ABSTRACT
A number of approaches to stakeholder theory have been offered over the past twenty-plus years with all subject to debate and various critiques. While the reality of the stakeholder idea is clearly flourishing, 1 tensions related to stakeholder theory continue to dominate its dialog. 2 These reflect in general the difficulty in integrating instrumental/economic theories of the business corporation with the normative/ethically oriented approaches used to justify business engagement with, and responsiveness to, society and stakeholders. It is often held that the two perspectives are antagonistic and largely incompatible as first, social duties present a trade-off problem to market-driven profit objectives and second, normative values are inherently difficult to morally and consensually justify. 3 As a result of these theoretical challenges, research orientations to stakeholder theory frequently do not entail solid integration of the two competing perspectives.
