Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-n9wrp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-18T19:26:31.685Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Missing the Target: Normative Stakeholder Theory and the Corporate Governance Debate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

John Hendry
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

After a decade of intensive debate, stakeholder ideas have come to exert a significant influence on academic management thinking, but normative stakeholder theory itself appears to be in considerable disarray. This paper attempts to untangle the confusion and to prepare the ground for a more productive approach to the normative stakeholder problem. The paper identifies three distinct kinds of normative stakeholder theory and three different levels of claim that can be made by such theories, and uses this classification to argue that stakeholder theorists have consistently pitched their sights either too high or too low to engage effectively with the rival shareholder theory. To the extent that they have their sights too high they have also undermined their own position by sacrificing credibility and introducing major problems of derivation.

Type
Corporate Governance
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 11 , Issue 1 , January 2001 , pp. 159 - 176
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 2001

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alchian, A. and Demsetz, H. 1972. “Production, Information Costs, and Economic Organization.” American Economic Review 62: 777–795.Google Scholar
Berle, A. A. and Means, G. C. 1932. The Modern Corporation and the Rise of Private Property. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Berle, A. A. Jr. 1931. “Corporate Powers as Powers in Trust.” Harvard Law Review 44: 1049.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berle, A. A. Jr. 1932. “For Whom are Corporate Managers Trustees: a Note.” Harvard Law Review 45: 1365–1372.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berman, S. L.; Wicks, A. C; Kotha, S.; and Jones, T. M. 1999. “Does Stakeholder Orientation Matter? The Relationship between Stakeholder Management Models and Firm Financial Performance.” Academy of Management Journal 42: 488–506.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boatright, J. R. 1994. “What’s So Special about Shareholders?” Business Ethics Quarterly 4: 393–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowie, N. 1998. “A Kantian Theory of Capitalism.” Business Ethics Quarterly, Special issue no. 1: 37–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brattan, W. J. Jr. 1994. “The New Economic Theory of the Firm: Critical Perspectives from History.” In The Law of the Business Enterprise, ed. Wheeler, S.New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Burton, B. K. and Dunn, C. P. 1996. “Feminist Ethics as Moral Grounding for Stakeholder Theory.” Business Ethics Quarterly 6: 133–148.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Child, J. W. and Marcoux, A. M. 1999. “Freeman and Evan: Stakeholder Theory and the Original Position.” Business Ethics Quarterly 9: 207–224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dodd, E. M. Jr. 1932. “For Whom are Corporate Managers Trustees?” Harvard Law Review 45: 1145–1163.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Donaldson, T. and Preston, L. E. 1995. “The Stakeholder Theory of the Corporation: Concepts, Evidence and Implications.” Academy of Management Review 20: 65–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evan, W. M. and Freeman, R. E. 1988. “A Stakeholder Theory of the Modern Corporation: Kantian Capitalism.” In Ethical Theory and Business, 2nd edition, ed. Beauchamp, T. and Bowie, N.Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall. Reprinted in subsequent editions. In 4th edition (1993) at pp. 75–93.Google Scholar
Freeman, R. E. 1984. Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach. Boston: Pitman.Google Scholar
Freeman, R. E. 1994. “The Politics of Stakeholder Theory: Some Future Directions.” Business Ethics Quarterly 4: 409–422.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freeman, R. E. 1999. “Divergent Stakeholder Theory.” Academy of Management Review 24: 233–236.Google Scholar
Freeman, R. E. and Evan, W. M. 1990. “Corporate Governance: A Stakeholder Interpretation.” Journal of Behavioral Economics 19: 337–359.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freeman, R. E. and Gilbert, D. R. Jr 1988. Corporate Strategy and the Search for Ethics. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Friedman, M. 1962. Capitalism and Freedom. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Friedman, M. 1970. “The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase Its Profits.” New York Times Magazine, September 13, 1970, pp. 32–33.Google Scholar
Fromm, E. 1978. To Have or to Be. London: Jonathan Cape.Google Scholar
Goodpaster, K. E. 1991. “Business Ethics and Stakeholder Analysis.” Business Ethics Quarterly 1: 53–73.Google Scholar
Goodpaster, K. E. and Holloran, T. E. 1994. “In Defense of a Paradox.” Business Ethics Quarterly 4: 423–430.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hasnas, J. 1998. “The Normative Theories of Business Ethics: A Guide for the Perplexed.” Business Ethics Quarterly 8: 19–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hendry, J. 1999. “Economic versus Social Relationship Models of the Firm as a Foundation for Normative Stakeholder Theory.” University of Cambridge, Judge Institute of Management Studies working paper.Google Scholar
Jensen, M. C. and Meckling, W. H. 1976. “Theory of the Firm: Managerial Behavior, Agency Costs, and Capital Structure.” Journal of Financial Economics 3: 305–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jensen, M. C. and Murphy, K. J. 1990. “CEO Incentives: It’s Not How Much You Pay, It’s How.” Harvard Business Review, May-June, pp. 138–153.Google Scholar
Jones, T. M. and Wicks, A. C. 1999. “Convergent Stakeholder Theory.” Academy of Management Review 24: 206–221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langtry, B. 1994. “Stakeholders and the Moral Responsibilities of Business.” Business Ethics Quarterly 4: 431–444.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Luhmann, N. 1995. Social Systems. Stanford Calif.: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Lyotard, J.-F. 1984. The Postmodern Condition. A Report on Knowledge. Manchester: Manchester University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marens, R. and Wicks, A. C. 1999. “Getting Real: Stakeholder Theory, Managerial Practice, and the General Irrelevance of Fiduciary Duties Owed to Stakeholders.” Business Ethics Quarterly 9: 273–294.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Monks, R. A. G. and Minow, N. 1991. Power and Accountability. New York: HarperCollins.Google Scholar
Monks, R. A. G. and Minow, N. 1995. Corporate Governance. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Phillips, R. A. 1997. “Stakeholder Theory and a Principle of Fairness.” Business Ethics Quarterly 7: 51–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawls, J. 1993. Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Rawls, J. 1971. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reed, D. 1999. “Stakeholder Management Theory: A Critical Theory Perspective.” Business Ethics Quarterly 9: 453–484.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ross, S. 1973. “The Economic Theory of Agency: The Principal’s Problem.” American Economic Review 63: 134–139.Google Scholar
Scott, J. 1997. Corporate Business and the Capitalist Classes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shankman, N. A. 1999. “Refraining the Debate between Agency and Stakeholder Theories of the Firm.” Journal of Business Ethics 19: 319–334.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shleifer, A. and Vishny, R. W. 1997. “A Survey of Corporate Governance.” Journal of Finance 52: 737–783.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wicks, A. C. 1998. “How Kantian a Theory of Capitalism?” Business Ethics Quarterly, Special Issue no. 1: 61–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wicks, A. C; Gilbert, D. R. Jr.; and Freeman, R. E. 1994. “A Feminist reinterpretation of the Stakeholder Concept.” Business Ethics Quarterly 4: 475–498.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williamson, O. E. 1975. Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Antitrust Implications. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, O. E. 1984. “Corporate Governance.” Yale Law Journal 93: 1197–1230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williamson, O. E. 1985. The Economic Institutions of Capitalism. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar