Management, Political Philosophy, and Colonial Interference

• Published in: Philosophy of management Vol. 21; no. 3; pp. 301 - 313
• Main Authors: Werhane, Patricia H., Bevan, David
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01-09-2022; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Business and Management; Education; International Political Economy; Neocolonialism; Philosophy; Political philosophy; Quality of Life Research; Social responsibility; Systems thinking; Colonialism; CSR
• ISSN: 1740-3812; 2052-9597
• DOI: 10.1007/s40926-021-00187-9

In this paper we set out to explore the claims that corporate social responsibility (CSR) itself is little more than a complementary extension of the project of coloniality initiated by the Enlightenment (e.g. Banerjee
2019
). We will not dispute that claim. Rather we will develop three points. First, we will apply a non-linear, systems approach to demonstrate how we all, of any color, ethnic origin or historical location are all part of an interconnected interrelated sets of systems—what some thinkers call a complex adaptive system or systems (e.g., Miller and Page
2007
) so that dismissing or degrading any particular ethnic, gender, or racial group is dismissing part of our history and origin. Secondly, we will argue that Enlightenment, coloniality, as well as neo-coloniality, and decoloniality sprung up from the Enlightenment projects themselves. Thus, the very critiques of Enlightenment, accurate as they may be, evolved from that perspective and have to be taken into account even in those critiques. Third, what appears to be an “either-or” – that is, that commerce should stick to business and not engage in political activities (forms of neocolonialism) or accept these business-political activities despite critiques – is not a simple choice. Rather, conceding that commerce and political systems cannot be nicely separated, we will provide some principles or ways to evaluate these activities, seemingly ubiquitous particularly in emerging economies.