Understanding the Roots of Shareholder Primacy

This chapter reviews the law of directors’ duties in a number of Anglo-American countries to assess what influence directors’ duties have had on the extent to which directors are adopting stakeholder approaches. This data allows conclusions to be drawn regarding the extent to which legal reforms are required in the area of directors’ duties to create an enabling legal framework for corporate social responsibility. The chapter also presents the results of research on the business objectives of corporations, which provides insights into how corporations themselves define their purposes. The legal interpretations of the purpose of the corporation can then be contrasted with interpretations based on directors’ views and what corporations themselves state in their business objectives.