Purpose: This paper aims to probe the limits of the empirical-normative divide as a conceptual framework in business ethics. Design/methodology/approach: A systems theory perspective debunks this divide as a false distinction that cannot do justice to the conceptual complexity of the field of...

Stakeholder scholars have long explored how stakeholder relationships differ from economic transactions. We contribute to this ongoing inquiry by developing a conceptual framework of relationality in stakeholder theory that encompasses a stakeholder‐theoretic extension of Williamson's...

Chester Barnard’s work can be shown to contain subversive elements which accord with the spirit of institutionalist scholarship. Barnard saw corporations as systems of power whose sustainability must be backed by moral resources which are becoming increasingly scarce today. This vision...

This paper explores the potential of big data, such as those compiled by the Google Books project, to inform the dominant theories of the firm that tend to be grounded on strong assumptions about the capitalist nature of the modern society. Combining the novel methodologies of the digital age...

In this article, we draw on established views of CSR dysfunctionalities to show how and why CSR is regularly observed to be both shaped by and supportive of capitalism. We proceed to show that these dysfunctionalities are maintained by both the pro- and anticapitalist approaches to CSR, both of...