ABSTRACT
One of the key insights of stakeholder theory has not been well understood, and it is that the intersection of stakeholder interests is more interesting than the conflict of stakeholder interests. While there are many strands to ‘stakeholder theory’, the body of work that has emerged attempts to shed some light on three interconnected problems. These are explaining how value creation and trade are possible in a world of great change; figuring out how to combine the best thinking about business with the best thinking about ethics; and addressing the problem of how managers should think about new capitalism. While there are many unsettled questions in stakeholder theory, it provides a better starting point for understanding the global financial crisis than the alternative. The essence of stakeholder theory is that customers, suppliers, employees, communities and financiers go in the same direction. Business models are successful when they capture the intersection of stakeholder interests.
