A Novel Grey Stratified Decision-Making (GSDM) Model for Social Sustainability-Based Supplier Selection

Social dimensions of sustainability are far less discussed in the spectrum of sustainability. As suppliers are able to influence decisions across a supply network, we argue that the considerations for the social aspects of sustainability should begin from the process of supplier selection. Integrating social sustainability into the supplier selection process can ensure that firms can focus on the wider aspects of sustainability. We use a sustainability framework for social sustainability to identify the social sustainability factors for supplier selection. Based on this and the related literature, we identify and classify the factors into six categories of human rights and equity, health and safety, wages and benefits, education and training, child and bonded labor, and, finally, philanthropy and ethics. Furthermore, we propose a two-layered grey stratified decision-making (GSDM) model for identifying the best suppliers, by considering the attributes of social sustainability, along with the primary performance attributes of supplier selection, subject to a set of diverse objectives. A case evaluation and implementation of the proposed methodology has been conducted in the context of an electronics manufacturing industry in India. Here, we address the specific problem of social sustainability-based supplier selection, and the methodology is novel, as it can address the problems with compensatory aggregation in multicriteria decision-making situations. This research helps in increasing the awareness among firms regarding social sustainability and the related factors, and their prominence for a supplier selection problem, focusing on the sustainability theory extended to firms. Considering the practical implications of the study, managers and practitioners can ascertain the importance of social sustainability and the related factors in any strategic decision-making situation, including supplier selection.