Corporations and corporate governance: what do these concepts mean for multinational corporate power and social responsibility?

Abstract

Theories of the corporation have been crucial in the approach of corporate law to the way in which the corporation is run and for whose interests. This area is termed 'corporate governance'. The focus in this paper is on the utility of these theories and resulting practice to multinational corporations, whose corporate power render them open to wider legitimacy questions. The paper reveals that although, corporate governance deals with issues involved in reconciling the running of the corporation to ownership or corporation interests, it does not deal with issues of multinational corporation's accountability to society for corporate power or ensure that the corporation is run in the society's interests.