The Social Market: what are businesses for?

DURING the 1980's I campaigned throughout the UK on behalf of British manufacturing and the importance of "wealth creation."

This campaign often led us to seek an answer to a fundamental question - " What are businesses for?" Are they simply mechanisms for individuals to make money or do they have a wider "social" purpose?

Well one thing is certain. No business can do anything for its stakeholders i.e. the owners, its employees, its customers or even Society if it does not trade effectively. Businesses must, in the first place, make money. But is that the end of it?

I think the recent successful flotation of Google offers an answer. Larry Page and Sergy Brin (the owners) took a strong ethical stance on two points. First, their company was to operate over the long-term for its stakeholders. Secondly, they were very clear about Google having obligations to the world at large, and said so.

Here we have ardent capitalists accepting their responsibility to try and help humanity and to trade ethically. Their six year old company is now worth $27 billion and they are both very successful. As a potential MP I support Google's approach to business as I have long believed that " the Market is a good servant but a poor master."