The responsible company of the future: reflective responsibility in business

The starting point of this paper is the fact that the one thing that is certain about the future is its uncertainty. While uncertainty has always been a constant of human life, the paper argues that due to technological and social developments, risk and uncertainty are going to be defining features that companies of the future will have to deal with. Given that almost all managerial and organisational decisions have moral consequences, the question is how companies can and should act. The paper suggests that one possible way in which moral challenges under risk and uncertainty can be addressed is the concept of responsibility. It demonstrates that there is a close affinity between responsibility and uncertainty on the one hand and between responsibility and business on the other. However, the traditional concept of responsibility has severe limitations that preclude it from being applied successfully. In order to overcome the weaknesses of traditional responsibility a reflective notion of responsibility is developed. Reflective responsibility is the attempt to apply its defining features, which are openness, teleology, and consequentialism, onto itself. The theory of reflective responsibility is then developed and, by using an example, it is demonstrated that it corresponds well with participative management strategies. The paper concludes that reflective responsibility overcomes the weaknesses of traditional concepts of responsibility and at the same time retains their strength of being able to deal with uncertainty. The theory of reflective responsibility therefore offers a plausible course of action for companies that want to be the ethical companies of the future. q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Futures 37 (2005) 117–131 www.elsevier.com/locate/futures 0016-3287/$ see front matter q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.futures.2004.03.032 * Tel.: C44-116-207-8252; fax: C44-116-207-8159. E-mail address: [email protected] (B.C. Stahl). B.C. Stahl / Futures 37 (2005) 117–131 118