Isabel Johnson
Debate Paper – Profit and Society
9/30/14
Word Count: 1316
Introduction
Modern society is heavily based on the success and failure of businesses. There are many
indicators of this, but one example is the rise and fall in the stock market. The stock market fluxes with
the times. When a major national or international event occurs, company stock will increase or decrease
although the company is not involved with the event. One example of this happened in 2011 during the
U.S. intervention in the Libyan civil war, stocks fell five percent (Isidore). This demonstrates the
connection between market economy and society.
The pattern seen today is that businesses seem to be focused on increasing profit. Companies
are constantly updating and improving their products in hopes of increasing profit. Some are breaking
this standard and are becoming more involved with society through philanthropy events and
environmental awareness. With both of these patterns seen within companies it leads to ask: is
increasing profit the only social responsibility of business?
Stakeholders:
Sub – Issues:
Large Corporations
Gross Domestic Product Index
Small Businesses
Quality of Items
Consumers (large industrial, local household)
Consumerism
Governments
Company Lobbying to Government
Stock Exchange
Company reputation and image
School Systems
Environmental Impact
Yes Position
In the article In Defense of Increasing Profits as the Social Responsibility of Business, Jonathan
Mariano describes the relationship between society and business through profit. It is emphasized that
profit is a sign of success with in a business no matter the size. As Mariano explains “whether a business
services a few folks locally, or a mass of population internationally, the role of profit and loss is still the
same in any business situation.” Therefore, in providing the community with more goods to
accommodate all customers, the business will increase profit. Overall, profit can be used as a tool to
measure how well or how poorly a business is operating and in reaction to that will want to increase
profit by selling more product to their consumers.
Mariano makes a fair point but can be argued that profit is not the only indicator of success.
Every year, information is released about how much gross domestic product was produced for a
company. Many associate this with how successful a company has done in the past year. Although there
is some truth to this, there are other scales and awards given that make a business more reputable and
successful than others. For example, Deloitte awards companies within Ireland with “Best Managed
Companies Awards” and “Deloitte Technology Industry Awards.” With these incentives, businesses have
other means of being successful than solely based on profit.
No Position
The author of the article Why Companies Can No Longer Afford to Ignore Their Social
Responsibilities makes an argument that companies use to be focused on gaining profit but in today’s
society cannot afford to because of pressure from their customers. In modern society, there are more
problems (environmentally, socially, and internationally) that companies are now expected to be
involved with. Because of this, the public expects companies to use their profits and take positive efforts
to improve these problems. Businesses have to maintain this image because “consumers and other
companies are likely to shun firms that develop unethical reputations” (Wharton). Thus, companies
cannot afford to have a bad reputation and in turn must provide more to society in order to keep their
profits up. In addition to this, modern technology and the spread of information contributes highly to a
company’s image. The public now has unlimited access to a company’s records and will share their
opinion about it more publicly than before. Knowing this, companies have to use a large amount of
money to hide any unwanted information; so if they have less to hide, then less money is spent. In
conclusion, for a business to gain profit, they must provide for customers.
This article includes multiple arguments for the need of businesses to be involved in society, but
one objection is that companies will accommodate to their customers for publicity, and not for the
benefit of society. As explained in the article, companies need to maintain an image, but do they need to
stand by that appearance? Some companies have promoted themselves as environmentally friendly or
beneficial to areas, when in turn, the product they are producing is harming the environment or hurting
an area more. Thus, a company is able to personify an certain image, but may not side with the values
associated with that.
Third Article
In July, Greenpeace posted an article titled It's time for LEGO to block Shell in response to the
new Artic focused LEGO series funded by Shell. The sets include artic animals and interactive scenes of
oil drilling sights in the artic. For Shell, this is a way to promote a good reputation to society that they
are involved with young children development. LEGO in turn makes good profit off of the sales.
Greenpeace became involved because they dislike LEGO amplifying Shell’s image and is “allowing Shell
to pretend it's a caring, family-friendly company and helping it to get away with its Arctic aggression”
(Duff). To combat this, Greenpeace launched a massive campaign to urge LEGO to break their ties with
Shell. The campaign continues today, but in that time, LEGO continues to sell millions of sets of their
artic themed toys and Shell’s image is maintained. What does this mean for profit, image, and society?
This article highlight’s the positive image Shell is trying to promote, much like how society drives
profit, but also emphasizes how increasing profit drives LEGO to continue to produce the sets. In all, this
demonstrates that yes social responsibility can increase profits for a business, but it may not be viewed
as positive social responsibility by all.
Personal Perspective
My perspective of this issue is that increasing profits is not the only social responsibility of
businesses. As stated in the no perspective article, companies cannot afford to ignore current social
problems. This is not only true for their image to their customers, but also to their workers and people
interested in working there. People want more out of a job than just money; they want affiliations with
local groups, a comfortable work atmosphere, and being able to contribute more to their customers. In
doing this, businesses have happier workers and are able to commit to their image. A good example of
this is the gay right’s movements happening in areas of the U.S. Companies can and/or have to promote
themselves as a gay accepting community, in order to appease their workers and motivate people to
work for them. Thus, companies must be attuned to current social trends and needs in order to develop
their image and incentivize workers.
Works Cited
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Sept. 2014.
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Duff, Ian. "It's Time for LEGO to Block Shell." Greenpeace International. Greenpeace, 1 July 2014.
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Friedman, John. "Milton Friedman Was Wrong About Corporate Social Responsibility." The
Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 12 June 2013. Web. 28 Sept. 2014.
Isidore, Chris. "Impact of War on Stocks and Oil." CNNMoney. Cable News Network, 03 Sept. 2013.
Web. 30 Sept. 2014.
Knowledge@Wharton. "Why Companies Can No Longer Afford to Ignore Their Social
Responsibilities | TIME.com." Business Money Why Companies Can No Longer Afford to Ignore
Their Social Responsibilities Comments. TIME, 28 May 2012. Web. 30 Sept. 2014.
Mariano, Jonathan. "The Social Responsibility of Business: In Defense of Profits." Triple Pundit RSS.
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