Business and Society

Abstract

It is obvious that all societies, from simple hunting bands to the complex industrial societies in which we live, must produce the basic goods and services their members depend upon. All societies, that is, have an economy in the sense of mechanisms which permit the production and circulation of goods and services. However, the principles which underpin these processes of production and circulation vary from society to society. In most pre-industrial societies kinship is one of the most important mechanisms or ‘institutions’ through which goods and services are allocated. That is to say, one gains access to food, shelter and personal security primarily as a member of a particular family group. In our type of society, the family is by no means redundant as a provider of important goods and services, from cooked meals and washed clothes to an overall feeling of security. Nonetheless we obtain a large proportion of what we need — food, clothes, consumer durables — by paying for them with money. Monetary transactions are the predominant feature of our type of ‘capitalist’ society and when we talk about ‘business’ we think primarily in terms of money-making. A successful business person is someone who makes a lot of money for him/herself and/or high profits for his/her company. Money, in fact, operates at three levels in relation to the firm. First, we invest money or ‘capital’ in a particular project, whether it is to buy machinery for making furniture or a computer to provide financial services. A business person will, second, pay out wages to buy the labour, whether intellectual or manual, of employees. And last, by selling the goods and services on the open market the entrepreneur hopes to make a profit. Capital, wages, markets and profits thus seem to be the basic ingredients of ‘business’ in our type of society.