Do businesses have a social responsibility?

Yes
No
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    4/15/2007 9:56:12 PM

    I think it's fine that we leave that open, because it could mean anything accomplished for the greater good of society -- something positive and exclusive of the business being a revenue-generating machine. This is more philosophical, and therefore, I feel, more pertinent as a long-term issue than "Should businesses strive to 'be green?'" or something else that is very "now" and quite possibly a fad.

    3/21/2007 7:50:38 AM

    i'm sitting here thinking:  have a social responsiblity to what?

    3/20/2007 5:31:33 PM

    issue prior to revisions:

    Should businesses strive to achieve social objectives?
    Yes
    No
    No position or position not known.

    3/6/2007 10:25:32 PM

    I agree.  Let's go for that.

    2/28/2007 5:58:50 PM

    I like Jacki's suggestion.  I'm in favor of that.

    "Do businesses have a social responsibility?"

    2/18/2007 9:50:21 PM

    I'm treading in new terrain here, outside the realm of film, but here goes... I like Jacki's restatement. The way it's currently phrased seems to suggest the potential self-interests a business could have in achieving social objectives, like the huge PR buzz Adobe created last year for its newly renovated green approach to their San Jose headquarters.

    I think the more open phrasing of "Do businesses have a social responsibility" leaves it a more balanced issue.

    1/7/2007 12:57:00 PM

    i'd prefer more simply:

    "Do businesses have a social reponsiblity?"

    i think it works well enough without adding all that weirdness about stockholders ... since "stockholders" do not necessarily equate to "businesses".  here's some background info on social responsibility ...

    1/6/2007 2:35:17 PM

    I like the issue as framed by nick and BrianR.

    1/5/2007 12:48:20 PM

    Do businesses have a "social responsibility" that goes beyond serving the interest of their stockholders or their clients? 

    Great!  We could use this...

    1/5/2007 8:18:46 AM

    sorry... the ISBN feature isn't formatting well. on my list to fix.

    1/5/2007 8:18:09 AM

    #ISBN##0226264017#I like bpr's "socially responsible". In fact, I pulled the seminal work on this issue off the shelf - Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom - and he writes:

    The view has been gaining widespread acceptanced that corporate officials and labor leaders have a "social responsibility" that goes beyond serving the interest of their stockholders or their members.
    This is a well-defined area that does not have the ambiguities that yantiss mentions due to my use of "objectives". So for professional courtesy, I would reword as:

    Do businesses have a "social responsibility" that goes beyond serving the interest of their stockholders or their clients?

    "members" just doesn't seem to apply. However, if this sounds too academic for wIs, then it ought to be toned down... thoughts?

    12/16/2006 5:42:49 PM

    How about if you go the route more towards,

     is it worth it for a company to be socially responsible?

     or something along those lines...

    12/14/2006 9:03:02 PM

    i know what nick is getting and jsyantiss elaborates on it:

    "social objectives" is way too broad a term.

    "beneficial to humanity"  is equally nebulous.

    what about:

    Should the private sector contribute to the public sector?

    or our other option is jsyantiss' proposal:

    Should businesses strive to achieve objectives that are beneficial to humanity?

    12/13/2006 6:31:44 PM

    In reality all do. There is no business on the face of the earth that does not attempt, strive, struggle to achieve social objectives. Beneficial in a humanitarian sense? Now there is a can of worms, or--here she is again--Pandora's box. I make a freonstat. I want you to buy it. I pay mega-bucks to educate you to the fact that you need one of my freonstats. If I am successful, I have achieved a social objective. Pick any product or service, ANY, and ask yourself if it would achieve market success, without reaching the social objective of convincing people to buy it.

    How much of an impact such a marketing venture has on society depends on the product or service, and how many people are convinced to purchase it. However, no product or service will be a market success without society being changed by its introduction and use, whatever it is.

    Now, if you mean, "should businesses strive to achieve objectives that are beneficial to humanity?" then as a human I would have to say yes. But free enterprise, and democracy, and all of the things we associate with freedom, demand that we do not REQUIRE prescribed objectives--other than that they are not actually demonstrably detrimental--of businesses.

    12/4/2006 12:38:07 AM

    i proposed in here accidentally but decided to post something anyway.

    There was a big debate a long time ago which I read about in Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom many years ago about whether or not companies ought to have social goals. As I recall, Friedman said absolutely not - along the lines that it was best that the company focus on the business and return any unnecesary funds (those used for social goals) to the shareholders.

    Anyway...this is the kind of academic debate type issue I love for high-level topics.