and