Symposium on Trusteeship and Future of Capitalism

Over the last decade a growing number of citizens have begun to challenge the legitimacy of the current economic order, a central pillar of which is the private corporation. The role that corporations play in the economy is a determinant of the degree to which economic systems are viewed as fair and legitimate. When corporate behavior is perceived as rapacious, self-interested, and insensitive to the needs of society, citizens may demand radical changes to the system. Proposals for tighter regulation, heavier legislation and even nationalization may gain support. The threat of radical change may require that organizations begin to inculcate a shift to addressing major social problems such as climate change and employee well-being whilst they focus on profits.

In response some corporations are integrating ethical considerations, social responsibility, and environmental sustainability into their corporate strategies. Some are sourcing fair-traded and sustainable raw materials and addressing community development in their operations. And some are increasingly promoting the view that there is no necessary trade-off between profitability and social responsibility.

This brings up the question: Are socially virtuous business practices compatible with shareholder capitalism?

This is the 150^th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi who is considered as the Father of the Indian nation. Gandhi in his writings indicates that a non-violent system of government is an impossibility and in this he takes a position close to the libertarian one that taxation is theft by the state. However, Gandhi is very unlike the libertarians who consider justice to be owed only to those who are participants in a mutually beneficial cooperative scheme. To them justice is about self-interested reciprocity.

The core of an individual for Gandhi is the development in the individual of what is often called as empathy, fellow feeling. This is very close to what Adam Smith, the father of economics, in his work The Theory of Moral Sentiments, called the propensity for sympathy. The propensity to ‘truck, barter, and exchange’ is the motivation that drives the market economy that Smith explains in The Wealth of Nations. The propensity for sympathy dominates Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments and plays a major role in motivating another type of exchange – gift exchange. Behaviour stemming from sympathy is in the process of doing good to others also doing good to oneself.

Gandhi advocated Trusteeship, the idea that an individual considers that part of his wealth in excess of his needs as being held in trust for the larger good of society. Gandhi enunciated this doctrine because it promotes economic egalitarianism and more importantly is a voluntary mode of redistribution.

The Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad in association with JSW School of Public Policy proposes to have a one-day Symposium on Trusteeship with speakers on February 4, 2020.

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