Reflecting on the Year's Progress Regarding Business and Society: Voices of Hope and Voices of Skepticism

Authors: Scully, Maureen; Roberts, Alex; CasePlace.org
Source: The Aspen Institute Center for Business Education
Year: 2005

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Abstract:

As 2005 draws to a close, it is a good time to review how corporations have changed the way they do business over the past year. Many large corporations, such as BP, GE, Goldman, and Wal-Mart, have announced changes in how they will relate to the environment and to key societal stakeholders, such as employees, communities, and the health care sector. Lee Scott, the CEO of Wal-Mart, details some specific policy changes in response to criticism of its environmental impact, lack of health care coverage for employees which burdens community hospitals, and low wages for employees. BP has targeted new environmental policies in response to charges of "green washing."

These proposed changes prompt the question: Will fundamental change really occur? Those who answer "yes" might appeal to the ideas that "small wins" do accumulate into more fundamental solutions to large societal issues, that sustained protest generates responses, and that even "window dressing" eventually pushes corporations toward living up to an image. Those who answer "no" might appeal to the ideas that "small wins" allow just enough venting that the status quo can persist, that corporations have sufficient power to resist pressures from critics, and that clever "window dressing" keeps external image management "loosely coupled" from fundamental change in operations.

To encourage discussion of this question at this annual time for reflection, we provide some readings from the business press, including press releases from corporate leaders with promising specifics about policy changes. We point to two conceptual background readings to introduce the ideas of "small wins" and of "loose coupling" between popular pronouncements about reform and everyday operations. These readings are frequently cited classics from the area of organizational theory and change.