企业的职责是什么？赚钱，还是其他什么？

    随着“公益公司”（一类必须对社会产生积极影响的新型公司）的兴起，以及今年4月孟加拉血汗工厂坍塌造成人员伤亡，各界呼吁企业严加管理供应链之后，这个话题引发了热烈的讨论。

    但这个话题并不新鲜。四十年前的6月，也就是1973年的6月刊《财富》（Fortune）杂志就刊登过吉尔伯特•伯克一篇有关“‘企业责任'风险”的文章。一方面，伯克援引米尔顿•弗里德曼的话称，企业的宗旨是实现利润最大化，而不是按他的说法，“用属于别人（即股东）的钱去解决社会问题”。

    弗里德曼曾经说过：“商人没有钱可以花在社会责任上，除非他拥有垄断的权力。任何参与社会责任活动的商人都应立即遭到反垄断诉讼。”

    站在这个巨大鸿沟另一边的是理想主义者们，伯克写到，他们“是自以为道德的极端”。这些倡导者们认为，除了“遵守法律，企业应当积极提倡减少污染的措施，扩大少数人权益，总体上成为模范公民，同时积极承担与模范公民相关的所有成本。

    不过，四十年前的《财富》杂志也曾暗示，或许还有第三种方式；认同社会责任或许不只是意味着花钱。现实世界纷纷扰扰，社会责任能以自己的方式影响在这个世界中经营的企业的盈利状况。四十年后再来看看伯克文章中提到过的一些公司以及企业社会责任的普遍现状，这种观点似乎已经胜出。

    《企业力量和社会责任》(Corporate Power and Social Responsibility)一书的作者、加州大学洛杉矶分校(UCLA)教授内尔•贾克比是第三种方式的早期支持者。“我并不是要求企业光干活，不挣钱，”伯克援引贾克比的话说。“但政治力量就像市场力量一样真实，企业必须对它做出回应。”

    对于旧金山Levi Strauss & Co.面临的选择，伯克就是这样定性的。“许多仰慕这家公司的人也都注意到了，它有3%的税后净利润来自精心挑选的社会责任项目，”伯克写道。但“Levi Strauss显然从这3%中得到了很多。它在一个非常开明的城市经营，市场品味受到年轻人的高度影响。因此，不管公司高管内心信奉什么，他们的社会责任支出看上去是相当有效的公关。”

    四十年后，Levi Strauss的许多企业社会责任项目仍注重涉及旧金山政治的相关事宜。Levi Strauss & Co负责社会和环境可持续发展的副总裁迈克尔•柯博瑞说：“80年代初，我们是第一批认同、推行艾滋病教育和工作场所政策的公司之一。”1991年，“我们是第一家制订全面供应商规范的服装公司，要求合作伙伴达到劳工、环境、卫生和安全相关标准。”

    What businesses owe the world: Then and now

    What is the role of a corporation? To make money, or something else?

    It's a heady debate these days, with the rise of "Benefit Corporations" -- a new class of corporation that requires a positive impact on society -- and calls for companies to police their supply chains in the wake of April's deadly factory collapse in Bangladesh.

    But it's not a new debate. Forty years ago this month, in the June 1973 issue of Fortune, Gilbert Burck wrote about "The Hazards of 'Corporate Responsibility.'" On one side, he quoted Milton Friedman, arguing that the purpose of a business was to maximize profit rather than, in Burck's words, "tackle social problems with money belonging to other people (i.e. their stockholders)."

    As Friedman said, "No businessman has money to spend on social responsibility unless he has monopoly power. Any businessman engaged in social responsibility ought to be immediately slapped with an antitrust suit."

    On the other side of this yawning chasm you had idealists, who "tend to extreme forms of self-righteousness," Burck wrote. In addition to "mere compliance with the law, say the advocates, business should actively initiate measures to abate pollution, to expand minority rights, and in general to be an exemplary citizen, and should cheerfully accept all the costs associated with this good citizenship."

    But perhaps, Fortune hinted, there was a third way; a recognition that things termed social responsibility might not just translate into money out the door. They could impact, in their own way, the bottom line of businesses operating in a real and often messy world. Forty years later, looking at some of the companies mentioned in Burck's piece and the broader state of corporate social responsibility, this view seems to have won out.

    Neil Jacoby, author of Corporate Power and Social Responsibility and a professor at UCLA, was an early proponent of this approach. "I don't really ask companies to do a single thing that isn't profitable," Burck quoted Jacoby. "But political forces are just as real as market forces, and business must respond to them."

    That's how Burck characterized the choices facing Levi Strauss & Co. of San Francisco. "As its many admirers note, the company contributes 3 percent of its net after taxes to carefully chosen social programs," Burck wrote. But "Levi Strauss is obviously getting a lot for that 3 percent. It does business in an intensely liberal city and has a market in which tastes are heavily influenced by young people. And so, whatever its top executives believe in their heart of hearts, their social-responsibility outlays would appear to be rather effective public relations."

    Forty years later, many of Levi Strauss's CSR programs still focus on issues that fit with San Francisco's politics. Michael Kobori, vice president of social and environmental sustainability at Levi Strauss & Co reports, "In the early '80s, we were one of the first companies to acknowledge and address HIV/AIDS education and work-place policies." In 1991, "We were the first apparel company to establish a comprehensive supplier code requiring our business partners to meet standards related to labor, the environment, and health and safety."

    但比较1973年和现在的企业社会责任做法，最大的不同在于，现在的公司探究这个问题时往往会超越公关层面，寻找那些最具商业意义的活动。公关效益当然是件好事，但这往往不是唯一目的。

    柯博瑞举了个例子，即Levi Strauss形形色色旨在降低生产用水和能耗的环保计划。它们一方面或许能帮助这个星球，一方面也会降低成本，在竞争激烈的服装行业提升利润。

    接下来是如何管理风险的问题。柯博瑞说：“1995年我们制订供应商水质指引时，很多公司，包括我们的供应商们，都质疑为什么他们得投资建设水处理设施。”但“今天，水已成为这个行业中的重要问题。”在有些国家，比如中国，政府已经开始关闭那些没有采取适当水处理措施的工厂。我们在倡导这些指引时，不仅改善了环境，也改善了业务。”

    这个注重商业效益的案例帮助当代企业社会责任摆脱了伯克所担心的社会运动形式。1973年的伯克文章还记录了商业保险公司CNA Financial Corp.编撰的《企业社会责任细则》：详细介绍了can的建议，怎样才能让所有高管都参与到社会目标中来，进而让下属也参与进来。整个手册有点福音书的意味，似乎要展开一场全面的除恶战争。但是，这一切要花多少钱，谁来为此买单，这些问题似乎没人谈起，”伯克写道。

    CNA公司企业传讯部副总裁萨拉•庞表示，四十年前的CSR“非常强调从上至下，采用的是指挥和掌控的形式。”几十年来最大的演变是“底层员工开始参与进来，共同形成和推动企业责任和策略。”CNA公司的员工可以在公司有业务运营的各个社区自行选择慈善和义工项目，然后，CAN公司再给予相应的支持。

    为什么要这么做？分析显示，本地慈善可以为投入的每一分钱带来更大效应。庞说：“根据双盲研究，我们发现，在美国、加拿大和欧洲的社区中，购买保险的决胜局竞争中，积极参与社区活动的企业会胜出。”捐赠和义工服务让CNA的名字以一种更有效、更深入的方式出现在公众面前，而且成本往往还低于某些广告。

    或者，正如伯克在1973年所述，“那些内心是不折不扣的建设者、那些对万能金钱拥有强烈渴望的企业高管们或许仍然会得出结论，积极承担社会责任的形象符合公司利益。”他引用诺贝尔奖经济学家保罗•萨缪尔森的话，在真实世界里，一家大公司“不只是可能会参与社会责任；它最好努力做好这件事。”（财富中文网）

    The biggest difference, though, between the 1973 approach to CSR and today's is that companies delving into this issue tend to wind up looking beyond PR to activities that make the most business sense. The PR benefit is a plus, of course, but that tends not to be the only one.

    Kobori, for instance, lists Levi Strauss's various environmental initiatives aimed at using less water and energy during production. While that may help the planet, it also lowers costs, which boosts profits in the competitive apparel industry.

    And then there's the question of managing risk. Kobori says, "When we established our supplier water quality guidelines in 1995, many, including our suppliers, questioned why they needed to invest in building water treatment facilities." But, "today, water is a significant issue across the industry. In countries like China, the government is moving to shut down factories that do not have proper water treatment. In initiating these guidelines, we not only improved outcomes for the environment, we also improved outcomes for our business."

    This focus on the business case has helped modern CSR initiatives evolve from the crusading sorts Burck fretted about. The 1973 article chronicled CNA Financial Corp.'s production of "an elaborate manual on corporate responsibility -- a document that details just how CNA proposes to involve all its executives in social goals, and how they in turn should involve their charges. The whole opus has a somewhat evangelical tone, suggesting the marching orders for an all-out war on the devil. What it all will cost and who will pay for it are matters nobody seems to talk about," Burck wrote.

    Sarah Pang, vice president of CNA's corporate communications department, says that 40 years ago CSR "was a very top-down, command-and-control kind of exercise." The biggest evolution over the decades has been "employee involvement at the grassroots level to shape and drive corporate responsibility and strategies." CNA employees in each community where the company does business can choose priorities for giving and volunteering, which CNA then supports.

    The reason? Analysis suggested that local giving produced more bang for the buck. "In blind studies, we would find that in communities throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe, when it comes to a tie-breaker about buying insurance, people who are involved in the community win the tie," Pang says. Donations and volunteering get the CNA name out in front of the public in a way that's more effective, and often cheaper, than some kinds of advertising.

    Or, as Burck put it in 1973, "Corporate executives who are strict constructionists at heart, and who harbor powerful lusts for Almighty Dollars, might nevertheless conclude that an activist social posture was good for their companies." He quoted Paul Samuelson, the Nobel laureate economist, who said that in the real world, a large corporation "not only may engage in social responsibility; it had damn well better try to do so."