Volume 13, 2002
Proceedings of the Thirteenth Annual Meeting
Ronald K. Mitchell
Pages 462-467
Stakeholders of the World Unite
Assessing Progress on the Path Toward a Stakeholder Theory of the Firm
Is there a connection between anti-globalization protests and our failure to develop a stakeholder theory of the firm? Or, put another way, what if we were to conceptualize the anti-globalization movement as the efforts of “suffragettes and suffrages” for the emancipation of those stakeholders who are the disenfranchised or unrecognized citizens of the corporation? What kind of theory of the firm would be consonant with such an assertion? And, what analytical path would we follow to uncover the outlines of such a theory? From this analysis, we might bring into focus the next conceptual milestones needed along our road to developing a functional and functioning stakeholder theory of the firm. In this discussion I shall explore these analytical steps.