Talk is cheap – a historical note on talking about the “interest of the company” as something more than the interest of the shareholders

In the current discussion relating to the establishment in company legislation of a responsibility on the part of the company to contribute to finding solutions to various societal problems, the view is not infrequently held that the company has, or in any case should have, an “interest” which embraces something more than the interest of the shareholders, and that the board of directors and management should be obliged to act in this larger interest. An example of this is the EU Commission's ...