IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/buetqu/v9y1999i02p207-223_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Freeman and Evan: Stakeholder Theory in the Original Position

Author

Listed:
  • Child, James W.
  • Marcoux, Alexei M.

Abstract

We argue that the Rawlsian social contract argument advanced for stakeholder theory by R. Edward Freeman, writing alone and with William M. Evan, fails in three main ways. First, it is true to Rawls in neither form, nor purpose, nor the level of knowledge (or ignorance) required to motivate the veil of ignorance. Second, it fails to tailor the veil of ignorance to the fairness conditions that are required to solve the moral problem that Freeman and Evan set out to solve (whereas Rawls’s own use of the device surely tailors the veil of ignorance to the problem of designing a just social order). Third, the argument, considered apart from its claimed Rawlsian pedigree, fails to bolster the stakeholder theory because it fails to demonstrate the rationality of adopting the institutional rules that Freeman and Evan favor.

Suggested Citation

  • Child, James W. & Marcoux, Alexei M., 1999. "Freeman and Evan: Stakeholder Theory in the Original Position," Business Ethics Quarterly, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(2), pages 207-223, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:cup:buetqu:v:9:y:1999:i:02:p:207-223_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1052150X00004371/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Y. Fassin, 2008. "The Stakeholder Model Refined," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 08/504, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    2. Velamuri, Rama & Venkataraman, Sankaran, 2005. "Why stakeholder and stockholder theories are not necessarily contradictory: A knightian insight," IESE Research Papers D/591, IESE Business School.
    3. Scott L. Newbert & Michael D. Stouder, 2011. "Justice in entrepreneurial organizations," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 38(5), pages 453-465, April.
    4. Lori Verstegen Ryan, 2006. "Foundation and Form of the Field of Business Ethics," Journal of Private Enterprise, The Association of Private Enterprise Education, vol. 22(Spring 20), pages 34-49.
    5. Allen Kaufman & Ernie Englander, 2011. "Behavioral Economics, Federalism, and the Triumph of Stakeholder Theory," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 102(3), pages 421-438, September.
    6. Marc Cohen, 2010. "The Narrow Application of Rawls in Business Ethics: A Political Conception of Both Stakeholder Theory and the Morality of Markets," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 97(4), pages 563-579, December.
    7. David Rönnegard & N. Craig Smith, 2024. "A Rawlsian Rule for Corporate Governance," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 190(2), pages 295-308, March.
    8. Silke Machold & Pervaiz Ahmed & Stuart Farquhar, 2008. "Corporate Governance and Ethics: A Feminist Perspective," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 81(3), pages 665-678, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:buetqu:v:9:y:1999:i:02:p:207-223_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/beq .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.