ABSTRACT

A legitimate concern of business is the maintenance of stable economic and social circumstances. In essence, where and how are the boundaries of moral authority drawn in circumstances where business feels required to influence responsible social change? Where, and how, such change is most effectively exercised? This chapter aims to provide some insights into these questions, using the lived experiences of South African (SA) business leadership in the decade leading up to the advent of democracy in SA in 1994. It presents some of the resulting insights on the role and nature of this unique lived experience of SA business leadership. The overall objectives of the study from the experiences of SA are: to reveal and understand the nature and role of the decade-long business leadership experience of a particular group of SA business leaders who played an instrumental role in the political, economic and social change necessary to move to a post-apartheid SA.