How should companies participate in politics? For all the discussion about the social responsibilities of the corporation, there’s been less discussion of how and whether companies should influence government. A new set of principles from the Erb Institute of the University of Michigan suggests some guidelines based around responsibility, legitimacy, accountability, and transparency.
What are the political responsibilities of corporations? They are not to be confused with social responsibilities. Milton Friedman addressed the latter in a famous essay written half a century ago: “In a free society … there is one and only one social responsibility of business — to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.”
