Corporate social responsibility – going back to the source

The 50th anniversary of Milton Friedman’s 1970 essay has triggered a deluge of commentary celebrating or critiquing the ideas it proposed. My bias probably swings to the “profit maximisation is not the entire answer” side of the debate but I recognised that I had not actually read the original essay. Time, I thought, to go back to the source and see what Friedman actually said.

I personally found this exercise useful because I realised that some of the commentary I had been reading was quoting him out of context or otherwise reading into his essay ideas that I am not sure he would have endorsed. I will leave my comment on the merits of his doctrine to another post.

Friedman’s doctrine of the limits of corporate social responsibility

Friedman’s famous (or infamous) conclusion is that 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 fraud.”

My more detailed notes on what Friedman wrote can be found here. That note includes lengthy extracts from the essay so that you can fact check my paraphrasing of what he said. My summary of his argument as I understand it runs as follows:

• Friedman first seeks to establish that any meaningful discussion of social responsibility has to focus on the people who own or manage the business, not “the business” itself.
• If we focus on the corporate executives who manage the business as agents of the shareholders, Friedman argues that these executive should only use the resources of a company to pursue the objectives set by their “employer” (i.e. the shareholders).
• What do the shareholders want the business to do?
• Friedman acknowledges that some may have different objectives but he assumes that profit maximisation constrained by the laws and ethical customs of the society in which they operate will be goal of most shareholders
• The key point however is that corporate executives have no authority or right to pursue any objectives other than those defined by their employer (the shareholders) or which otherwise serve the interests of those people.
• Friedman also argues that the expansion of social responsibilities introduces conflicts of interest into the management of the business without offering any guide or proper process for resolving them. Having multiple (possibly ill defined and conflicting) objectives is, Friedman argues, a recipe for giving executives an excuse to underperform.
• Friedman acknowledges that corporate executives have the right to pursue whatever social responsibilities they choose in their private lives but, as corporate executives, their personal objectives must be subordinated to the responsibility to achieve the objectives of the shareholders, their ultimate employers.
• It is important to understand how Friedman defined the idea of a corporate executive having a “social responsibility”. He argues that the concept is only meaningful if it creates a responsibility that is not consistent with the interests of their employer.
• Friedman might be sceptical on the extent to which it is true, but my read of his essay is that he is not disputing the rights of a business to contribute to social and environmental goals that management believe are congruent with the long term profitability of the business.
• Friedman argues that the use of company resources to pursue a social responsibility raises problematic political questions on two levels: principle and consequences.
• On the level of POLITICAL PRINCIPLE, Friedman uses the rhetorical device of treating the exercise of social responsibility by a corporate executive as equivalent to the imposition of a tax
• But it is intolerable for Friedman that this political power can be exercised by a corporate executive without the checks and balances that apply to government and government officials dealing with these fundamentally political choices.
• On the grounds of CONSEQUENCES, Friedman questions whether the corporate executives have the knowledge and expertise to discharge the “social responsibilities” they have assumed on behalf of society. Poor consequences are acceptable if the executive is spending their own time and money but unacceptable as a point of principle when using someone else’s time and money.
• Friedman cites a list of social challenges that he argues are likely to lay outside the domain of a corporate executive’s area of expertise
• Private competitive enterprise is for Friedman the best way to make choices about how to allocate resources in society. This is because it forces people to be responsible for their own actions and makes it difficult for them to exploit other people for either selfish or unselfish purposes.
• Friedman considers whether some social problems are too urgent to be left to the political process but dismisses this argument on two counts. Firstly because he is suspicious about how genuine the commitment to “social responsibility” really is but mostly because he is fundamentally committed to the principle that these kinds of social questions should be decided by the political process.
• Friedman acknowledges that his doctrine makes it harder for good people to do good but that, he argues, is a “small price” to pay to avoid the greater evil of being forced to conform to an objective you as an individual do not agree with.
• Friedman also considers the idea that shareholders can themselves choose to contribute to social causes but dismisses it. This is partly because he believes that these “choices” are forced on the majority by the shareholder activists but also because he believes that using the “cloak of social responsibility” to rationalise these choices undermines the foundations of a free society.
• That is a big statement – how does he justify it?
• He starts by citing a list of ways in which socially responsible actions can be argued (or rationalised) to be in the long-run interests of a corporation.
• Friedman acknowledges that corporate executives are well within their rights to take “socially responsible” actions if they believe that their company can benefit from this “hypocritical window dressing”.
• Friedman notes the irony of expecting business to exercise social responsibility by foregoing these short term benefits but argues that using the “cloak of social responsibility” in this way harms the foundations of a free society
• Friedman cites the calls for wage and price controls (remember this was written in 1970) as one example of the way in which social responsibility can undermine a free society
• But he also sees the trend for corporate executives to embrace social responsibility as part of a wider movement that paints the pursuit of profit as “wicked and immoral”. A free enterprise, market based, society is central to Friedman’s vision of a politically free society and must be defended to the fullest extent possible.
• Here Friedman expands on the principles behind his commitment to the market mechanism as an instrument of freedom – in particular the principle of “unanimity” under which the market coordinates the needs and wants of individuals and no one is compelled to do something against their perceived interests.
• He contrasts this with the principle of “conformity” that underpins the political mechanism.
• In Friedman’s ideal world, all decisions would be based on the principle of unanimity but he acknowledges that this is not always possible.
• He argues that the line needs to be drawn when the doctrine of “social responsibility” extends the political mechanisms of conformity and coercion into areas which can be addressed by the market mechanism.

Friedman concludes by labelling “social responsibility” a “fundamentally subversive doctrine”.

But the doctrine of “social responsibility” taken seriously would extend the scope of the political mechanism to every human activity. It does not differ in philosophy from the most explicitly collectivist doctrine. It differs only by professing to believe that collectivist ends can be attained without collectivist means.

That is why, in my book “Capitalism and Freedom,” I have called it a “fundamentally subversive doctrine” in a free society, and have said that in such a 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 fraud.”

Hopefully what I have set out above offers a fair and unbiased account of what Friedman actually said. If not then tell me what I missed. I think he makes a number of good points but, as stated at the beginning of this post, I am not comfortable with the conclusions that he draws. I am working on a follow up post where I will attempt to deconstruct the essay and set out my perspective on the questions he sought to address.

Tony – From the Outside