What is the point of Business?

By David Hunter, Consultant, Charity & Social Enterprise Department (Bates Wells Braithwaite LLP) and Knowledge Exchange Fellow (University of Bristol Law School)[1] and Ms Nina Boeger, Senior Lecturer in Law and Director of the Centre for Law and Enterprise (University of Bristol Law School).

img-20161127-wa0001Businesses are, in some respects, like cement. They are an integral part of the society we inhabit, and yet for the most part invisible to us as tangible entities. We give them little thought, but our lives would be very different were we to wake up to a world without either.

In April 2016, the UK government did invite us to think about the nature of business though as part of what it called a Mission-led Business Review. It set up an Advisory Panel and ran a public consultation and, seven months on, the Panel has reported back to the government with its recommendations[2]. The timing is interesting, with the review commencing when David Cameron was still Prime Minister, before the UK’s Referendum on EU membership and the US election, but the publication of the Panel’s findings coming when those events have demonstrated a clear sense of public discontent with the status quo.

What was the Review about, what is a ‘mission-led business’ and what are the likely responses to and impact of the Panel’s findings? (more…)

We need a new corporate landscape

By Prof Charlotte Villers, Professor of Company Law, and Ms Nina Boeger, Senior Lecturer in Law (University of Bristol Law School–Centre for Law and Enterprise).

© Childs & Sulzmann. Artist’s impression of Boxworks at the Engine Shed
© Childs & Sulzmann. Artist’s impression of Boxworks at the Engine Shed (Bristol)

Our corporate landscape has relevance for our post-Brexit future. Yet deep public distrust exists not just with regard to our politicians but also with regard to business. Recent debacles involving the now defunct British Home Stores and Sports Direct are just the tip of the iceberg in what is widely seen as a broken economic and political system that has given precedence to the leading market actors.

Corporate governance is the key means by which global wealth is distributed but that wealth is not distributed fairly. Two stakeholder constituents are prioritised: boardroom directors who frequently enjoy eye-watering pay and perks, and shareholders, at least in theory, through the profit maximisation imperative. Both groups have focused on making a quick buck rather than the long term interests of their companies. Workers, at the bottom of the corporate hierarchies, have little chance of improving their means of living and face greater levels of insecurity in their working and home lives. Workers further down the supply chain risk their lives trying to scratch a living in countries only too glad to gain trade from the powerful multinationals.  Consumers lose out as product quality and services are whittled down and the environment, as a natural resource constituency, barely gets a look in. (more…)