Purpose – Poverty is indeed a terrible monster confronting humanity today. It is alarming and, indeed, not without despair to note that 22,000 children under five die every day as a result of poverty. Thus, in a calendar year, more than eight million children do not progress past the age of...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss the financial turmoil of 2008 that followed the collapse of the housing bubble in the USA which was the starting point of a global economic crisis. Huge costs are borne by every part of society. Much wealth has been destroyed. Millions of jobs...

Purpose – The paper is a viewpoint about Thorstein Bunde Veblen (1857‐1929) a known yet misunderstood author, as much appreciated as criticised. The aim of this paper is to present an overview of Veblen's work whilst providing a few keys to his writing and showing the interest of his work...

Purpose – This paper aims to present Alfred Chandler's works as one of the main authors to face the business and society field. It synthesizes his conceptual achievements though national capitalisms that he has identified. Design/methodology/approach – Alfred Chandler's works are summarized...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to disenchant advocates of sustainability of the current form of capitalism and to argue that under current intensification of globalisation of economic and political efforts, “privilege” and “alienation” might be...

Purpose – This paper seeks to investigate the manner in which a traditional ceremony with a high emotional content is being transformed into a capitalist market industry through a case study of the Thai company Suriya Coffins. Design/methodology/approach – The case study involves a critical...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the rethinking what it means to be human and our relationship with the Earth. Design/methodology/approach – The principles of the new economy were systemic, Earth‐centric and directly addressed a range of issues facing life on Earth:...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to argue that the main ontological position of modern capitalism, founded on the philosophy of utilitarianism, derived of course from the work of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, is fundamentally flawed as it ignores power inequalities and assumes...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the theory and practice of stakeholder democracy. After examining the liberal notion of representative democracy, the paper seeks to identify the democratic deficit associated with the shareholder and stakeholder approaches to corporate...