Corporate power and responsible capitalism? : towards social accountability / Bryn Jones.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 246-286) and index.

Contents note continued: 11. Embedded accountability: alternative possibilities and political perspectives.

I. Context and history -- 1. A climacteric of corporate crisis and over-reach -- 2. The 'Anglo-Saxon' business corporation: anatomy and evolution -- 3. Social challenges for corporate accountability: the rise and fall of state collectivism -- II. Social embedding and disembedding of business systems -- 4. The neo-liberalisation of big business: disembedding or re-regulating? -- 5. Financialised market accountability and the empowerment of shareholder value -- 6. Contextualising the neo-liberal model: social embeddedness of economic relations -- 7. Alternative, socially embedded business systems: Germany, East Asia, and industrial districts -- III. The pursuit of responsible capitalism: campaigns and political recipes -- 8. Communitarian solutions: business as moral integration -- 9. Environmentalism and social movement influences on corporate responsibility -- 10. Corporate voluntarism: responsibility or accountability? -- 11. Embedded accountability: alternative possibilities and political perspectives -- Conclusion: re-embedding through democratic ownership and governance.

Can business corporations be made more responsible for their actions? Abuses of corporate power, its responsibilities and scandals, pervade political, academic and public debates. In this important book, Bryn Jones locates the sources of this 'corporate over-reach' in key features of the share-traded corporations which dominate global economies and national societies. Focussing on the disembedding of businesses from their social roots, he assesses alternative types of business system and prospects for shifting from 'social responsibility' to social accountability. Split into three parts, this book brings together a multitude of ideas and evidence from different fields to address: context and history, the social embedding and disembedding of business systems, and the pursuit and pitfalls of responsible capitalism. It concludes by recommending potential models for reform in the UK.-- Provided by publisher.