The Role of Business

Business is obviously an important economic, political and societal actor. Businesses large and small employ many of the workforce and their views and attitudes about the economy and society are both influential and sought after by government. Business is accountable to its owners and shareholders, but increasingly societies and governments are demanding a wider accountability, even if quite how this is to work in practice is far from settled. Business rarely speaks with one voice as business interests are disparate and diffuse. Small business often has completely different views to big business on particular issues. Even for a single issue such as the policy response over tariffs for a single commodity, for example, steel or sugar, there is likely to be a wide range of business views. Some favour trade liberalization — importers and downstream users in these cases — while other business interests — domestic producers — might seek government protection.