W6 Writing Assignment: Grace Case
Requirements: Answer the following questions in 300-500 words each and submit your responses to the instructor using the Writing Assignment Folder in Sakai. Your document should be in a Word document format (.doc or .docx).
Please read the Grace Case starting on page 617. Answer 3 of the following questions:
1. The specific theory of corporate social responsibility encompasses four kinds of obligations: economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic.
How are business leaders meant to organize these four responsibilities? Which ones take precedence over the others and why?
Judging the man named W. R. Grace through the lens of CSR, how well did he respond to his obligations? Explain.
Judging the company’s more recent activities in the 1980s through the lens of CSR, how well did it respond to its obligations? Explain.
2. The triple-bottom-line theory of corporate responsibility promotes three kinds of sustainability: economic, social, and environmental.
What does the term sustainability mean within this theory and within each of the three categories?
The W. R. Grace company has a long history. From the information provided, what are some of the steps the company has taken to become economically sustainable? Explain.
What are some of the steps the W. R. Grace company has taken to promote social sustainability? Explain.
What is environmental sustainability? How can the dumping of toxic waste in Woburn be categorized as unethical within the area of environmental sustainability concerns? Explain.
3. Stakeholder theory affirms that for companies to perform ethically, management decisions must take account of and respond to stakeholder concerns.
What is a stakeholder?
Looking back at the early company in New York in the 1800s, who would have been some of the stakeholders surrounding the Grace shipping company?
Looking to more recent history, to the corporation as a producer of industrial chemicals in Woburn, Massachusetts, who were some of the major stakeholders surrounding Grace?
Explain why the Grace Institute, which receives generous support from the W. R. Grace industrial chemical corporation—and the women receiving training there—are stakeholders in the W. R. Grace corporation.
The Grace Institute—the people employed there and the women receiving free training—depend to some extent on the chemical company being profitable. Could you construct an argument in favor of the chemical company being environmentally irresponsible if that allows profits, and therefore necessary support for the Institute?
4. As this question is being written, the share price of W. R. Grace is $26.17, and there are a total of 72,780,100 shares out there in the world. You’ve saved some money from a summer job and invested in Grace, 100 shares to be exact. That costs you $2,617, and means you own a not overwhelming 0.000137 percent of the company. Next, you email this to the CEO: “I worked hard for my $2,617, I bought stock to see that amount rise, and I want you to pour a little bit more of the profits into research and development of new products, and a little less into the Grace Institute.” Assuming the CEO is a proponent of stakeholder ethics, what do you suppose the response would be?
5. There are a number of arguments supporting the proposal that corporations are autonomous entities (apart from owners and directors and employees) with ethical obligations in the world. The moral requirement argument contains four elements:
Corporations are already involved in the broad social world and the ethical dilemmas defining it, and therefore they are obligated to participate and help solve problems.
Well-established, successful, and powerful corporations can be involved in the effective resolution of broad social problems, and that ability implies an obligation to do so.
Corporations rely on much more than their owners and shareholders. They need suppliers, employees, a town in which to locate, consumers, air to breathe, and water to drink. That reliance implies an obligation to care for the welfare and protection of those things.
Because businesses cause problems in the larger world, they’re obligated to participate in the problems’ resolution. How can each of these general arguments be specified in the case of W. R. Grace?
6. Summarize the externality argument in favor of corporations having ethical obligations in the world. How can it be specified in the case of W. R. Grace?