Global Compact International Yearbook 2013
27
Agenda
Stakeholder Management
and lobbying practices on the other. The only thing that
seems to have changed in this respect is that the lobbying of
individual companies is now more visible. The flow of media
reports on lobbying suggests that many companies have not
internalized the danger.
In a seminal paper, Mark Suchman wrote about gaining,
maintaining, and repairing legitimacy. There are three kinds,
he argued. Pragmatic legitimacy is based on the audience’s
(
stakeholder’s) self-interest. Cognitive legitimacy rests on
comprehensibility and taken-for grantedness. Finally, moral
legitimacy is based on normative approval. All legitimacy
management depends heavily on communication between
the organization and its stakeholders. In essence, then, if a
business wants to be sustainable, in the narrow sense of con-
tinuing to survive, then it needs to remain legitimate, thus
maintaining its social license to operate. This is at the heart
of stakeholder management. More recently, Guido Palazzo
and Andreas Scherer have argued that moral legitimacy is
increasingly important as other bases for legitimacy decline.
Their argument explains the ever-greater societal and media
pressure on companies to act responsibly. Indeed, the suc-
cess of the Global Compact itself is hard to explain without
a rise in the significance of moral legitimacy. It is therefore
remarkable that corporate lobbying seldom appears to enjoy
normative approval.
David Vogel wrote: “Lobbying needs to become a critical
component of a CSR strategy. It is not enough for companies
to engage in sophisticated private initiatives, however strate-
gic. They must also be willing to support public policies that
make it easier for them and other firms to do the right thing.”
John Elkington has recently made a very similar argument.
We agree that this is needed. But it will not be enough for
companies to simply decide to change. Mistrust of politics and
politicians is deeply rooted in the culture of many companies.
The practices resulting from that mistrust mean that policy-
makers have come to expect companies to lobby unethically,
adjusting their expectations accordingly. So in addition to
changing themselves, firms will need to work to change the
expectations of their policymaking partners. If the root of the
problem is cultural, then the treatment must also be cultural.
This is not an engineering problem, and it cannot be solved
simply by introducing codes of conduct or implementing
greater transparency. The stories we tell ourselves to make
sense of our environment have real-world consequences: They
directly affect not only what we see and feel, but also how we
act. In short, if we want to have responsible lobbying, then
we need to change the story. Engaging with stakeholders and
sharing good-practice examples is a positive way to start, as is
ensuring that company lobbyists are fully integrated into the
rest of the company. Real change will take time and require
intensive engagement. This is hard, but the rewards for both
business and society could be substantial.
Dr. Stephanos Anastasiadis
is a Lecturer in Sustainabil-
ity at Royal Holloway Uni-
versity of London, where
he teaches business ethics
and sustainability. He is
an independent advisor
to Forum Ethibel, which
maintains socially respons-
ible investment labels, and
has previously worked as a
lobbyist.
Dr. Sigrun M. Wagner is a
Lecturer in International
Business and Sustainability
in the School of Manage-
ment at Royal Holloway,
University of London,
having gained her PhD at
Loughborough University
Business School on lobby-
ing of multinational enter-
prises in the automotive
industry.
Lobbying needs to become a critical
component of a CSR strategy.
“ ”