We are already past the economics of Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman, who in the September 1970 issue of Time Magazine, said: «the social responsibility of corporations consists of maximizing the earnings of the stockholders». Noam Chomsky is more of a realist: «Corporations are the closest things to totalitarian institutions». They do not have to give explanations to the public, or to society. They act as predators, and their prey consists of other corporations. To defend themselves, the people can only count on one instrument: the State. There is, however, a difference that must not be overlooked: «while General Electric, for example, need not answer to anyone, the state must give regular explanations to the people» (Le Monde Diplomatique, Brazil, nº 1, August 2007, page 6).
Corporations realized decades ago that they are part of society, and have a social responsibility, in the sense that they must cooperate if everyone is to have a better society.
It could be defined this way: Social responsibility is the obligation the corporation assumes, of seeking goals that in the mid and long range, are good for business, and also good for society as a whole.
This definition must not be confused with social obligation, that is, of meeting their legal obligations: the payment of taxes and fulfillment of their duties with respect to their workers. This simply is what the law requires. Nor is it the social answer: the capacity of an enterprise to respond to the changes wrought by a globalized economy and society, such as for example, changes in governmental economic policies, new legislation, and the transformations in consumer profiles. The social answer is that which the enterprise must do in order to adapt and to be able to reproduce.
Social responsibility goes beyond all of this: it is what the enterprise does after having fulfilled all its legal obligations, in order to improve the society of which it is a part, and to guarantee a quality of life and of the environment. It is not just what it does for the community, which would be philanthropy, but what it does with the community, with the participation of its members in projects designed and supervised in common. This is the liberator.
However, in recent years, thanks to the ecological consciousness awakened by the imbalance of the Earth-system and the life-system, the theme of socio-environmental responsibility has arisen. The key event occurred on February 2, 2007, when the UN organ that encompasses 2,500 scientists from more than 135 countries, the Intergovernmental Group of Experts on Climate Change, (IPCC), after six years of investigations, released its findings to the public. We are not headed towards global warming and profound climate changes. We already are within them. The status of the Earth has changed. The weather will change greatly. If we do nothing, the temperature could rise by up to 4-6 degrees centigrade. This change, which is 90% certain, is anthropogenic, which means that is caused by human beings, better put, by the form of production and consumption that already has been in existence for three centuries, and which now has been globalized. The greenhouse gasses, especially carbon dioxide and methanol, are the main causes of global warming.
The following question was posed to the corporations: to what degree will they contribute to cleaning up the planet, by introducing a new paradigm of production, consumption and recycling of waste, consistent with the rhythms of nature and the network of life, and without sacrificing the natural goods and services?
This theme is being discussed in all the great global corporations, particularly after the reports by Nicholas Stern (former principal economist of the World Bank); the former vice-president of the United States, Al Gore: An Inconvenient Truth, and several conventions on global warming by the UN. If henceforth we do not invest some 450 billion dollars, per year, to stabilize the climate of the planet, by 2030-2040 it will be too late, and the Earth will enter an era of great extinctions, that in great measure will affect the human species. A recent gathering of the International Agency of Energy noted that the decisions must be made now, and not in 2020. The year 2015 is our last chance. After that it will be too late, and we will go forward to an encounter with the unspeakable.
These environmental problems are so important that they must be put before the simple question of social responsibility. If we first do not assure planet Earth, with her ecosystems, there will be no way to save society and its collection of corporations. Consequently: socio-environmental responsibility!
Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.
