Social Responsibility Of Business example essay topic

Business vs. the Environment Business today has so many responsibilities. Aside from making a profit, they are forced to take on a different responsibility, one that involves the environment. Even though, they already have many regulations set by the government, they are still being asked to answer to the call of helping out the rest of society take of nature. This essay will discuss the pros and cons of corporate responsibility for the environment through the agent-of-society and agent-of-capital views. The agent-of-society view holds that corporate managers are prima facie obligated to consider the interests of everyone who is likely to be affected by what managers decide to do.

With this view in mind, Michael Hoffman states, "Corporate managers should be held morally responsible for going beyond considerations of profits, law, and market morality to try to do what they can to help solve our most pressing environmental problems". In his article, Hoffman argues that business must creatively find ways to become part of the solution, instead of the problem. Business should try to become more environmentally friendly and think of ways to help mitigate the many environmental problems we have. Consumers argue they have no control over or say in whether business provides environmentally friendly products or not. They argue that it's not up to them "how the products are made, how the services are provided, or how the legislation is enacted". Although, some businesses have tried to come up with environmentally friendly products but they find that consumers are unwilling to pay extra for them.

He thinks corporations can and must develop a conscience, including an environmental conscience. Like the owner of the paper company, business should think of ways to stop the pollution and harm to the environment and take action quickly so that they can set an example for other businesses to follow. One really good point that Hoffman made was that to ensure the survival of the planet, society needs the cooperation of all its players to solve its most urgent problems. But businesses don't view this as something profitable to them so they don't spend the time, money, or resources to try to solve the problems. They feel as if this is a problem that the government needs to find appropriate solutions to. Businesses are not ready or capable to take risks or make sacrifices that will put them out of business.

The Environmental Defense Fund is now trying to encourage businesses into becoming more environmentally friendly. Their strategy "is to get businesses to help solve environmental problems by finding profitable or virtually costless ways for them to participate". They want to find win-win situations so that businesses will want to help. The agent-of-capital view holds that corporate managers are prima facie obligated to be an agent to the shareholders and focus on the pursuit of corporate profits within the "rules of the game" established by law and capitalist market morality. Milton Friedman's main theory is "the social responsibility of business is to produce goods and services and to make a profit for its shareholders, while playing within the rules of the market game; to engage in open and free competition without deception or fraud". Friedman also makes a very good point.

He says that "corporation is an artificial person and in this sense may have artificial responsibilities, but 'business' as a whole cannot be said to have responsibilities". Therefore, business cannot have a social conscience. Even if there are "social responsibilities", they are the responsibilities of the individuals, not the business. These corporate executives are also people in their own right who have their own "social responsibilities", but they are acting within the scope of their employment so they have to think of the business and the fact that they are spending someone else's money, namely the stockholders', the employees', and the customers' money. There are three arguments that I believe are the best when arguing for the agent-of-society view. First is Hoffman's view that "society needs the ethical vision and cooperation of all its players to solve its most urgent problems, especially one that involves the very survival of the planet itself".

In order for society to solve its problems, the people of the society need to come together and support each other in trying to find solutions to fix the problem. Everyone should bring their knowledge, expertise, and resources needed to deal with the environmental crisis. Second, Hoffman says the "we quite often act differently when we think of ourselves as consumers than when we think of ourselves as citizens". When we think of ourselves as consumers, we act for ourselves, more often then not; but as citizens, we take on a broader view and do what is best for our community. For example, if corporations need to raise prices in order to produce more environmentally friendly products, an ordinary consumer would object to the increase in prices, but a citizen, thinking of the long-run and of the community, would be okay in paying the higher price, knowing that, in the future, it would benefit them. And third, as I mentioned before, the Environmental Defense Fund has a new, encouraging strategy that gets business to help with the environmental crisis by finding profitable or costless ways for them to participate.

This is a win-win situation because we get the businesses to compromise and the environmentalists are happy to have some extra help. These are some of the good arguments one can use to show that the agent-of-society view should be adopted. Milton Friedman has something to say about this. He disagrees with Hoffman's view of agent-of-society and says that we shouldn't adopt it.

One of Friedman's main points is that business does not have a "social conscience" and therefore cannot be asked to take on "social responsibilities". He argues that only people have responsibilities; the individual businessmen and corporate managers, are the ones who have to take on this responsibility. His reason why business should not go above and beyond the law to enforce environmental policies is shown in the example of the taxes. If business was to find ways to restrain inflation, improve the environment, or fight poverty, businessmen would have to "decide whom to tax, by how much, and for what purpose", and then spend the proceeds in such a way that will help the cause. Friedman says this will not work because there are no checks and balances to assure that the desires of the public are being met nor do the businessmen making the decisions have a political right to do so. Although, Friedman argues for unanimity, saying that if we really do have a free market then individuals cannot force others to cooperate, he admits that conformity is unavoidable.

Even though people have a right to vote and a say in what happens, they still have to conform if they are overruled by the majority. That's just the way it is. So in adopting the agent-of-society view you are giving in, even more, to the conformity than before. The effectiveness of Friedman's main objection is very strong. To ask an "artificial person" to follow through with its "social responsibilities" just can't be done. I agree with Friedman and conclude that we should not adopt an agent-of-society view of corporate responsibility for the environment.

There are three reasons why I have come to this conclusion. First, although Hoffman's idea of society coming together to help save the environment and our planet is a good one, it will never work. There is not one single idea that society as a whole can agree on, especially not the environment, and as Friedman said, we will just have to conform to what everyone else agrees on. Second, even though we are all citizens, we tend to think of ourselves more as consumers because we are only focused on our well being and future.

We don't think of our every move as being something that will affect the environment or society. And lastly, I think Friedman is right in saying that business's only social responsibility is to use its resources to engage in increasing profits as long as they stay within the rules of the game. That is the sole function of a business. Government can keep changing the rules and adding to them but business will not go above and beyond what is necessary for them to maintain their profits. These reasons go to show that the agent-of-society view is not a good one to adopt.