Business and the polis: corporations as political actors

Journal of Business Ethics (2010) 94:333–352 DOI 10.1007/s10551-009-0266-y  Springer 2009 Business and the Polis: What Does it Mean to See Corporations as Political Actors? ABSTRACT. This article addresses the recent call in business ethics literature for a better understanding of corporations as political actors or entities. It first gives an overview of recent attempts to examine classical issues in business ethics through a political lens. It examines different ways in which theorists with an interest in the normative analysis of business practices and institutions could find it desirable and fruitful to use a political lens. This article presents a distinction among four views of the relations between corporations and politics: corporations as distributive agents, corporations as political communities, corporate practices and policies as citizenship issues, and corporations as active participants in the political process. This article finishes with an examination of three challenges that need to be overcome by the theory of the firm as a political actor. KEY WORDS: business and government relations, business and politics, corporations and citizenship, organizations, political philosophy Introduction An interesting feature of the recent literature on corporate roles and responsibilities is that there has been a call for a better understanding of corporations and the business world in general, as ‘‘political actors’’. When saying that there has been a call for such a conception of corporations as political actors, I refer very broadly to a set of recent articles and books that stress the importance of looking more politically at firms and business institutions and practices. The question I want to ask in this article is: what does it mean more precisely to look at corporations this way, and what are the implications? The short answer is that it could mean a lot of things. Moreover, depending on the interpretation that one makes of the ‘‘politicization’’ of corporations, it could have very different implications. Treating Pierre-Yves Néron corporations as political entities, actors, institutions, or units could probably highlight some normative issues related to business institutions and practices and contribute to a better understanding of these issues. It could also sometimes lead to the formulation and defense of radical propositions. It may also simply lead to the reaffirmation of classical theoretical statements in business ethics. In brief, treating corporations as political things could be theoretically useful and have potentially quite radical implications, but in some cases it might be also quite banal or not very fruitful from a theoretical perspective (we should not put this option out too quickly). This is why I try to propose in this article some theoretical avenues to investigate and clarify the very idea of ‘‘corporations as political actors.’’ I first try to clarify what is at stake in this call for a theory of the firm as a political actor. Then I examine four political views of corporations and business institutions and the various theoretical insights possibly offered by these different views. I conclude taking into consideration three challenges that need to be overcome by theorists interested in building a theory of the firm as a political actor. The call for a theory of the firm as a political actor The study of ‘‘business and society’’ is characterized by a certain ‘‘conceptual anarchy.’’ Academics, NGOs, business people, corporations, and governments use many different ‘‘vocabularies’’ or ‘‘normative frameworks’’ for discussing and evaluating the responsibilities of corporations (Schwartz and Carrol, 2008). Philosophers like to refer to more abstract tools and concepts from moral theory for applying them to business systems and interactions. Whereas some like to use the language of sustainability to talk about environmental practices in 334 Pierre-Yves Néron economic development, others refer to the now omnipresent language of corporate social responsibility which acts as a rejection of ‘‘orthodox’’ business models, and is closely linked to the language of stakeholder management which tries to expand, the obligations of businesses and managers to include the interests and opinions of a wide range of groups affected, the stakeholders, by firm’s activities and policies. Economists enter theses debates by framing the issues in terms of good corporate governance, which comes mostly from law and economics and is concerned with structures of incentives and controls for managing fiduciary responsibilities and reducing agency problems.1 As noted in the ‘‘Introduction’’, recent studies in the field suggest a desire to add to these various normative frameworks a new language with strong political connotations. Taking new realities into account, some theorists now urge that we seek a better and richer understanding of the political aspects of businesses activities. Moreover, this ‘‘call’’ comes from very different perspectives and disciplines. It is revealing, for instance, that this move toward a political understanding of economic organizations is explicitly suggested in the title of a recent collaborative article, regrouping many young scholars from different disciplines, called ‘‘Corporations as political actors,’’ in which the authors reflect on the globalization process in which ‘‘corporations have become political actors’’ in ‘‘postnational constellations’’ (Rasche et al., 2008). A recent call for articles for an upcoming special issue of the Business Ethics Quarterly also invites scholars to contribute to a better understanding of the ‘‘political mandate of the corporation’’. Recent developments in the theory of corporate citizenship also open the door for a more explicit political understanding of corporations. Corporate citizenship theorists from the ‘‘first wave’’ have seen the use of the language of citizenship as a way to achieve a better understanding and to articulate a better justification of the idea of corporate social responsibility (CSR), broadly understood as the idea that firms are required to benefit the societies in which they operate in ways that go beyond the production, in compliance with laws and regulations, of goods and services as a part of the firm’s normal profit-seeking activities. Wood and Logsdon, for example, notice that the language of corporate citizenship tends to replace the language of CSR or at least, tend to be used as a synonym. They also seem to recognize that some of their own views about corporate citizenship are compatible with classical definitions of CSR (2002, p. 162). According to this view, treating corporations as ‘‘citizens’’ means that corporations should acknowledge a broader social role and corporate obligations should be extended to include multiple stakeholders beyond the traditional base of shareholders, such as workers, local communities, and the environment, and the outcomes of policies and programs directed toward those societal relationships. The language of corporate citizenship, then, should be associated with the defense, or maybe a better defense, of the set of corporate obligations usually associated with the concept of CSR (Birch, 2001; Dawkins, 2002; Logsdon, 2004; Logsdon and Wood, 2002; Post and Berman, 2001).2 Corporate citizenship theorists (and critics) from the ‘‘second wave’’ have been more critical of this tendency to use the vocabulary of citizenship as a (new) comprehensive framework to think, in a very general way, about the roles of corporations in our society. They refuse to see corporate citizenship as an all-encompassing framework or as a concept that could do a better job in capturing what is actually denoted by the concept of CSR (Crane et al., 2008a, b; Matten and Crane, 2005; Matten et al., 2003; Moon et al., 2005; Néron and Norman, 2008a). Instead of seeing corporate citizenship as an extension or a reformulation of CSR, they suggest to take seriously the political connotations of the idea of citizenship. Moon et al. argue, for instance, that corporate citizenship should be used as a ‘‘metaphor’’ to illuminate the roles corporations already play in the political process of contemporary societies (2005). Crane and Matten call for a ‘‘political view of the firm’’ in which corporations are not seen as purely economic institutions but as actors firmly located within the political arena (2008). Crane et al. (2008a) contend that debates on corporate citizenship have led to a more general debate that has just begun on the political nature of the corporation. According to these authors, the main benefit of applying the citizenship thinking to issues in business ethics is that it exposes the political nature of debates about CSR and stakeholder theory. It offers ‘‘a new perspective on the corporation’’ because ‘‘it unveils the political nature of its involvement in society’’ and ‘‘helps to illuminate Business and the Polis certain dimensions that might otherwise go unexamined’’. (Crane and Matten 2008, p. 29). In a similar vein, Néron and Norman suggest that the use of the language of citizenship may concern only some particular sets of corporate obligations in some specific relations, namely with governments and regulatory agencies (2008a).3 The idea here is that the best way to make sense of the metaphor of citizenship is to take seriously the kind of the specific political relations and activities that citizenship is usually associated with. In brief, the theory of corporate citizenship should, first, draw our attention to the different ways corporations interfere in the political process and the shaping and reshaping of their regulatory environment and, second, aim to provide theoretical avenues that would allow us to determine which political activities and relations with government regulators are appropriate or inappropriate, permissible or impermissible, obligatory or forbidden for corporations. Even a more radical critic of corporate citizenship, for example, van Oosterhout agrees with the idea that there is a need for a better understanding of the political aspects of the life and activities of business organizations. While radically rejecting the introduction of the vocabulary of corporate citizenship, van Oosterhout suggests, nonetheless, that there is much to be gained by developing concepts and theoretical tools that can help us to truly transcend what he calls the ‘‘confines of economic and political organizations’’ (2008, p. 39). Underlying van Oosterhout’s proposition is the idea that we should not take for granted that there is a radical division between the sphere of politics and the sphere of economic organizations. Or more specifically, that we should not take for granted that organizations with economic purposes are apolitical entities. Scherer and Palazzo follow the same path and refer to what they consider a new conception of corporate responsibility in which the firm is seen as a ‘‘politicized’’ actor ‘‘democratically embedded’’ (2007, pp. 1105–1112). In another article written with Baumann, they argue for what they call a ‘‘political responsibility of the business firm’’ (Scherer et al., 2006, p. 515). They suggest that our theoretical understandings of corporate roles and responsibilities have been obfuscated by a historically developed de-politicization of the corporation in which there is a clear separation between the 335 economic sphere, with its own sources of legitimacy, and the political sphere, with its own, different, sources of legitimacy. However, according to these authors, this apolitical conception of the firm is both normatively and empirically untenable, and, hence, the need for a ‘‘politicization of the corporation’’ (Matten, 2009; Scherer and Palazzo, 2007). We should, as Hanlon suggests, overcome the ‘‘denial of politics’’ in the fields of business ethics and CSR studies (Hanlon, 2008). One particularly provocative invitation to take seriously the political nature of the firm is to be found in the Crane et al.’s approach in which groups related to the firm are not seen as ‘‘stakeholders’’ but as ‘‘citizens’’ (2004). The authors propose, in what could be considered as a radicalization of the stakeholder paradigm, to use the lens of citizenship theory to look at the ways different groups interact in the shaping and reshaping of ‘‘ethical institutional arrangements for business,’’ leading to a reconceptualization of stakeholder relations with the firm in a fundamentally political language (2004, p. 108). These are all examples of the recent call for a political conception of the firm and its activities. However, it is worthy here to take a few steps back and recall that this ‘‘politicization’’ of corporations was at the heart of some of the most radical critiques of the social responsibility of business, most notably in Friedman’s charge against the idea (Friedman, 2002). In the Friedmanian view, it is precisely skepticism toward the idea of ‘‘firms as political actors,’’ which leads to a reaffirmation of the neoclassical view that firms’ main responsibility is to maximize shareholders profits. The reference to corporations as having ‘‘social responsibilities’’ is no more than an ideological and subversive way to politicize economic institutions. In order to put it crudely, this is, from a Friedmanian point of view, a very bad idea. Recent literature though, suggests that theorists do not hesitate to use this language of politics to think normatively about business. Corporations and politics: four directions What should we think about the call for a better understanding of the political aspects of business life? How should we welcome this invitation to think about the firm as a political actor? Why should we 336 Pierre-Yves Néron think, contrary to the Friedmanian skepticism, that it is a theoretically fruitful idea? My contention is that it is highly seductive but it is not clear how it could be helpful and what it means exactly for the normative analysis of business practices and institutions. The agenda for a ‘‘political theory of the firm’’ is appealing but remains unclear. This is why, in this section, I try to provide some insights first by answering these questions and then clarifying a little bit further what it means to use a ‘‘political lens’’ to examine issues in business ethics. I propose four directions in which we might think politically about corporations and examine some of the implications of doing so. Corporations as distributive agents The first possible desirable way to look at business with a political lens is to focus on the impact of the firm on the society as a whole. Corporations are among the most powerful social entities in our world and are, sometimes, depicted as the key institutions of our time. Their ‘‘pervasive presence’’ and impact on human lives rival that of history’s most powerful emperors, czars, and kings.4 They control vast human, organizational, and financial resources, transnational borders and affect every human life. They shape flows of capital, natural resources, and labor; they influence national governments and local communities; and they support (directly and indirectly) everything from education to the arts and sports. Moreover, in the process of globalization, business organizations are even taking on broader, more complicated roles in society. Here, firms could be viewed as being ‘‘political’’ in the sense that they have an impact on society as whole and often serve larger purposes than profit maximization. They have significant distributive effects because they are able to impose a heavy imprint upon society as a whole. This could be called the ‘‘stakeholder’’ view of the corporations as political actors. One of the recurrent themes in stakeholder theory is the importance of not overlooking the ‘‘public’’ nature of the modern corporation, which should not be understood simply as a ‘‘private’’ association but as a social institution whose activities and policies have an impact on a plurality of stakeholder groups and not only on shareholders’ welfare.5 This ‘‘political’’ view of the nature of corporations is extremely important for critics of classical or orthodox models of business. Take, for instance, the so-called progressive corporate law movement. For Mitchell, Green and Millon, our classical views on corporate responsibilities are biased from the start because they fail to realize the public nature of corporations (Mitchell, 1995). This is why one of the crucial moves of the progressive corporate law theorists is to invite us to shift from a ‘‘contractarian’’ view of the firm to favour what Millon calls a ‘‘communitarian’’ view: Communitarians tend to differ from contractarians in emphasizing the broader social effects of corporate activity. Contractarians focus on the corporation’s internal relationships, applying a cost-benefit analysis to a relatively narrow range of more or less readily monetizable interest. Communitarians see corporations as more than just agglomerations of private contract; they are powerful institutions whose conduct has substantial public implications. Thus, for example, assessing the costs of the reorganization of a corporation like Time is not just a matter of adding up possible costs in worker layoffs and potential gains to Time shareholders. It is also necessary to take into account the general public’s possible interest in the various publications’ continued editorial independence. (Millon, 1993, p. 1379) This ‘‘communitarian’’ view is probably very close to what a lot of theorists have in mind when they refer to the need for a political view of the firm. Millon’s basic point here is that firms are not merely private associations with purely economic goals but social or public institutions that are related to, and have an impact on, many other important social institutions that realize important social goals. In brief, what progressive corporate law and stakeholder theorists are trying to do here is to empirically turn Friedman on his head. From this point of view, Friedman is simply wrong at the beginning about the nature of corporations. As a matter of fact, it is simply not true that firms’ activities are limited to the market. They are ‘‘political’’ from the beginning because they are social institutions created by political communities and serve larger purposes than profit-seeking. Of course, stakeholders, CSR, and progressive corporate law theorists are right in pointing to the ‘‘public’’ nature of firms as social institutions of capitalist Business and the Polis societies.6 Corporations are certainly powerful political actors in this sense. After all, if politics is about giving an answer to the immense question of ‘‘who must do what for whom?’’, then there is no doubt today that businesses are successful political actors.7 Moreover, as they enter new arenas, such as health care, education, and even military operations, where tough choices and tradeoffs among multiple goods are commonplace, conflicts between economic objectives and other public worthy aims is likely to increase. It is why it is surely right to ask ourselves, as these theorists do: what are the responsibilities of these ‘‘social institutions?’’ and what are their capacities in certain domains of social and environmental action? The main problem with this first view of the firm as a political actor is that it is hard to see how it could bring a refreshing perspective on debates about firms’ roles and responsibilities. CSR and stakeholders theorists and critics of the modern business firm are incessantly making this point. Moreover, the problem is not that it is a false view. The problem lies in its normative scope. Firms could certainly be understood as ‘‘social institutions’’, in this stakeholder theory sense, because their policies and activities have significant distributive effects on many groups in our societies. The problem is that it should be, in fact, a relatively noncontroversial starting point. Even neoclassical economists arguing for the Friedmanian view could agree with this starting point while insisting on the idea that the fact that corporations are ‘‘social institutions’’ is precisely at the basis of the best strategy to justify the profit orientation of firms in competitive markets.8 Corporations as political communities It appears to be possible to look politically at the business world in a different way, viewing firms as being themselves ‘‘small’’ political communities. The very basic idea here is the following: the modern business firm is not only an organization for making decisions in a market economy. Economics organizations are, sometimes, huge communities ‘‘populated’’ by hundreds and thousands of employees with a variety of interests, values, and different conceptions of the good life. These ‘‘organizational citizens’’ 337 create ties, cooperate, regulate conflicts, and coordinate their efforts through different ‘‘political’’ mechanisms of collective decision making.9 This view of corporations as small political communities is implicit in Christopher McMahon’s suggestion that the task of justifying the existence of the firm in our economic systems is analogous to the task of justifying the existence of the state (McMahon 1994, 1995, 2007). From this point of view, it is possible to make what Joshua Cohen calls ‘‘parallel case arguments’’ according to which it is plausible to claim that workers stand in relation to economic enterprises in a similar way as citizens stand in relation to the state.10 If political theorists have been concerned with the exercise of legitimate authority by the state, then they also must be concerned with the way that economic organizations, especially large corporations, are organized.11 In his study on what he calls the ‘‘political theory of organizations’’, McMahon appears to make two claims about the political aspects of business organizations. First, that given their size and organizational resources, some important political decisions are left to be made by corporations; and second, that firms are analogous in some way to political communities. These claims draw our attention to two different meanings of corporations as political actors that I want to highlight here. The first claim is about the external effects of corporate activities and corresponds broadly to what I call the view of ‘‘corporations as distributive agents.’’ In this view, some important ‘‘political’’ decisions are made by corporations in the sense that they have an impact on who gets what, when, and how in our societies. The second claim draws our attention to another political aspect of firms because it is a claim about the internal organization of corporations and leads us to the view of corporations as political communities. It is a claim about those who are ‘‘inside’’ the firm. As such, ‘‘political theorists’’ of the firm appear to have some reasons to draw our attention to issues of authority in such relations. It is often claimed, in the economic literature on the theory of the firm, that the main distinction between firms and markets is the exercise of authority within the firm (Hsieh, 2008). Contrary to competitive market relations structured by the price mechanism, intrafirm relations are administrated relations that are governed by the rules that structure the bureaucratic hierarchy of the 338 Pierre-Yves Néron organization (Heath, 2007, p. 359). McMahon wants to take seriously the normative aspect of this feature of intrafirm relations while asking the question of the foundations of the authority exercised by managers in such hierarchical bureaucratic structures (1994). Of course, the association suggested by McMahon between the state and the firm as both being similar political units is probably too strong, and could be contested. Phillips and Margolis, for example, criticize this analogy as being misleading (1999). As they point out, states and firms (and associations in general) could also be viewed as having very different features and purposes. They insist on three major differences between states and large corporations: – Exit: freedom to exit from a state is quite different than freedom to exit from a corporation. Freedom of exit is a fundamental normative component of what organizational membership means, just as its impossibility is constitutive of state membership. – Aims and purposes: It is appropriate to expect organizations to promote specific aims and goals, but not for a state. – Mutual assessment of contribution: the mutual evaluation of members of economic organizations is different from the evaluation of members of a state, which should be viewed as a community of equals. Firms tolerate a greater level of meritocracy and it should be the case. Philips and Margolis’ message is clear. Even if we agree with McMahon that we should care about the way large corporations are organized, the analogy with the state is too strong. We should not underestimate some important features of the state, most notably those related to its coercive power. The problem of protecting citizens from abuse and exploitation by the state might differ in some ways from the protection of worker interests in the workplace. As Moriarty puts it, the point is that we all know that there is a difference between Saddam Hussein and Montgomery Burns (Moriarty, 2005). Despite these criticisms, it seems appealing to refer to firms, not necessarily as quasi-states, but as some sort of political communities. After all, similar to political communities organized through some variety of government, corporations are sites of power, collective action and decision making. One could argue, as Walzer did a long time ago, that the analogy works better with cities. Cites, similar to firms, ‘‘are created by entrepreneurial energy, enterprise, and risk taking; and they too, recruit and hold their citizens, by offering them and attractive place to live’’ (Walzer, 1984, p. 295). In drawing this Walzerian analogy, one is led to see the differences between firms and political communities similar to states and cities as matter of degree (Moriarty, 2005). For example, it is true that state membership is not the same as organizational membership. The voluntariness is more important when we think about the latter than when we think about the former, because the possibility of exit is greater in corporations. However, at the same time, one should not exaggerate the possibility of exit in corporations. Exit from a corporation could be easier in some degree than exit from a state, but it could also be painful. It involves research costs in finding a new job as well as transition costs in making the move from one job to another.12 As Moriarty puts it: ‘‘It is obvious that leaving one’s country is difficult. It is perhaps not appreciated how difficult leaving one’s job can be. For many workers, leaving a job means losing seniority, retirement funds, health benefits, job-specific skills, community ties, and friends. Most will need to find new jobs, and these can be hard to find.’’ (Moriarty, 2005, p. 460). If there are such important limits to the freedom of exit from corporations, then one should regard voice as a significant alternative. Where the costs of exit are very high, workers should be able to rely on voice, the capacity to express dissent, and contest some of corporate policies without exiting (Hsieh, 2005). In recent articles, Nien-hê Hsieh goes in the same direction by drawing some attention to issues of distributive justice in the organized production of goods and services, which he perceives as an underestimated topic in contemporary political philosophy. He reviews contemporary studies on the various demands that workers can legitimately make to managers and examines claims about meaningful work and worker participation in firms’ governance structures. While insisting on the requirement to go beyond parallel case arguments, Hsieh suggests that the need for efficient decision making in contemporary economic organizations involves the possibility of substantial Business and the Polis arbitrary interference from managers in the lives of workers. This feature, according to him, should draw our attention to the legitimacy of power and authority in corporate structures (Hsieh, 2005, 2006, 2008). Here, it should be noted that my aim is not necessarily to articulate and to defend these claims. It is rather to show how the idea of corporations as political communities points in some refreshing directions. When Hsieh asks what justice requires in economic production and evaluates the moral importance of ‘‘voice’’ beside ‘‘exit’’ and the notion of ‘‘meaningful work,’’ he gives us a good idea of what it could mean to take a political look at what is going on inside the firm. My primary concern, hence, is to illuminate the style of analysis and normative reasoning suggested by the view of firms as political communities, and how the use of a political lens can contribute to a better understanding of some forms of participation in economic enterprises and some under-theorized intrafirm relations (such as the contestation of managerial decisions and authority). Take, for instance, the classical accounts of the theory of the firm. One clear advantage of using a political lens in viewing intrafirm relations is that it might help to highlight some neglected aspects in the economic theory of the firm in which corporations are seen as a nexus of contracts. In this view, the firm is understood as a set of principal–agent relations that necessarily create agency problems. The main objective of the governance structures of the firm is then to overcome these agency problems by providing the appropriate set of incentives. However, in some versions of the theory, it is easy to find a quite pejorative view of the ‘‘agents’’ who are supposed to act in the interest of the principal. While reading the literature on ‘‘agency theory,’’ one could have the feeling that ‘‘agents’’ similar to employees are simply depicted as lazy opportunists who will avoid working whenever the boss isn’t looking (Heath, 2009). The problem with this view is not only that it fails to provide a proper account of agents’ moral motivations but also that it fails to provide an appropriate understanding of the rich life of complex organizations. It generally fails to explain why employees do not only respond to external incentives but also develop some moral allegiances to their business organizations. It fails to explain why successful 339 management and organizational strategies to overcome agency problems do not only always rely on the good engineering of external incentives but also on building a strong organizational culture that promotes trust.13 To see firms as some sort of political communities offers a promising way to overcome some of the major weaknesses of agency theory, or at least to shed some light on under examined aspects of the rich and complex life of modern economic organizations. It is so because it might help us tell better stories about these complex organizations. To suggest that firms are somehow small political communities explains partly in which ways organizations such as firms matter for their members. It allows us to describe groups similar to the group of employees as members of a community with an organizational culture, some common values, and specific common goals. The fact is that these members are not only a part of a useful division of labor but persons with values and a particular conception of the good life. Moreover what a community such as a firm provides is not only a job but also community ties and friends. For many of us who spend most of our life in that kind of community, it is an important source of meaning.14 Here again, my aim is not to develop an alternative to agency theory. It is to illustrate the style of analysis suggested by the ‘‘firms as political things’’ perspective. My point is that in allowing us to focus on such themes as community ties, trust-building, loyalty, belonging, culture, and leadership in terms of what Gary Miller calls ‘‘political leadership,’’ it might provide some insights to better understand how hundreds and thousands of agency problems are solved on a daily basis by huge organizations (Miller, 1993, Chap. 11). Of course, the use of the idea of firms as political communities should not lead to an overestimation of the degree of harmony and trust in firms. The life of economic organizations is also about conflicts. Different groups inside the firm can have highly divergent interests and cooperation is not easy to enforce. However, is also this is also what the idea of corporations as political communities is about. It should also be understood as a way to focus on these different conflicts, not only between shareholders and managers, but also among many different stakeholders.15 340 Pierre-Yves Néron One of the most radical theoretical ways to follow this path and to see corporations as political communities is probably to be found in the Crane et al.’s approach of ‘‘stakeholders as citizens’’. In a way that could be reminiscent of some republican accounts of the workplace, the authors suggest that we push the stakeholder theory a little bit further in theorizing the groups usually referred to as stakeholders as ‘‘citizens.’’16 This shift from stakeholders to citizens undoubtedly suggests a focus on the political dimensions of economic organizations. Corporations, in this view, are seen as communities of ‘‘internal’’ citizens in constant relations with ‘‘external’’ citizens such as NGOs and consumers. This is highly seductive. The language of citizenship is a powerful and inspiring one. However, this attempt to politicize the relations between different firm groups using the vocabulary of citizenship could also be problematic. One could doubt whether it really helps to clarify the nature of obligations that arise within these specific relations. For example, Crane et al. contend that ‘‘thinking about corporations as dealing here with ‘citizens’ rather than simply ‘consumers’ or ‘employees’, etc. brings up several issues.’’ (2004, p. 110). Note the language. According to this approach, we should not refer to key groups affected by the firm’s activities as ‘‘simply’’ employees or consumers but as citizens. It clearly suggests that our usual language is insufficient, and it posits the language of citizenship as a ‘‘richer’’ one. In some sense, it is obviously true. As I noticed earlier, it is true that individuals who have a job in a firm are not only employees who accomplish some kind of work. They have rich backgrounds, ideas, values, and a conception of the good life; they may also disagree with some of their firm’s policies or decisions. However, it is also true that the language of citizenship is very general and highly abstract, in the sense that it does not capture very well the variety of roles and functions of moral agents in a complex institutional division of labor; and the rights and obligations that derivate from those roles and functions. It is, in fact, very useful to refer to the group that provides labor as ‘‘simple’’ employees or to the group that provides financial capital as ‘‘simple’’ shareholders because it helps to clarify the nature of the relation in which they are involved.17 The introduction of a language with strong political connotations (e.g., the language of citizenship) should not undermine the insights provided by an ethics of roles. Another possible problem with this view is that it often presupposes that seeing the firm as political communities will lead to the justification of some specific normative conclusions, namely those usually defended in stakeholder theories. For instance, Crane et al.’s (2004) account of firms’ key stakeholders as ‘‘citizens,’’ it clearly leads to a radical critique of the shareholder view of the firm and to the defense of what could be associated with a democratization of the firm. However, it is interesting to note that an economist such as Hansmann (1996), while analyzing the different structures of ownership in his impressive book The Ownership of Enterprise has also argued that ‘‘one theme that has emerged with particular force is the importance of viewing the firm as a political institution’’ (1996, p. 287 my emphasis). Of course, Hansmann’s theory is far from the theory of corporate citizenship or the idea of workplace republicanism and could eventually lead to a radical critique of stakeholder theory. But it is extremely significant that he, too, refers to the firm as a ‘‘political institution’’ without drawing radical propositions for change in the structures and patterns of ownership or defending the ‘‘stakeholder firm.’’ The firm here is labeled as a political institution by Hansmann because his account stresses the importance of the costs of collective decision making among different groups of ‘‘patrons’’ with different interests. In some sense, he essentially agrees with James March’s famous conception of the firm as a political coalition. The composition, goals, and ownership structures of the firm are not given; they are negotiated, and determined through a set of political decision-making mechanisms inside the firm.18 This is why Hansmann is able to illuminate the importance of the costs of collective decision making as one of the main explanatory factors in ownership patterns. Firms, in Hansmann’s framework, are political communities that regroup different actors who are precisely seeking to reduce the costs of politics. A thoughtful examination of these debates on ownership and the cost of collective decision making is, of course, beyond the scope of this article. However, this overview highlights the various possible uses of a political language to talk about economic organizations. Moreover, it highlights also the Business and the Polis differences in scope and potential radicalism of the project. Corporate activities and policies as citizenship issues The first two views of corporations as political things insist on a distinction between the internal organization of the firm and external relations with societies as a whole. A third way to look at the political nature of business is to examine some corporate policies, structures, and practices as ‘‘citizenship issues’’ while also looking at broader societal issues. Here, by ‘‘citizenship issues,’’ I refer to corporations’ policies, structures, and practices that seem to be at the basis of political reactions from citizens or groups of citizens. Hence, corporations are not seen metaphorically as ‘‘citizens,’’ but as a growing matter of concern for real citizens. Their operations are then seen as ‘‘citizenship’’ issues. It is important here to note that individual citizenship refers not only to a legal status or to what this status means for the identity of those who enjoy it, but also to a set of attitudes or virtues.19 Citizenship does not refer only to a politico-legal status and to an aspect of personal identity, but also to a practice. Citizens are expected to behave in certain ways (engaging responsibly in public discourses, respecting the rights of others, seeing the big picture, etc.) and to engage in some types of activities (voting, participating to a certain degree in public debates, etc.).20 This third suggested way of looking at the political nature of business insists on this practical dimension of citizenship and the set of behaviors and activities associated there with. It starts from the realization some of these citizenship practices (from individual citizens) are now redirected toward corporations and business actors instead of being primarily directed toward governments.21 The importance of this redirection of political activities by individual citizens and groups was stressed by Hertz in her ‘‘Better to shop than vote’’ article where she states, very enthusiastically: … instead of showing up at the voting booth to register their demands and wants, people are turning to corporations. The most effective way to be political today is not to cast your vote at the ballot box but to 341 do so at the supermarket or at a shareholder’s meeting. Why? Because corporations respond (Hertz, 2001, p. 191). Of course, it is not necessary to be as enthusiastic as Hertz about the political effects of shopping and shareholder activism to take this ‘‘mutation’’ in citizenship’s activities and behaviors seriously. Crane and Matten take a more modest stance and suggest that to apply citizenship thinking to the business world doesn’t consist simply in taking a citizenship concept ‘‘from outhere’’ and apply it to corporations (2008, p. 32). It obscures the fact that corporations themselves are subtly and sophistically involved in this reshaping of citizenship in general. They suggest, rightly, that we should see some reactions to corporate power through this citizenship, hence political, lens. When NGOs and local communities complain about some corporate operations, certainly, it should not be viewed only as a market disoperation or as public relations failures by corporations themselves but also as ‘‘examples of a citizenry unhappy about the inequitable distribution of power to ‘corporate citizens’ ‘‘(2008, p. 29). As the view of corporations as political communities draws our attention to some political aspects of what is going on inside the firm, this view of corporate policies and practices as ‘‘citizenship issues’’ suggests that what is going on inside the firm also matters for larger political communities. Not only social and environmental impact of firms, but also the political decision-making process, organization, and structures of firms are crucial for broader political communities. Talks about CSR, sustainable development, corporate citizenship, or triple bottom line, of course, reflect this. However, the apparently more neutral language of ‘‘corporate governance reforms’’ also hides political dimensions, as illuminated by recent studies of corporate governance patterns. Gourevitch and Shinn (2005), for instance, in their illuminating book, examine how patterns of corporate governance are shaped by political structures and reflect public policy choices. Maintaining some distance from the classical nexus-of-contracts view of the firm while accepting its usefulness, they show how patterns of corporate governance are also influenced by various elements of politics – interests, institutions, and political conflicts. While doing so, they give us a better idea of how political movements, organizations, and parties, from 342 Pierre-Yves Néron both the right and the left, organized their discourses to favor changes in corporate governance structures.22 From that point of view, talks about the relations between corporations and the politically charged notion of citizenship are understood, not as an invitation to see corporations as citizens, but as a challenge to our understandings of citizenship practices and their preconditions. It is, thus, pretty similar to other propositions such as ‘‘cosmopolitan citizenship,’’ ‘‘ecological citizenship,’’ ‘‘transnational citizenship,’’ ‘‘postnational citizenship,’’ ‘‘diasporic citizenship’’ and so on. All these propositions, that Melissa Williams labels as the citizenships of globalization, aim to revisit our assumptions about citizens status, entitlements, and modes of participation in light of new societal developments (2007, p. 228). For example, ‘‘ecological citizenship’’ has become a popular way to frame debates in environmental politics, such as ‘‘cosmopolitan’’ and ‘‘transnational’’ citizenship have been frequently used as tools to think about issues of global justice. This is why, it should be stressed, that this redirection of citizenship activities from governments toward corporations is crucial for a theory of individual citizenship: its practices, institutions, preconditions, and so on. It does not justify the use of the metaphor of ‘‘corporate citizenship’’ as a tool to think about corporations’ responsibilities, obligations, and virtues. It is much more an argument for the idea that political philosophers of citizenship should think more seriously about the role of corporations in political life and discourses than it being an argument for the use of the language of citizenship to think about corporate responsibilities. Here, of course, an important issue concerns the normative evaluation of this mutation in the practical component of citizenship.23 It is one thing to say that there is such a redirection of citizenship practices, but it is another to evaluate it. It is not clear at all whether the most effective way to be political is to target corporations and whether it should be. Clearly, Hertz (quoted above) is not only trying to describe new citizenship activities but also celebrating them. Authors such as Crane, Matten, and Moon are not always clear about this. They seek to describe and illuminate what they perceive as new realities in the realm of citizenship, but at some point, they also seem to present these mutations in the practice of citizenship as being clearly desirable. Putting debates about the desirability and effectiveness of this mutation of citizenship aside, the contestation of corporate practices appears, nonetheless, to be increasingly important in the realm of individual citizenship. A striking feature of the postsocialist critique of capitalism is that several groups now devote most of their resources to orient changes in corporate practices and policies, instead of pushing for more regulation by governments or, more radically, for the nationalization of entire industries.24 The efforts of many activists from the left and critics of modern capitalism have been devoted trying to convince individual firms, using ‘‘naming and shaming’’ strategies and more collaborative ones, into accepting voluntary constraints on their practices and activities. As Wayne Norman states it, instead of using the language of socialism, class warfare, or struggles against private property, those critics of modern capitalism are most likely to formulate their criticisms and recommendations in the language of ‘‘corporate social responsibility,’’ ‘‘sustainable development,’’ and ‘‘stakeholder capitalism’’ (Norman, 2004).25 From this perspective then, what appears to be significant with this third way of looking politically at business practices and institutions is that it sheds some fresh light on the idea of social responsibility of business and the various ways it is embedded in political spheres and movements (Colomonos, 2005). The ‘‘market for virtues,’’ in which virtuous companies are recompensed and bad ones punished or ashamed, is a complex arena involving a plurality of actors that interact within complex networks of exchanges, collaboration, deliberation, and confrontation (Vogel, 2005; Colonomos, 2005). These complex interactions and the shaping and reshaping of this market for virtues could be described as what I shall call a ‘‘politics of accountability’’ in which corporations negotiate and renegotiate their place into society with consumers, media, politicians, governments regulators, and other ‘‘civil regulators’’ (Zadek, 2001) while ‘‘moral entrepreneurs’’ (Colonomos, 2005) such as NGOs seek to wield economic powers in two directions: by handing out economic rewards to the virtuous and to punish, by shaming them, those who fail to conform to a specific normative order.26 The protagonists of this politics of accountability are, of course, numerous. Shifts in languages and Business and the Polis strategies to render account or to force others to do so are frequent. Moreover, my aim is not to give a detailed account of this politics of accountability. It is to show how labeling corporate activities and policies as ‘‘citizenship issues’’ allows us to conceptualize CSR and stakeholder approaches not necessarily as a clear set of identifiable moral obligations for corporations not only ‘‘business-as-usual’’ strategies, but also as – Political discourses: discourses that aim to articulate some ‘‘contestation claims’’ and accountability demands from a discontented citizenry about the impact of some corporate practices and operations and the designs of markets; and – Political strategies: strategies and tactics that aim to advance some particular set of issues, agendas, or interests on the public sphere by targeting market actors instead of governments. It should also be noted that Crane et al. suggest going a little further in our conceptualization of the relations between citizenship and markets actors such as corporations (2008a, b). According to them, we should not entirely focus on the role of corporations in the reshaping of the practical dimension of citizenship, but also on their roles in the administration of individual citizenship rights. This is an important theme in their most recent writings. Corporations are now playing a radically new key role in governing citizenship next to governments. This is, of course, very important. If we think, as Crane and al. urge that we do, that corporations now play a significant role in what they call the administration of citizenship, then it could have an impact on both the conceptualization of corporate responsibilities and our theorizing about individual citizenship. However, here, it should be said that, in some sense, the idea that corporations play a significant role in the administration of citizenship is nothing new. Moreover, this is close to the first view of firms as distributive agents. This is because as market actors, corporations are a part of a complex institutional matrix that provides important ‘‘citizenship goods’’ for individuals. They provide jobs, retirement plans, and financial security similarly as media provide important citizenship goods in providing information for open public debate. Therefore, when Crane and Matten suggest that we 343 should think of the new ‘‘incorporation of citizenship,’’ they tend to overestimate the novelty of the dynamic they are trying to shed some light upon. Corporations as participants in the political process A fourth, and probably the most straightforward, way that uses a political lens to think normatively about business practices and institutions is to regard corporations as actors that can influence the construction of public policies, regulations, and laws. Business organizations simply have become – through their zealous lobbying, contributions to political action committees (PAC), public declarations, participation in public debates, provision of information, participation in public consultation processes, and so on – significant actors of the ‘‘advocacy politics’’ of democratic societies.27 Here, it is important to distinguish this fourth understanding of corporations as political actors from the first one, of corporations as ‘‘distributive agents’’. In this first understanding, businesses are political actors because they are important social institutions with considerable financial and organizational resources that have a profound impact on who gets what, when, and how. In this ‘‘stakeholder’’ sense, corporations are political actors because they are, by nature, social institutions. However, here, corporations become political actors in intentionally trying to influence the construction of public policies, regulations, and laws. This is significant because it represents a way to take seriously the distinction between the systemic effects of business on politics and the intentional influence of firms on the political process (Bernhagen and Bräuninger, 2005). As noted above, firms clearly classify as political actors in the sense that the design of markets and business organizations have significant distributive effects on many groups. However, as (sometimes, quite active) participants in the political process, corporations do not become political actors by simply doing their job in competitive markets. They intentionally enter the political arena to influence the shaping and reshaping of their regulatory environment. This distinction is important from a normative point of view because it refers to different kinds of relations between firms and other social institutions, and it also suggests that 344 Pierre-Yves Néron we might want to apply different normative tools or languages to think about these relations. At this point, it is worth noting that this fourth, quite obvious, way to think about the political nature of the firm has been surprisingly overlooked in normative debates about the desirable conduct of business and the design of markets. As Leonard Weber points out, in a rare academic discussion on the ethics of corporate political activities, it seems that questions about the legitimacy of corporate political activities such as zealous lobbying and contributions to PAC are being pushed more by NGOs, and activists (shareholders and non-shareholders) than by academics with an interest in the normative analysis of businesses practices (Weber, 1997, p. 72).28 In general, normative theories of corporate rights, obligations, virtues, and so on, have failed to take seriously David Vogel’s suggestion that ‘‘the most critical dimension of corporate responsibility may well be a company’s impact on public policy’’ (2005, p. 171). This should be regarded as regrettable. There are significant ethical concerns about the role of corporations in advocacy politics (and also the role of money in politics in general), in contemporary democracies.29 Given the asymmetry of power between citizens and ‘‘corporate citizens,’’ certain questions do arise: What should be the proper role of corporations in the political realm? Do corporations have the right to influence elections? How should top executives think about the way their corporations could influence governments? Should responsible corporations restrain themselves in the political realm or even that, as the former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich argues, they have a responsibility to ‘‘respect the political process by staying out of it’’ (Reich, 1998, p. 16)? Answers to these questions should be considered as crucial parts of a definition of what it is to be a responsible economic organization, at home and abroad. In order to develop that line of argument, of course, one has to recognize the fundamental role government regulations play in the promotion and implementation of responsible business practices (most notably as the main institutional response to market failures) (Heath and Norman, 2004; Heath, 2006). Moreover, after focusing on how paramount state regulation has been over the past century in making corporations more responsible, we also realize that we must pay much more attention to the responsibilities of corporations within the political and administrative processes that lead to the reform of government regulation. One has also to recognize that firms are ‘‘political actors’’ in the sense that they are key actors of the advocacy politics, who influence the construction of public policies, regulations, and laws. Therefore, if government regulations play such a fundamental role that the shape and content of such regulations are now heavily influenced by firms themselves, then one of the main aspects of the definition of a responsible business organization should be the determination of its political role and the limits of this role. This could lead us far given the historical and ideological opposition of the business world to government regulations (Baumol, 1974). As Joseph Heath puts it, ‘‘one of the more troubling features of the way businesses conduct themselves in the public sphere is that they consistently lobby against regulations that are designed to correct market failures’’ (2007, p. 371). Hence, my suggestion is that one very interesting implication of taking such a stance is that it points out some of the most morally problematic aspects of the conduct of corporations, namely, the entrenchment of market failures by political oppositions to their correction by the state. Building the political theory of the firm: some challenges In the preceding section, I have made several suggestions on the various possible ways in which to use a political language to think about business practices and institutions. What should we think about this call for a more explicitly political conceptualization of normative issues that arise in the conduct of business? How should we welcome the use of political language to think about these issues? What does the future of a ‘‘political theory of the firm’’ look like? In order to suggest some possible answers to these questions, I would like to conclude by highlighting some problems with this political theory of the firm. While doing so, I do not want to imply that building such a theory is unworthy. I think that doing so is one of the main tasks of academics with an interest in the normative study of business practices and institutions. As a consequence, Business and the Polis I want to contribute to future debates about the political nature of business by suggesting three challenges that need to be overcome. One striking feature of this call is that it is highly seductive. It appears to correspond to some of our intuitions about some features of the business world. Moreover, after examination, it seems to be a fruitful way to open new debates and illuminate certain dimensions that might otherwise go unexamined in ‘‘classical’’ business ethics. Of course, seeing corporations as political actors could be a good way to take very seriously the common (and often vague) suggestion that business organizations are not purely economic ones. Investigation of the ‘‘political’’ in business life could then serve to clarify what we mean exactly when we say that business organizations are not purely economic ones. It could also illuminate some aspects of these organizations in putting the spotlight on some internal relations between groups inside the firm (shareholders, nonshareholder groups, and the management). However, it could also be said that this invitation to think more politically about business remains, at least partly, very vague, especially when authors as diverse as Crane, Matten, Palazzo, McMahon, Hartman, Walzer, Dahl, Hsieh, and Hansmann, with very different intellectual projects and political orientations, refer to corporations as political ‘‘entities,’’ ‘‘actors,’’ or ‘‘institutions.’’ Furthermore, it is not self-evident that it always helps to think more clearly about some issues and problems to systematically label these issues and problems as ‘‘political.’’ These remarks make clear that it would be highly problematic to simply talk about every problem or intellectual project in business ethics as ‘‘political’’ ones. Let us call it the over-inclusion problem. This is important because this call for a better understanding of corporations from a political point of view seems to be especially vulnerable to this problem. As a consequence, the first challenge facing the political theory of the firm would be to overcome this overinclusion problem. One way to do so is by drawing the kind of distinctions drawn in this article, which appears to be a useful way to show the variety of intellectual projects behind this call. It is useful because it ‘‘compartmentalizes’’ this very general idea of a ‘‘political theory of the firm.’’ It retains the basic intuitions behind this call for a political view of the 345 firm while insisting on the variety of relations and interactions that fall under this political umbrella. In order to show that such a theory has different compartments is important to put aside a tendency toward uniformity that is inherent to the overinclusion problem. Business ethicists appear to be often tempted by the formulation of a moral uniform code in which a theory of general morality (Kantian, utilitarian, Aristotelician) is applied to business problems (Heath, 2007).30 It would be tempting for theorists of the political nature of corporations to do the same, i.e., to use a political language in such a way to think about every business relation. It is probably a mistake done by Crane and Matten in using the citizenship language to think about almost every problem in the normative evaluation of business practices and institutions, from corporate governance matters to consumer’s choices through CSRs, industrial relations, and meaningful work. As noted above, this is well exemplified by their call for a theory that understands workers as ‘‘citizens’’ instead of viewing them as ‘‘simple’’ employees. The problem with this claim is that it overlooks the importance of a complex institutional division of labor in which human agents play different kinds of roles. Human beings can wear different hats depending on the kind of institutional interactions in which they are involved. The basic insight of what could be called an ‘‘ethics of roles’’ is that the recognition of the importance of this complex institutional division of labor is crucial in the way we think about the rights, responsibilities, obligations, and virtues of moral agents. This is why the systematic use of the very general language of citizenship risks blurring our sensibility to considerations of division of moral labor and good institutional design. In order to put it simply, it is not morally insignificant to refer to those persons who do a specific job within an organization that we call a ‘‘corporation,’’ as ‘‘employees.’’ It situates them in an institutional context, giving us important insights about their rights and responsibilities, and their legitimate demands. It should be clear by now that a call for a political view of business ethics issues should not blur crucial differences between different kinds of interactions or relations and their different natures. This is why my characterization of these four views takes seriously the difference, stressed by Heath, between intrafirm 346 Pierre-Yves Néron relations and extrafirm relations (Heath 2006, 2007). Some extrafirm relations, such as business and government relations, are obviously political while some others, such as competitive practices between firms through market interactions, might not be especially well understood as political ones, both empirically and normatively. Meanwhile, some intrafirm relations, such as relations between employees and managers, could be fruitfully understood as political relations of power, authority, community, and trust building, but they remain eminently different from others types of political activities. Some other relations between economic actors are not straightforwardly political and, thus, are not especially well theorized as political relations or as citizenship activities. For instance, Hertz’s enthusiasm about shopping as the most efficient political activity in contemporary societies exudes overconfidence. Despite recurrent talk about the fall of nation states and a ‘‘silent takeover’’ by corporations, the state remains the key political actor, and changes in government have deep and pervasive impacts. Theorists of the political nature of corporations and business institutions should resist such enthusiasm in their attempts to shed some light on the political nature of corporate practices. A second problem would be the formulation of a political view of the firm that simply leads to a reaffirmation of the set of ideas usually associated with CSR and stakeholder theory. In this case, it would be impossible to differentiate this political approach from classical CSR and stakeholder approaches. Let us call this the differentiation problem. Some recent attempts to see corporations as political actors appear to fail overcoming this problem, and, thus, fail in meeting expectations. Despite the invitation to set up an agenda to build the new political conception of the firm and shed some light on under-theorized interactions and practices, these attempts offer something close to classical CSR accounts and stakeholders theories. For instance, one of the contributors to the report on the First Swiss Master Class in CSR (untitled ‘‘Corporations as Political Actors’’) refers to a debate on ‘‘whether or not business possesses a political responsibility beyond its traditional role in society’’ (Rasche et al., 2008, p. 154) and suggests that a political responsibility moves beyond philanthropic gestures and ‘‘encompass innovative models of business and practices that leverage that which motivates business in a way that results in social and environmental value creation.’’ (Rasche et al., 2008, p. 155). Another contributor argues that corporations have a political responsibility that ‘‘can be defined as: to respect human rights, avoid being complicit in human rights abuses, do what they can to promote human rights principles.’’ (Rasche et al., 2008, p. 164). These two formulations of the political responsibility of corporations are quite similar to classical accounts of CSR. It is in fact not self-evident that it helps to refer here to a political responsibility. Most theorists of CSR believe that social responsibility of business is not simply about philanthropic gestures and should ‘‘encompasses innovative models of business and practices that leverage that which motivates business in a way that results in social and environmental value creation.’’ In order to label this as a political responsibility appears to be a way to add some normative weight to a well-known statement. The same could be said about the second account of corporate political responsibility. Moreover, if we are to label these responsibilities as political responsibilities, then the focus on human rights alone is surprising. In fact, this definition of political responsibility fails to capture three of the four core areas of the UN Global Compact with corporations: labor standards, environment, and anti-corruption. Why should we think, for instance, that a negative obligation not to abuse human rights is best described as a political responsibility? Aren’t the collaboration and cooperation with relevant governmental and civil authorities to fight corruption in developing countries more straightforward political activities? Isn’t the lobbying of governmental agencies for stronger environmental regulations and standards a better example of an obvious, clear-cut political responsibility? Is there any reason to describe every ‘‘innovative model of business’’ as being political? Obviously, this association between the political view of business practices and the CSR agenda is not a problem in itself. It is, of course, a possible result of our inquiries. However, it would be mistaken to assume from the start that using a political lens to look at normative issues in the conduct of business would go hand in hand with something similar to a ‘‘strong CSR agenda.’’ We should not think that it will necessarily be the case. On the contrary, we Business and the Polis might be open to the possibility that taking such a stance could lead to surprising, unexpected results. One possibility, to overcome this problem, is to admit that among the four views examined here, some could be clearly more relevant or theoretically useful than others. For instance, one could say that the first view of firms as distributive agents is probably the most vulnerable to this differentiation problem. The idea of firms as political actors in this sense is well recognized in the CSR literature. It is the familiar idea that given their nature as ‘‘public’’ institutions, corporations cannot abdicate their broader social responsibilities. One might also plausibly argue that the view of corporations as political communities is more promising because it clearly appears to draw our attention to some undertheorized relations within the organizational structures of the firm. One might also say that, in order to overcome this differentiation problem, the fourth view of corporations as active participants in the political process appears to be especially promising. It is, of course, the most straightforward way to think politically about corporations, which puts aside difficulties related with problematic or unobvious uses of a political lens to think about business. However, it is also a view that might draw our attention to very specific, but fundamental, practices by corporate actors that are not especially well theorized with the tools provided by CSR and stakeholders theories. This is probably why Scherer and Palazzo suggest that some corporate activities in complex networks of (global) governance point to the need for a better understanding of the political nature of business (2007, p. 1115). The main contribution of a ‘‘political theory of the firm’’ then might not be to a reassessment of business practices in general, but to a point in the direction of a new theory of corporate responsibilities, which focuses on the various ways in which firms, in their external relations, interfere in the political process, in the direction of a robust normative theory of corporate lobbying. Interestingly enough, recent literature on the topic does not go in this direction. It rather suggests that the fact that corporations use zealous lobbying and political strategies to foster their economic ends does not change them into political actors (Crane et al., 2008a, b). It does not imply, as such, that they have a political responsibility. It is a very significant 347 feature of this literature that makes clear that the call for a better understanding of the political nature of businesses does not represent a way to draw some attention to a specific set of activities such as lobbying and campaign contributions. It seems to refer to something more. According to Crane, Matten, and Moon, for example, the theory of the firm as a political actor calls for a radical rethinking of the classical division of labor between business and government. It also states that corporations become political actors only when they adopt new patterns of behaviors oriented toward the ‘‘common good’’ (Crane et al., 2008a, b). It is then clear that authors such as Crane, Matten, and Moon seem to have in mind something else rather than a reaffirmation of a classical account of CSR, especially when they insist on the possibility of rethinking (maybe radically) the division of moral labor between business and government. Given this, it is probably useful here to draw a distinction between three different understandings of the call for a theory of the business firm as a political actor. As should be clear by now, some authors clearly refer to this as another way to defend CSR. Let us call it the Reaffirmation view. Some other scholars clearly refer to such a theory as a paradigm change in the way we normatively think about businesses’ roles and responsibilities in our societies. Let us call it the Shift in paradigm view. Proponents of this view associate the idea of the business firm as political actor as an opportunity to rethink the classical division of labor between business and government and to redefine corporate social and environmental roles and responsibilities in a more expensive way. Another way to understand this call for a ‘‘political’’ theory of the business firm is to see it as a useful way to draw some attention to a specific set of corporate activities such as lobbying, contributions to campaigns, and so on. Let us call it the Shift in subject view. According to this view, recent literature on the firm as political actor suggests, more modestly, a change in the subject of our thinking about corporate roles and responsibilities. It draws our attention to the importance of corporate political activities and suggests the need for more theoretical tools to think normatively about and design principles for business and government relations. This classification of the different positions should give us a better idea of the varieties of projects and 348 Pierre-Yves Néron their scope. The Reaffirmation view is of course facing the differentiation problem and seems to imply that call for a political theory of the firm might not be especially fruitful. The Shift in paradigm view does not face this problem and clearly implies a more radical project. The proponents of this view suggest a new paradigm in which corporations are understood as assuming new roles of governance and statealike responsibilities (Crane et al., 2008a, b). They are, therefore, able to put aside the differentiation problem, but are probably facing what I called the over-inclusion problem: the risk, under a new paradigm, to label every issue of business ethics as ‘‘political’’ ones without making any real theoretical improvement. By suggesting that the fourth way to think politically about corporations (Corporations as participants in the political process) might be the most fruitful one, I am, therefore, proposing something more in the lines of the Shift in subject view. It does not simply reaffirm classical CSR discourses, but does not necessarily assert the need for a paradigm change in business ethics. It simply stresses, maybe more modestly and less enthusiastically, the need for a better normative theory of (classical) corporate political activities. Finally, the third, probably more abstract, challenge is to realize that the choice of using a political lens to examine issues of business ethics is itself partly political. In the preceding section, I have proposed four directions in which it could be theoretically fruitful to think about the complex relations between the business world and the polis. It is worth noting that these various ways to think politically about business practices and institutions are not really consensual. As Crane and Matten point out, there are some resistances in business circles to the very idea that firms be seen as embedded in some sort of political relationships that the call for a political theory of the firm is trying to shed light upon (2008, p. 30). This is because the very idea of using a language with strong political connotations is, from the start, a controversial one. It suggests unobvious ways to publicly talk about business ethics. Let me just give two examples. First, CEOs and top management executives may be especially reluctant to address issues about the legitimacy of management authority raised by the view of corporations as political communities. They might, for instance, be uncomfortable with the suggestion that ‘‘voice’’ should be viewed as a significant response to managerial decisions. Second, corporations could also be quite uncomfortable with my remarks on the importance of taking very seriously the fourth aspect (Corporations as participants in the political process) examined here in our normative discussions about corporate responsibilities. A conception of corporate roles and responsibilities that draws our attention to the ways firms interfere in the political process, and, therefore, in the shaping and reshaping of their regulatory environment, may have radical implications, given the ideological opposition and skepticism of the business class toward government regulations. Corporations generally wish to put the spotlight on their various direct charitable contributions to the community, but have little incentive to highlight their lobbying efforts, campaign contributions, political connections, and so on (Néron and Norman, 2008a, p. 17, b, pp. 62–65). In order to put it crudely, they will tend to promote their own green innovations and practices inside their organizations, such as the use of recto–verso for the production and distribution of corporate documentation, but will have fewer incentives to be transparent about how they lobbied to defeat stronger environmental regulations inspired by the protocol of Kyoto. In contrast, some NGOs and critics of capitalism might have reasons to favor this introduction of a ‘‘political’’ (in the fourth sense) view of the firm. As Néron and Norman argue, this kind of resistance from some groups to the introduction of specific ways to talk about corporate responsibilities could be partly explained by the fact that it is sometimes hard to draw a clear line between the analysis of the language of politics and an exercise in the politics of language (Néron and Norman, 2008b). This is because when evaluating a normative framework or language to think about business practices and institutions, we have to answer two related but different questions. First, we want to know whether the language or normative framework X is helpful for thinking in a clear, coherent way about corporate responsibilities (and their justifications). Second, we also want to ask ourselves whether the language or normative framework X is an efficient way of talking about responsible business practices in public discourses. The first question is largely calling for a ‘‘neutral’’ analysis of the language of Business and the Polis politics which aims to construct better normative theories about corporate duties and obligations; the second question is an invitation to engage in the politics of language, to propose guidance on how we should or shouldn’t use different normative frameworks to promote what we would consider to be more desirable outcomes in the social world.31 In order to use the title of Williams Connelly’s important book, we engage in such a process to modify the ‘‘terms of political discourse’’ (1983). Given the above-mentioned sort of dynamic, it is not very surprising that some business circles might be uneasy with a more explicitly political language to talk about their responsibilities, practices, and internal organization, while some of their critics could enthusiastically embrace this language. In that case, the ‘‘politics of language’’ of the corporate world would consist in resisting the introduction of a more explicitly political language and promoting other, maybe more pro-business, normative languages. From this point of view, the debate about the introduction of a political language to think about business practices and institutions is itself political because it is a way to engage in the shaping and reshaping of the terms and structures of public debates and discourses about business practices and institutions. Conclusion Recent literature in business ethics suggests that there has been a call for a ‘‘political’’ understanding of corporations, and business practices and institutions in general – a call for what could be designated as a ‘‘political theory of the firm’’ or a ‘‘theory of the firm as a political actor.’’ This article aimed to investigate what it means to take seriously this call. In order to do so, it proposed four different ways, and their potential implications, to think politically about issues in business ethics. It also showed how recent literature has failed to take seriously these distinctions and, therefore, has failed to identify the proper scope of the project. This is the reason why this article also points to some potential difficulties that theorists involved in this project need to overcome. Of course, none of these critical comments or the clarification attempts made in this article should be viewed as a rejection 349 of the project. Clearly, it is a worthy one. They should be viewed as an attempt to orient the whole project, as an invitation to not overestimating its scope, to put aside overconfident claims, and to be careful about its implications. The utilization of a political lens to look at some aspects of the business world is clearly useful to think in an imaginative, empirically informed way about normative issues related to business practices and institutions. In this sense, it might be useful to overcome what Hanlon calls the ‘‘denial of politics’’ in business ethics. However, it is also clearly the case that some relations are not especially well theorized as ‘‘political’’ ones. Moreover, some, e.g., shopping, are at best problematically theorized as being political. We should always keep in mind that while there are some grains of truth in the slogan ‘‘Everything is political,’’ some things are more political than others. Notes 1 For some reflections, which I draw here, on this plurality of languages or framework, see Néron and Norman (2008a, pp. 4–6). 2 See also Jeurissen (2004), Waddock (2004), and Zadek (2001). See Matten and Crane (2002, 2005), Moon et al. (2005), and Néron and Norman (2008a) for an analysis and a critique of this association of corporate citizenship with CSR. 3 See Heath for the importance of applying very different ‘‘normative logics’’ to different relations inside the firm and outside the firm (Heath, 2006, 2007). 4 See Lynn Sharp Paine (2002, pp. 91–96). 5 See Boatright (2002) for a good discussion of this claim. 6 I use the term ‘‘institutions’’ here to talk about formal organizations. 7 See Bernhagen and Bräuninger (2005, p. 43). 8 Here, see Heath (2006, pp. 540–542). See also Stiglitz (1996). 9 This could be reminiscent of James G. March’s famous study on the firm as a political coalition (March, 1962). 10 See Cohen (1989, p. 27) for an excellent account of parallel case arguments and the need to go beyond, see Hsieh (2008, pp. 15–22). 11 In the preface of his 1994 book Authority and Democracy, McMahon wrote that ‘‘The authority of governments might also be called political authority, although for reasons that will become clear as we 350 Pierre-Yves Néron proceed, I believe that in important respects managerial authority deserves the label ‘political’ as well.’’ (1994, p. xiii). 12 See Hsieh (2005, 2008) for a good discussion of the limits of exit. 13 See Dees (1992) for a good survey of the problems and limits of the principal–agent analysis of the firm. See Gary Miller for an attempt to produce a more sophisticated account of agency theory. 14 See Lynn Sharp Paine (2002) for a very interesting account of what she calls the ‘‘pervasive presence’’ of corporations in our individual life. 15 Of course, conflicts also occur among minority shareholders and controlling shareholders. 16 Here, I refer to Sandel’s (1998) account of the workplace in his defense of a ‘‘civic’’ economy. See Dagger (2006) and Hsieh (2006). 17 This is the basic point made by Joseph Heath (2006) in his critique of stakeholder theory. 18 Here, I almost use March’s words. See March (1962, p. 672). 19 For an account of citizenship in the liberal tradition, see Kymlicka and Norman (1994). 20 It should be noted that not all virtuous activities are recognized as examples of good citizenship. When people’s special efforts are directed toward their children, we call them ‘‘good parents’’. If a teacher pays special care to the welfare and education of his students we call him/her a good teacher. If your neighbors collect your mail while you are on vacation, then you will think of them as good neighbors; and so on. 21 David Vogel captured this shift in political activities with the title of his 1978 book ‘‘Lobbying the Corporation.’’ 22 See, of course, Gourevitch and Shinn (2005), and also Cioffi (2006). 23 Here, it could be fruitful to learn from recent debates in the theory of citizenship about the idea of ‘‘ecological citizenship’’ between Dobson (2003) and some of his critics. 24 For a great critical account of the rise and fall of SOE (state-owned enterprises), see Stiglitz in his ‘‘Whither Socialism.’’ 25 Of course, as Norman himself notices, this is a very incomplete characterization of the contemporary left. There are still quite radical socialists, left-libertarian, advocates of basic income schemes, luck egalitarians, and so on. Moreover, there is also a leftist critique of CSR and sustainable development. See Wayne Norman (2004) for a longer discussion of CSR and the left. 26 For some interesting remarks on what I call the ‘‘politics of accountability,’’ see Colomonos (2005) and also Kuper (2004). 27 It should be noted that the analysis of corporate involvement in the political process and democratic advocacy could raise some issues about the kind of agents that corporations are. Is a corporation simply a collection of individuals? Or, is it possible to make sense to view a corporation as a single agent, similar to an individual, with a set of specific political interests? Of course, to deal with these questions about the ontological status of corporations and collective agency is beyond the scope of this article. For a good recent account of these issues, see Pettit (2007). 28 Here, it should also be noted that there is a huge empirical literature on corporate political activities (see Mitnick, 1993a, b for an important contribution and Wood and Logsdon (2008) for a good bibliography of studies on CPA). My point is not to deny the relevance of this literature, but to highlight the neglect of CPAs in the conceptualization of corporate rights and obligations. 29 See Dworkin (2002). 30 Heath criticizes this tendency to use a uniform framework. 31 For this distinction, see Néron and Norman (2008b). For a good methodological analysis of our awareness (or lack of) about the importance of the choice of languages, see William Connolly’s important book (1983). See also David Miller’s analysis of ‘‘linguistic philosophy and political theory’’ (1985). References Baumol, W.: 1974, ‘Business Responsibility and Economic Behavior’, in M. 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Pierre-Yves Néron Centre de Recherche en Éthique de l’Université de Montréal (CRÉUM), Montréal, QC, Canada E-mail: pierre-yves.neron@umontreal.ca