Benedict XVI’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, delivered the opening address at the Vatican’s Business Summit which engages business and finance with Catholic Social Teaching [ht:ba].
“Aiming at a higher goal” – a goal greater than profit – while not “rejecting profit”, represents the great challenge facing today’s business leaders who are seriously concerned to promote the common good and development – business leaders, in other words, who see their activity as a task and a vocation. The exclusive pursuit of profit proves inadequate as the economy and society nowadays have to deal with new challenges, including the environment, “common goods” and globalization.
This brings us to the great theme of business and social responsibility. Caritas in Veritate has pointed out that “business management cannot concern itself only with the interests of the proprietors, but must also assume responsibility for all the other stakeholders who contribute to the life of the business: the workers, the clients, the suppliers of various elements of production, the community of reference” (No. 40).
Ethical theories concerned with business and social responsibility abound, but not all of them are acceptable in the light of the Christian understanding of man and an authentic Christian humanism. This is especially true of those cases where socially responsible practices are adopted primarily as a marketing device, without any effect on relationships inside and outside the business itself, the destination of its profits, the demands of justice, worker participation, and so forth.
Nowadays business leaders who want to take the Church’s social teaching seriously will need to be more daring, not limiting themselves to socially responsible practices and/or acts of philanthropy (positive and meritorious though these may be), but striking out into new territories.
While this is Catholic Social Teaching, I do believe that there are many aspects that are broadly appealing. For one, businesses should make decisions that incorporate the interest of all stakeholders, including workers, managers, owners, and the surrounding community, rather than just the shareholders of the firm. Secondly, where socially responsible practices are undertaken as a marketing device is not sufficient. We need to heed the Cardinal’s call to be “striking out into new territories” when it comes to organizing our economic life. Thinking along these lines is the only way we will be able to build a just, ethical economy.
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