Being back on blawgosphere after a brief hiatus, I noticed this interesting column by Arun Maira in today’s Times of Bangladesh. By way of background, the recent events in the US and UK have cast a serious doubt on the efficacy of capitalism as a viable economic model. It has been subject to challenge in particular on the ground that it promotes greed, leading businesses to go overboard and that it also causes severe disparity in income and wealth in society. At the same time, a movement that connects business to society is also gaining momentum, as we have seen in some of the previous posts on this blog relating to social business (here and here).

Arun Maira poses some interesting questions and provides some perspectives on these matters. Here are some extracts:

“In his book Supercapitalism: The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life, Robert Reich, a member of former President Bill Clinton’s cabinet, observes that the wealth of the two richest Americans – Bill Gates and Warren Buffet – is equal to the combined wealth of 100 million poorer Americans.

He argues that this is a result of the capitalist process. He does not grudge the two their wealth. But he says a system that can result in such huge disparities cannot be completely right. In Bangladesh, the wealth of the richest Bangladeshis now equals the wealth of the richest Americans. One may wonder how many hundreds of millions of poorer Bangladeshis’ wealth would equal one of these rich Bangladeshis’ wealth?

Bill Emmott, former editor-in-chief of The Economist, in his book 20:21 Vision: 20th Century Lessons for the 21st Century says, “Capitalism in its present form is unpopular, unstable, unequal, and unclean”. These critics of capitalism are not communists. They are capitalists. Yet, they are calling for a better way. Therefore, let us not be stuck in ideologies. Let us face realities. Why is it ‘socialist’ and wrong to forgive the loans of struggling farmers in Bangladesh, while it is ‘capitalist’ and right to help Bear Stearns’ rich investment bankers on Wall Street pay off their loans?

When we consider how to transform capitalism to make it more inclusive and more sustainable, we must consider the role of business corporations in society. They are the engines of capitalism. Therefore, business leaders must consider the footprints of their corporation’s activities on the human community and on the environment.

We cannot remain stuck with the super capitalist notion that the business of business must be only business, and that corporate leaders are responsible only for creating shareholder value. We need a new framework for business management for the 21st century”