This chapter introduces a “market failures” approach to business ethics, arguing that while profit is a core obligation, businesses also have a duty to avoid exploiting legal or structural gaps in the market in order to preserve trust, fair competition, and long-term legitimacy.

This report proposes a framework for integrating corporate value creation with societal outcomes, arguing that long-term business success depends on healthy economic, social, and environmental systems. It calls on companies to align strategy, governance, and performance measurement with broader system impacts, moving beyond short-term financial metrics toward shared value creation. 

This toolkit helps B Corps and values-driven companies turn their mission into action through clear steps for engaging in policy advocacy—offering templates, case studies, and guidance on building coalitions, crafting messages, and showing up credibly in the public arena.

This article argues that decarbonization policy should be rooted in pro-market principles that preserve competition, innovation, and price signals. It critiques subsidy-heavy approaches and proposes market-based mechanisms to accelerate emissions reductions while avoiding regulatory capture and distortion. 

Part II extends the pro-market argument, examining governance safeguards and institutional design to prevent rent-seeking in climate policy. It stresses regulatory clarity, competition policy alignment, and safeguards against policy capture to ensure emissions-reduction efforts remain innovation-driven and economically efficient. 

While this report more broadly assesses America’s competitiveness, Chapter 3: The Role of Business in Politics Today and Tomorrow, identifies the role of business in political gridlock, and suggests potential solutions. (See pg 28-36)

The updated B Lab certification standards include a new impact topic on “Government Affairs & Collective Action”, requiring companies to disclose and govern their political engagement, advocacy, lobbying practices and collective initiatives for systems change. The changes raise expectations for transparency and accountability in how firms use their influence and voice.

The updated B Lab certification standards include a new impact topic on “Government Affairs & Collective Action”, requiring companies to disclose and govern their political engagement, advocacy, lobbying practices and collective initiatives for systems change. The changes raise expectations for transparency and accountability in how firms use their influence and voice.

This book by Severin Wirz, an attorney specializing in U.S. and international anti-corruption law, traces the origins, enforcement, and global impact of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). It explores how anti-bribery law reshaped corporate conduct, compliance systems, and international business norms, illustrating how legal accountability mechanisms influence global markets and corporate political behavior. 

This teaching case by Rajat Panwar of Oregon State University, explores the tensions faced by companies such as Singapore’s Olam, in whether to continue to advocacy for farm subsidies that benefit the industry but undermine biodiversity and raise questions about their sustainability commitments. The case challenges students to consider how, even when companies are clear about their interests in nature, taking a public stance is politically sensitive. 

The article explains that capitalism and open markets can strengthen democracy by fostering pluralism, competition, and opportunities for independent groups to operate outside government control. It argues the bigger risk is when governments capture businesses through regulation, which reduces that independence and weakens democracy.

This article examines how current economic and political upheavals reflect an ongoing misalignment between business and economies and acceptable societal outcomes. Encourages re-examination of long-held assumptions. 

This report argues free enterprise supports both individual prosperity and societal well-being, advocating for competitive markets over government intervention to ensure long-term economic growth.

This essay explores tensions between classical-liberal and national-conservative visions of markets and the common good. Drawing on Catholic social teaching and Wilhelm Röpke’s political economy, Salter argues that free enterprise and moral order must be treated as complements, not substitutes. He calls for dispersed property, subsidiarity, and policies that support economic independence, civic virtue, and human flourishing. 

Related Topics to Check Out

Free Enterprise Competitive Markets (A) – Central theme: explores how markets serve the common good when balanced by moral and civic considerations rather than pure efficiency. 

Healthy, Stable Systems (A) – Advocates dispersed property and subsidiarity to sustain freedom and prevent concentration of power—key CPR system-stability goals. 

Corporate Citizenship (B) – Frames enterprise as a moral actor embedded in community life, with duties to uphold shared well-being beyond profit. 

Responsibility (B) – Highlights the moral obligations of firms and policymakers to design markets that sustain families, workers, and civic order. 

This initiative explores how clear, stable legal systems support freedom, innovation, and economic growth—laying the groundwork for healthy markets and democratic institutions.

This paper provides a deep and detailed examination of how economies and businesses fare under leaders who purport to be both pro-business and populist. With the increase in the number of populist leaders throughout the world, this question has become increasingly pressing. 

Ex ante regulation modeled on the FDA enhances public safety by rigorously assessing AI systems before deployment to prevent harm, while providing industry with clear, consistent standards that build consumer trust, reduce costly post-release failures, and foster sustainable innovation.

Authored by the Energy Transitions Commission, representing a wide array of perspectives, this report proposes a pathway to a net-zero global economy by mid-century. Specifically, it outlines three priorities for the 2020s: scaling proven zero-carbon solutions, creating supportive policy and investment environments, and advancing next-generation technologies for hard-to-abate sectors. It emphasizes practical actions for governments, investors, and businesses and stresses global collaboration to meet climate targets.

This study examines the global trend toward populism from 1900 to 2020 and its long-term economic impact. It finds that countries under populist leadership experience a 10% lower GDP per capita after 15 years compared to a plausible non-populist counterfactual, linking populist governance to economic instability, weakened institutions, and heightened risks for businesses and investors.

Highlights key factors required to refocus capitalism on long-term inclusive growth, including specific practices and policies that businesses should support. (See pg 5-13)

This volume explores the promise of free markets to deliver prosperity and well-being—and the social, political, and institutional conditions required to sustain that promise. It shows why businesses have a stake in helping maintain those conditions through responsible political engagement.

This academic article revisits stakeholder theory, arguing that organizational purpose should integrate value creation across stakeholders rather than prioritize shareholder primacy alone. It refines the theoretical foundations of stakeholder governance and connects purpose to competitive advantage, institutional trust, and long-term sustainability within complex economic and civic systems. 

This article argues that companies often over-react to short-term investor pressures—even when investors are well informed—leading firms to underinvest in innovation, resilience, and long-term value creation. It shows how structural incentives and capital-market dynamics can distort strategy and weaken corporate governance, reducing firms’ capacity to act responsibly in broader economic and civic systems. 

This guide outlines nine clear pathways—like net-zero emissions, circular economy, and inclusive societies—across key sectors including energy, mobility, food, and manufacturing, providing businesses a strategic roadmap to embed sustainability in governance and operations for a thriving 2050 within planetary limits.

The Total Value Framework proposes measuring corporate performance across financial, human, social, and environmental dimensions. It aims to align capital allocation with long-term value creation by integrating stakeholder impacts into investment analysis and corporate governance decisions. 

The book opens by establishing the minimum expectation that businesses support the right rules of the game—those rewarding long-term value creation rather than destruction—and shows how companies can live their values through cross-sector collaboration, eco-efficiency, and strategies advancing prosperity, planet, and people, supported by real-world cases.

This article reexamines Milton Friedman’s shareholder primacy argument, suggesting that stakeholder capitalism can incorporate market discipline and accountability principles without abandoning broader societal obligations. It argues that profit-seeking must operate within competitive markets and legal frameworks that preserve democratic legitimacy and prevent capture.