WHAT IS THE BUSINESS OF BUSINESS?

A PLATONIC APPROACH TO CAPITALISM AND THE BUSINESS

ENTERPRISE

FERNANDO GALINDO
Facultad de Economía
Universidad Anáhuac (México)
fernando.galindocr@anahuac.mx

RAFAEL HURTADO
Departamento de Humanidades
Universidad Panamericana (México)
rhurtado@up.edu.mx

I. Institutions and the Common Good.

The business enterprise is a human institution. As every institution, it was created by the free
interaction of people, in time and space, aiming to achieve certain common goals within a
specific normative framework. This affirmation begs two questions: first, we need to explain
what an institution is, and why human beings need to build institutions; second, we have to
specify what kind of institution a business enterprise is.
We intend to address both questions by following five Platonic insights:
First, we consider the genesis and the place of the business enterprise among the constellation
of institutions that build the human society and, in their harmony, constitute the common
good. In this, we follow the Platonic strategy of Republic, where Socrates imagines the
genesis and essence of a polis that enables the flourishing of all its inhabitants. 1
Second, our argumentation uses the notion of the specific outcomes or benefits that we expect
from the business enterprise. Outcomes that only the business enterprise can produce in an
optimal way. This is an application of the notion of ergon (ἒργον) as it is explained in
Republic.2 The correct performance of the proper task (ergon) defines the essence of any
practice and institution. 3
Third, we consider the Platonic ideal of justice for our model. An ideal that applies to the
different human faculties as well as to the different institutions within a society.4

1
Cf. Resp. II. 368e-383c.
2
Cf. Resp. 352d8-353b13.
3
Cf. Resp. 374b6-c2. Our understanding of the ἒργον notion is in debt with the interpretations of Stemmer
(1988; 1997; 1998; 2005), Schmitt (2003); and Gomez Lobo (1989).

4
Cf. Resp. 427d-444e.

1
Fourth, we think that the desirable outcomes of the activity of the business enterprise and the
necessary conditions to achieve these outcomes constitute a conceptual paradigm as the one
used by Plato to think about the polis. 5 A “conceptual paradigm” is an intellectual model of
an ideal institution that helps us to improve or correct our real institution.
Finally, we distinguish between simulations of the business enterprise and the genuine
business enterprise. This is a classic Platonic strategy used in various Platonic dialogues.6
And it is extremely useful to denounce “falsifications” of the business enterprise.
We need institutions because of our nature, i.e. as a consequence of the kind of beings we
are. Like many other animal species, we need certain kind of association to survive. Unlike
any other animal species, we are capable of establishing this association through lasting
institutions. Moreover, we are in need of building lasting institutions as we do not content
ourselves with being part of a herd or a swarm. We aspire to something beyond mere survival.
As a species, human beings have been (apparently) the most successful one on earth. Our
ability to adapt ourselves transforming almost every ecosystem into a habitat and a home is
unmatched by any other animal species. These powers of collective adaptation and
transformation of the environment strongly contrast with our extreme vulnerability and
weakness in isolation. Few human beings are able to survive beyond the realm of civilization,
that is, outside the realm of our institutions; almost none are able to thrive in such
circumstances. Our need for institutions is then a consequence of our vulnerability and
weakness. We are weak and vulnerable, therefore we need to work together, to collaborate
with one another to thrive. 7
The different institutions are practical answers to our vulnerable and fragile human condition.
Each basic institution in our society tries to address some need or limitation inherent in our
nature. Each one collaborates in a singular way to our human development. Institutions are,
for the most part, practical answers to practical questions; answers that remain imperfect and
in need of correction and improvement. At the same time, institutions are also heavily
influenced —but never wholly determined— by a certain context: by the time and the
circumstances within which they are originated. Institutions also evolve and change for the
better or worse through time.
It is a common experience that people come together to start new institutions of different
sorts: religious, academic, political, artistic, entrepreneurial, etc. This fact may mislead us to
think that conscious reflection about the aims and means of an institution always predates
institutional practices. We might assume that the existence and functionality of an institution
needs to be conceived first in theory and only then could it be enacted for societal purposes.

5
Cf. Resp. 473a1-b3; Resp. 591c1-592b6; Laws 713b ff; Laws 739d-e.
6
See for instance Gorg. 464d3-c2; in Resp. VII, the famous myth of the cave; Resp. X specially 598c5-599b8;
and the Sophist, a dialogue mostly concerned with the problem of the authentic and the simulacrum, see Soph.
266b-267b.
7
This idea of vulnerability and mutual dependence is also a Platonic insight, see for instance Resp. 369b5-7.
MacIntyre in his valuable essay (1999) came to this same intuition via Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas and
develops it in a different and very productive way.

2
In other words, we may assume that institutional theorization —defining the goals, norms,
principles and ideals for an institution— precedes not only ontologically, but also
chronologically, the founding of any institution. This is a mistake.
As stated before, answering to real urgencies and needs give birth to institutions as practical
answers to practical questions. That is why institutional practices precede thinking and
theorizing about institutions. Many institutions or institutional practices sprang as it were
“spontaneously” through the simple interaction of the members of a given society in a
particular moment, without a previous theory to back them up.
The process of establishing and institution could be reconstructed in this simple way: some
human group tries to, collectively, address a practical problem. To do that, the members of
the group organize themselves in institutional ways (i.e. seeking the achievement of
collective goals through collective actions through time). Only then, if ever, they stop to think
about philosophical and normative questions regarding the defining framework of the given
institution. Practice precedes theory. Many institutions or institutional practices came about
in this way: commerce and trade precede economic studies; the polis, along many other
varieties of political organization precedes political philosophy and law studies; schools and
other educational instances long precede any philosophy of education or pedagogy; the
newspaper and the press precede what we now know as “media studies”; and the business
enterprise is much older that any philosophy of business. Even the nuclear family structured
around marriage and filiation is much older than any legislation or philosophy of the family.
Retrospectively, we should be able to find out what the practical question was, to which a
specific institution was intended to be an answer for. We should also be able to evaluate both
the goals of the institution and the satisfactory or unsatisfactory achievement of those goals.
The fundamental criterion to evaluate the goals of an institution and its performance is the
notion of the common good.
The realization of the common good could be understood as the collective enterprise of
generating and preserving the conditions that allow us to flourish in our own personal way.
These conditions are mostly institutional conditions and are only achieved when every
institution fulfills its proper task in a correct way. We need different institutions in order to
be educated, discover and foster our talents and, eventually, being able to define our personal
project and strive after it. An important aspect of the personal flourishing consists precisely
in being able to contribute to the common good through institutional practices.
In that sense, each craft, art or profession performs a double function: 1) it plays its own and
unique part in the perennial task of building, sustaining and developing a free and just society.
These practices collaborate in bringing about the conditions for the flourishing of each human
being in her or his community; 2) each craft, art or profession could also be a vocation, a
“calling”, that is , a particular way to develop a part of our talents in service of the whole
society. This is also a Platonic view: For Plato each genuine craft, art and profession is perfect
and complete, insofar as it achieves its unique and specific contribution to the good of the

3
person and to the institution that receives the benefits from the practice. the common good.
All the crafts, arts and professions serve at the same time the common and the personal good.8
The practice of medicine is the standard example of this idea. Many institutions are involved
in the lengthy process of educating someone to become a doctor; many more institutions are
needed to allow the doctor to exercise his or her profession properly. The same could be said
of institutional practices beyond the realm of the professions, like parenting.9
Not every form of collective action and organization brings about the proper conditions for
human development. Throughout history examples abound of social organizations that
privilege only some of its members while they imposed heavy burdens on others. Slavery is
the gravest example: a social structure that annihilates basic human liberties of the slaves in
order to increase the general productivity and ease the life conditions of the slave-owners.10
Slavery is not directed to the common good and does not qualify as genuine institution. It
represents a simulacrum, a corrupted institution. Just as in the classical platonic theory of the
Republic a demagogy would be a corrupted form of a democracy, a business based on slave
or child labor would be a pseudo-business, a corrupted form of the business enterprise. 11 The
notion of the common good helps us to correct and improve any given institution, or even to
eliminate it, if we find out that it serves no relevant purpose, or that it goes against the
common good. The common good works as a conceptual paradigm to order the institutional
cosmos.
To harmonize and articulate the variety of institutions in our society we also need a paradigm
of the common good: many social conflicts arise out of the frictions and even collisions
between the demands of different institutions on the same persons. The conflicts between the
Catholic Church and the State; or between the Unions and the Business Corporations in the
US during the depression years; or between the natural family and the business enterprise,
all signal the need of this harmonization.
However, not only the institutional goals and practices are to be examined and corrected
according to a paradigm of the common good. The paradigm itself may and should be
constantly reexamined. 12 Then, just as a practical institutional answer to a practical question
could be wrong —as in the case of slavery, the wrong answer to the problem of survival—
so could the theoretical paradigm that guides the examination of the institutions be itself a
misconception in need of correction.

8
Cf. Resp. 341c-342e.
9
Cf. Hurtado, R. & Galindo, F. (cords.) (2019); pp. 128-130.
10
In his chapter on slavery, Srinivasan (2017) estimates the “worth” of the enslaved African-American
population in 1859 at about $2.8 billion of that time; more than forty times the annual budget of the federal
government for that year. Slavery is usually very profitable and very harmful to the common and personal good.
11
Cf. Resp. VIII. 560d-561a, and 562a-563e for the perversion of freedom in the so called “democratic
regime” that eventually will fall into right-out tyranny.
12
This notion of common good derives from the Platonic notion of justice as explained for example in Resp.
427d-444e. See specially 443b1-2, were Socrates concludes that both justice in the person and justice in the
polis is achieved when every element performs its proper task in respect to govern and be governed.

4
The notion of the common good is itself a historical notion, a conception that we have
developed throughout the ages. It must therefore be subject to a constant refinement and
correction. It is a notion that could suffer evolution as well as regression. The ancient Greeks
thought for instance that slavery was mandatory by nature and beneficial for the common
good. Many classical philosophers also thought that monarchy was the most natural and
benevolent political regime. The Soviets thought that the abolition of private property was
essential for the achievement of the common good. And so, it is of course possible that we
now take some ethical assumptions for granted, and find out in the near or distant future that
they were totally unjustified and plainly wrong.

The Prismatic Function of Business

The common good is a prismatic notion with many complementary dimensions. The
prismatic functions of the family, for instance, are to cultivate intimacy and to learn the
virtues of donation and gratitude. 13 Although entirely possible, it is harder for a person to
grow about these virtues without the support of the family; it is questionable, though, that
intimacy could ever even exist outside the institution of a family.
No single institution could aspire to satisfy all the dimensions of the common good. We need
consequently different kinds of institutions to strive after its different aspects. Each of our
basic institutions should have a proper and specific function that only such institution can
perform in and optimal way.
As we mentioned earlier, the notion behind this very peculiar use of “function” is the ergon
(ἒργον) as understood by Plato. “Function” as the specific performance, task or even deed of
a given being that bring about a desired outcome. In this case we apply this notion of
“function” to the business enterprise: the performance and desired outcome that only the
business enterprise can bring about at all or can bring about in an optimal way. 14
In that sense, there must be some dimensions of the common good that can only be achieved
through the business enterprise and the correct performance of the business activity, if the
business enterprise is to deserve a place among the basic social institutions.
Plato explored the conditions, institutions, laws and uses that any polis would need in order
to flourish as a political body and, by the same token, to offer their citizens the possibility of
personal and political flourishing 15. Similarly, we asked ourselves what the institutional
conditions of a modern society would be. And we came to the to the conclusion that the
business enterprise is one key institution for the good life of such a society. Because the
business enterprise contributes generating five features of any decent and prosperous modern
society:

13
On the virtues of donation and gratitude see MacIntyre (1999).
14
For the notion of ergon (ἒργον) see Resp. 352d8-353b13 and Cf. Resp. 374b6-c2.
15
Cf. Resp. II. 368e-383c.

5
 1) First, the business enterprise provides innovation and efficiency in delivering services
and goods to society: services and goods that governments and the non-profit sector
are unable to provide and that in the economic terminology is described as utility.
2) The business enterprise is also the only institution designed to generate economic
value and profit. Without businesses the government will not be able to collect
enough taxes to perform its functions. And there would be no financial surplus to
support the non-profit sector.
3) As with profit so with employment, businesses are also the primal origin of jobs and
employment. Without the jobs provided by the business enterprises, the government
and the non-profit sector would lack the financial means to pay for the workers they
employ, let alone supply the jobs required by the society. There is no question that
few things are as important as employment for personal flourishing and for the
flourishing of a society.
4) Another key feature is that the business enterprise constitutes the most relevant
investment venue: without businesses, the number of investment opportunities would
be significantly diminished. The social consequences of having few investment
opportunities are hard to underestimate. Consider how a private or public pension
system could only be financed by investing its money savings. Pension funds are
essential to the stability and well-being of any modern society.16 “Lazy money” that
is, non-invested money, is permanently losing its value. Lack of businesses was one
of the reasons why the Soviet Union collapsed. Money without businesses is useless,
as we saw in the German hyperinflation of the twenties and as we are made painfully
aware continuously thanks to Venezuela’s Government today.
5) Finally, the business enterprise is an effective counterweight to government power. It
is a common worry among politicians, political pundits, and political activists that the
economic power of the business corporations could translate itself into political
power, imposing some corporate interests in the political agenda that are detrimental
for the democracy and the common good. It is a justified worry. We should consider
though, that business monopolies and oligopolies are not only harmful to democracy:
they also destroy the business ecosystem by hampering competition and the free
enterprise.

In a healthy business environment, the existence of a multitude of small, and middle

size business alongside with the big corporations empowers the business owners and
their employees. In such an environment the business owners have the economic
muscle and the political will to restrain government efforts to extend its authority and

16
Schreiber (1969) inquires about the social function of businesses’ profit motive. He finds three effects that
can only be achieved thanks to this “profit motive” (Gewinn-Streben): the first is full employment and, as a
consequence, economic stability (the “beschäftigungspolitische Funktion”); the second effect is the steering of
a healthy economy (“volkwirtschaftliche Lenkungsfunktion”); and third is the generation of financial resources
for future investment and progress (“Funktion des Fortschritts Finanziurung”) Schreiber points out, that there
is no original or necessary conflict between the interests of the employers (die Arbeitgeber) and the interests of
the employees (die Arbeitnehmer), because both groups benefit themselves from the efficient and profitable
operation of the business enterprise. Cf. pp. 68.

6
 influence beyond its proper boundaries. The employees are also empowered since
they do not depend on the trinkets, subsidies, and giveaways of the government to
assure their economic subsistence. They are also not wholly dependent on their
current employers since they are free to search for another job if many options are
available. That is why authoritative rulers usually crack down on small and middle
size businesses, but regard big businesses with monopolistic tendencies as their
natural allies —both aspire to hinder freedom. 17 The rulers will happily sacrifice
economic prosperity for the sake of political domination. And those who operate in
business with monopolistic drives see freedom of enterprise and competition as a
menace, not as an opportunity.

A healthy business environment guarantees freedom of enterprise, competition and

the rule of law –mostly regarding ownership and the fulfillment of contracts and
agreements. Economic independence favors independence of mind and political
independence. Authoritarian rulers detest small and middle size business because
they can neither subdue them through subsidies nor coopt them through corruption
and rent-seeking policies.

II. What is the Business of Business?

The five contributions of the business enterprise to the common good –mentioned above–
cannot be matched adequately by any other basic social institutions. These contributions are
the justification for the existence of the business enterprise. They answer the question about
why we need the business enterprise. Now that we have the justification, we are in a position
to argue about the function of the business enterprise: what is the business of business?
Applying the Platonic notion of ergon (ἒργον) the business of business can only be business:
the proper activity of business is an activity that either only the business enterprise can
perform, or that the business enterprise performs better than any other institution. If the
business enterprise fulfills its function, the mentioned desirable outcomes must be achieved.
To achieve those effects, the operation of the business enterprise needs to comply at least
with the following five conditions:
1. It must strive to be profitable.
2. The profitability must be achieved through the offering of goods and services that
benefit society.
3. It must provide employment in accordance with human dignity.
4. It must be sustainable.
5. It must pay taxes.
This set of conditions implies that not every activity that results in monetary gain or any form
of profitability qualifies as a business activity. Moreover, there is a peculiar form of ethics
17
Cf. in this regard the important book The Third Pillar by the distinguished economist Rajan (2019),
specifically the chapter 3, the section entitled Power and Permanence.

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inherent to the business activity. From this perspective, ethics in business is not an external
addition coming from some external instance, as religious authority or the state. To the
contrary, the correct way to do business, the successful way to do business, is an ethical way
to do business. 18 The analogy with the medical practice is again useful to better illustrate this
idea: to be a good medical doctor implies to praise health and quality of life of the patient as
the ultimate goal of the practice.19 To proceed otherwise would be unethical but would also
cause the medical doctor to miss his or her goal as a professional; he or she would also be a
poor practitioner of medicine.
We notice though, that this set of conditions is very demanding and even appears implausible.
We need therefore to briefly explore in the following section each condition to better
understand its collective implications. We will also discuss some possible counterarguments
to our position. Let us review the five conditions mentioned above:

1) The Profitability Compulsion

The profit motive is one of the essential features that differentiate the business enterprise
from the rest of the basic social institutions. We get suspicious, and rightly so, when an
institution dedicated to education or a news outlet states that profitability is among its highest
priorities. To seek profit could be very harmful for other institutions, such as a political party,
a religious order, or a news organization, it could cause them to betray their founding mission.
The same holds true for a marriage or a family. However, what is destructive for all these
institutions is essential for the business enterprise.
An unprofitable business enterprise with no prospect of becoming profitably should, within
a sound business environment, dry out of investment and cease to exist. Likewise, a business
that has stopped being profitable and has no perspective to regain profitability resembles
more a corpse than a living organism.
Only because of its cash flow and inherent compulsion after profitability can the business
enterprise be the origin of economic value and financial gain. And only then is the business
enterprise in a position to sustain in economic terms, either directly or indirectly, the
operation of the rest of the institutions within society. Through taxes, salaries, dividends,
revenue and other expenses, the earnings of the business enterprise are transferred to the rest
of institutions.
Historically, there have been attempts to decouple the profitability from the operation of the
business enterprise. Both the regimes of the Soviet Union in the past, and of Venezuela in
the present, have tried to generate profit without the independent work of the business
enterprise and to maintain the operation of “businesses” that had long ceased to be profitable.

18
The idea that ethics is inherent to sound business practice is now well known and has gained in acceptance
in several business schools thanks in part to the work of Robert Solomon and his Aristotelian approach to
business (1999), and Edward Freeman (1984, 2007, 2018), both authors take a non-reductionist view of
business.
19
Cf. Resp. 342a-c.

8
Both efforts have had devastating results. However, it is equally dangerous to reduce the
operation of a business to its profitability, that is to say: a business must be profitable, but it
is not enough to be profitable to be considered a business.
When thinking about human institutions, it is a common mistake to assume that they must
have one, and only one, proper function. That they must serve just one goal and all other
desirable objectives or goals are of secondary importance, or none. In fact, it is hard to think
of a single institution that fulfills this conceptual requirement. One purpose of a university is
to professionalize and certify its students; another is to teach them to think philosophically
and critically. The university should be a place that supports and sustains the intellectual
development of the lecturers, not just of the students. Similarly, one purpose of marriage is
to build a structure capable of generating and lovely receiving new human beings; an equally
important function of marriage is to allow the couple to live their love in a better way. The
blessing of the offspring and the carrying for them, while challenging, also offers the parents
a chance to cultivate and deepen their life in a more permanent and virtuous way. The
function of the state is not either to provide safety or to provide freedom; it must strive to
provide both, along with the conditions of political and social justice.
The notion that the only function of business is to generate profit is not only reductionistic,
it is also a dangerous one. A drug cartel, a band of kidnappers or of pirates may be
extraordinarily profitable. Still, a criminal gang is different from a business enterprise. A
governor in a country like Mexico may accumulate unfathomable amounts of money by
incurring in large-scale embezzlement of public funds; and by accepting bribes and kickbacks
in exchange for licenses or public contracts. We will not say that the governor may be a
corrupt public servant, but he is also a great businessman since he amassed a great fortune.
Just as we would not say of the infamous Bernie Madoff, that he was indeed a poor financer
and investment manager, but a great businessman. Such affirmations make no sense. Despite
its profitability, a successful scam is not a business, nor is a successful fraudster a successful
businessman or businesswoman, he or she is not a businessperson at all, but a fraudster and
a criminal.
Criminal enterprises are often profitable. That is indeed their main purpose and motivation.
They are also very harmful to society. They are profitable at the expense of others and at the
expense of society. They are not productive, but parasitic activities: they generate profit by
stealing from others and by destroying genuine business venues. Criminal enterprises are also
parasitic in the sense that they are unsustainable in the long run. They affect the life of society
for the worse. They do not offer meaningful and safe employment, and usually they do not
pay taxes either.
Here again is extreme useful the Platonic insight to distinguish between the genuine practice
or the genuine institution and its corresponding simulacrum: A criminal enterprise is similar
in many aspects to a business enterprise. Like the business enterprise the criminal enterprise
is also for profit and can also have a complex structure of management, clients, providers,
distribution channels, etc. But it is different in the most essential aspect: whereas the business
enterprise achieves profitability by creating value, the criminal enterprise achieves it by

9
destroying value. Millions of dollars were wasted so that Madoff were able to amass his
fortune; thousands of lives were taken so that the Chapo were able to build his empire. This
essential aspect makes the criminal enterprise only a “simulacrum”, a “fake” version of the
business enterprise. 20
Comparing a profitable scam with a true business enterprise shows that profitability is not
the exclusive goal of the business enterprise. It is a matter of utter importance how the
profitability of a business enterprise is achieved. The other four enumerated conditions come
to light when we reflect on this question.

2) Goods and Services that Benefit Society

If the business enterprise aspires to have a place within the nerve built by the basic social
institutions, it must serve society by its activity and not harm it. 21 We would have no reason
to support a profitable activity, if we find out that such profit is gained at our expense. If the
profit is not a “shared value”, it becomes a parasitic profit,22 ones that do not generate
anything, but only take away what others have produced. That is why, as a society, we do not
support or tolerate criminal activities, even when they are extremely profitable. What reason
then would we have to support profitable activities, that are certainly not illegal, but that harm
the consumer or society at large?
In contrast with many other profitable activities, is characteristic of a business that
profitability is achieved by offering goods and services that improve societies wellbeing. This
means not only that people are willing to pay in exchange for something that they need or
desire; it means also that they (the clients, buyers or consumers) and the society are better off
thanks to that good or service.
This is a very demanding condition. Many profitable legal activities, that we would usually
consider “businesses”, would not classify as such if judged by this standard. The fact that
they are legal does not imply that they benefit society. As stated before, criminal profitable
activities are bad, not because they are illegal, but because they are harmful in themselves.
The argument in favor of some products or goods that are indeed harmful for both the
consumer and society, but nevertheless they “satisfy” the desire of the buyers, and therefore,
they should be counted as a business, is a very weak one. Since obviously all sorts of
profitable criminal activities (as trafficking persons, or sexual exploitation of minors) also
“satisfy” the desires of the certain group of buyers.

20
For this distinction in Plato see among other places Gorg. 464d3-c2, Resp. 598c5-599b8 and Soph. 266b-
267b.
21
Schreiber (1969) pp. 72, also insists on this point: “This harmony among the profit motivation of the enterprise
and the demands of the common good is the force of the free economy” („Diese Übereinstimmung zwischen
Gewinninteresse der Unternehmung und den Forderungen des Gemeinwohls ist die Stärke der freien
Wirtschaft.” )
22
For a variety of “shared value” examples, see the seminal article Strategy and Society by Porter and Kramer
(2006). The authors are able to transcend the all too common assumed dichotomy between altruism and egoism.

10
Two desirable effects of the business activity namely, efficiency and innovation, are only
served, if the service or product benefits society. Innovation and efficiency are not
unqualified goods. The innovative junk bond that Michael Milken introduced at Drexel
Burnham Lambert or the mortgage backed securities first used by Solomon Brothers in the
1970s were among other financial innovations at the core of the 2008 crisis. 23
An innovative spirit and entrepreneurial drive were present in the actions of Joaquin Guzman
Loera, “el Chapo”. Through the forced labor of kidnapped teenagers, his “Cartel del Golfo”
built the first tunnels underneath the Mexican American border to traffic drugs in a massive
scale, earning them millions thanks to such “innovation”.24 The pornographic industry has
also been in recent years quite innovative and efficient in bringing contents to almost
everywhere and make them available to almost everyone. Such “gains” of innovation and
efficiency had only harmed individual persons, communities and the society at large.

3) Employment According to Human Dignity.

The business enterprise is the ultimate source of profit, and it is also the most important
provider of remunerate employment. Without the business enterprise, the other institutions
would neither have the means to pay for their employees, nor be able to supply employment
to the vast majority of the working population. Directly or indirectly, employment in the
business sector sustains employment in the rest of the basic social institutions. But just as not
any profitable activity qualifies as a business, not every working activity is an employment
according with human dignity. This is not the place to develop such relevant topic as it
deserves, but a few basic remarks can be made without much controversy:
The kind of work or employment that the business enterprise ought to provide, must possess
certain features from society’s viewpoint and also from the worker’s. The first characteristic
is related to the kind of activity that work constitutes: since the profitability is to be achieved
through offering goods and services that benefit society, the work of the employee must
somehow be related to such goal. This excludes “jobs” such as mobsters, hit or hatchet men,
hackers and fraudsters of any kind; along with many other remunerate activities.
From the worker’s viewpoint, the connection of his or her activity to a product or service that
benefits society gives meaning to this activity, since it offers the employee the opportunity
to contribute to the common good along with the chance to make a living –the work they
performed benefits them and society at large. Other relevant aspects are related to the

23
On the dangers and the absurdities of some financial innovations see Kay, J. (2015) pp. 59-61; and the section
“Housing” in chapter 5 and in chapter 6 the section “The payment system”. See also Geisst (2006) pp. 122-123
(on Drexel Burnham Lambert) and pp. 231 (on junk bonds).
24
It is no help that publications as Forbes reported about “el Chapo” as “CEO of the Sinaloa Cartel” and keep
track of his “net worth over time”. By doing so they unwillingly promote the conceptual association between
being rich and being a successful businessman. It makes all the difference how that wealth was achieved. For
an interesting journalistic article on “El Chapo’s” methods see Mont Reel (2015). For an analysis of the drug
“business” see Wainwright (2016). Wainwright explains from the outset the differences as well as the
similarities among criminal enterprises and a genuine business enterprise.

11
working conditions: the intensity of the activity, the toil that it imposes on the workers; if it
is a dangerous activity; if it allows the development and deployment of the worker’s abilities
and talents; if it offers a chance to learn new things and interact in a humane way with
coworkers and clients, etc.
A last obvious and significant aspect is the remuneration, broad conceived as to include
benefits such as pensions and healthcare packages, which is important but not essential.
Apprenticeships and similar schemes may be low or no remunerated at all, and they still may
be according with human dignity, depending on various factors. An apprentice may for a
while earn no money and have no benefits beyond the learning itself, which is of great value.
On the other hand, remuneration alone does not make a certain work compatible with human
dignity. Many forms of prostitution (sexual, intellectual, political) are highly remunerated,
and harmful for the person none the less. And some high regarded and high payed jobs are
so demanding on terms of time and attention of the worker, as to leave no space for family
life, friends, intellectual or spiritual aspirations. Disregarding the high pay, there is a case to
be made to assert that such jobs are not compatible with human dignity, since they hamper
gravely the flourishing of the person.25
This condition presents us again with a set of questions or problems in the ordinary labor
market. An especially thorny questions is the matters of low-wages. We will address some
of these problem in the next section.

4) Sustainability.
If profitability is not enough, and if the operation of the business enterprise is ordered to the
benefit of society, it is a necessary consequence for the business to be sustainable. Profitable
but parasitic operations are inherently unsustainable, in one or more of the three sorts of
commonly referred sustainability: financial, ecological or social. 26 Painful recent historical
experiences as the Colombian three-party civil war among the FARC-Guerrilla, the
government army forces, and the paramilitaries; or the Mexican war on drugs, shows that
such profitable activities as kidnapping, stealing, extortion and murder inflict damages to the
society and the economic life beyond any quantitative or monetary measure —they are
socially unsustainable.
From the point of view of ecological sustainability, the current dispute between Exxon Mobil
and one of its former shareholders, the Rockefeller Foundation, illustrates how the ecological
cost of a so far very profitable business may have ended up in the not-so-distant future, being
so high as to wreck up its entire business model. The ecological cost of consuming the oil

25
A recent and excellent journalistic article o explores the consequences of stress and mismanagement of mental
health at high performance and high rewarded jobs, see: The trillion-dollar taboo: why it’s time to stop ignoring
mental health at work. Raptopoulos and Fontanella-Khan in the Financial Times, July 10, 2019. Access to the
article is open to non-subscribers, this fact alone underscores the relevance of the information in the piece.
26
For a similar, although not identical position to ours on sustainability see Hartmand and DesJardins (2011)
Chap. 9.

12
reserves that Exxon has already at its disposal, may be the complete extinction of some
ecosystems causing a worsening so grave in the ecological conditions of certain regions, as
to jeopardize the very existence of entire populations. 27
Financial sustainability should be a given for a business. To explain it again is a redundancy
of the profitability compulsion. There is one nuance, though, that comes to the mind when
thinking about financial sustainability, and that is the time perspective. A business-like
operation may be on the short term extremely profitable while utterly unsustainable in the
long-term. That is precisely the case with the classic Ponzi scheme like the one conducted by
Bernie Madoff. The original scheme engineered by Charles Ponzi offered juicy short-term
earnings by exploiting arbitrage opportunities in foreign postal reply coupons that could be
redeemed in the US.28 In an ironical and bold reversal of this historical origin, Madoff
conducted his Ponzi scheme as a long-term investment apt to manage public pension funds
and endowments. Both schemes were inherently unsustainable from their respective
inception. Because of the different amounts and financial circumstances of their respective
historic times, it took longer for the Madoff scheme to crash down against financial reality. 29
If the business enterprise is to fulfill its function as a venue for long term investments, it must
be sustainable in these three senses.

5) Taxes.
Usually, neither persons nor corporations like to pay taxes. If the government is marred by
corruption even a low tax rate is perceived as unjust by the taxpayers. However, the business
enterprise needs a well-functioning government to operate and thrive, and taxes are
indispensable for the government to be able to fulfill its functions. A well-functioning
government performs at least five functions that are truly relevant for the business
enterprises. First among them is the establishment of the rule of law. Thanks to the rule of
law rights are respected, contracts are enacted, and rules are enforced. The protection of
individual, corporate or intellectual property is essential for a business to be competitive.
Without the rule of law, extortion, theft, trafficking (both of material products or even
human), kidnapping and murder afflict the business sector and the businesspeople. We see
the consequences of a weak or non-existent rule of law in a variety of degrees raging from a
total collapse of the state, as in Syria; to the rule of a kleptocracy as in Venezuela; or an
oligarchic system as in Russia; to the establishment of a corrupt elite in business and in
government, as it happens in Mexico. When the rule of law is weak, business suffers.
Contracts are not served, earnings are not safe and there are no incentives for new
investments.30

27
See the two interesting articles by Kaiser and Wasserman in The New York Review of Books (2016).
28
See the entry “Ponzi, Charles” by Frazer, W. in Geisst (2006) pp. 340-342.
29
On Madoff see for instance Sarna, D.E.Y. (2010) Chap. 20 and 21.
30
On the rule of law see Bingham (2010) and Willke (1996). Bingham explains the relevance of the notion of
the rule of law and offers a brief historical survey on the keystones that defined the meaning of this notion.
Bingham’s perspective orbits around the relation that should exist between the authority of the State and the

13
The business enterprise also needs the government in order to have leverage in international
relations —from general advice and rules of commerce, to trade agreements and international
institutions to deal with conflicts related with trade.
Thanks to taxes and a good relation between the business sector and the government
investment possibilities in infrastructure are opened to both. Infrastructure projects that no
business enterprise, not even a corporation, is able to develop by itself. Infrastructure
investments that are too expensive in the short-term, but very beneficial for the business
sector and society in the long term. Development projects such as airports, train lines, ports,
roads, etc.31
Taxes also sustained the social safety net that greatly diminish the social impact of the
unavoidable shifts of “Schumpeterian” creative destruction characteristic of the business
sector. Such safety net adds certainty to the lives of millions of workers and their families, a
domestic certainty that translates into political stability and is beneficial to the business
sector.
Finally, taxes alleviate the social costs that the negatives externalities of the business
operation inflict on the society.
In sum, taxes remind us of a basic truth: each business enterprise exists and operates in a
given place and is related to particular communities in many forms. The most manifest one
is that employees and clients always belong to a specific community. By paying taxes, the
business enterprise acknowledges the bond with these communities, regions and countries.
Paying taxes is a direct and unambiguous way to collaborate with the common good.

citizen in order to prevent abuses of power from the government. Wilken explores the proper functions of the
nation-state as a peculiar form of political organization, established during the sixteenth and seventeenth century
and still working in our day. Following the theory of the systems developed by Niklas Luhman, Wilken analyzes
how the social order could come into being, and why every society needs some form of government. Luhman’s
theory of systems shows remarkable affinities with the platonic perspective developed in this text. Luhman’s
aim is to explain the role of the nation-state in the generation of the social cosmos in which we live. For Wilken,
the basic function of the nation-state is to guarantee the security of its citizens. Security is achieved by attending
to three main problems: violence, poverty and ignorance. The nation-state deals with these problems by
establishing a particular infrastructure for each one of them. The basic action to deal with violence is repression,
done by the infrastructure of the criminal justice system along with the homeland security departments and the
military force. According to Wilken this infrastructure corresponds to the notion of the “Night-watchman state”
(the Nachtwächterstaat) in the liberal tradition. The basic action to deal with poverty is restitution, achieved
through policies of redistribution and social transfers as correspond to the Welfare state (Wohlfartstaat). The
basic action to deal with ignorance is prevention. Ignorance is understood as the lack of the relevant practical
and theoretical knowledge needed to take part in and profit from the complex systems that pervade the modern
life, such as the judicial system, the financial system, the political system etc. The nation-state establishes an
infrastructure based on knowledge (wissensbasierte Infrastruktur) that encompasses universities, research
groups and institutes, advocacy groups, think-tanks, expert’s commissions and the like. The asymmetry of
knowledge is one form of the asymmetry of power, therefore the nation-state must take provisions to protect
their less educated citizens from abuse.
31
For some historical examples of public-private investment in infrastructure see Srinivasan (2017) chapters 6
to 8.

14
III. Some Common Counterarguments.
Let us briefly review some counterarguments when presenting this view of business. The
most prominent counterargument is the affirmation that such a model, while well intentioned
and nice, is useless for any “real” business enterprise, then no business in the “real world” is
able to fulfill this set of conditions.
Every ideal and formal argumentation in the Platonic tradition —as this one is intended to
be— faces this kind of critique about the gap between the desirable theory and the customary
practice. However, such critique misunderstands the role of the business paradigm as a
compass and a corrective, that is, as a living entity. Certainly, the business enterprise is in
constant need of both guidance and correction. The conditions already stated serve to
evaluate how well a certain business is performing its complex mission. As every model, this
one remains aspirational through time. It is impossible to fulfill the set of conditions fully
and permanently. But, by having a model we are able to come closer to it and therefore to
correct and improve the operation of our business. This is also the approach taken by the
Socrates of Republic in the famous closing lines of the Book IX: the ideal polis that Socrates
and his companions have described in the previous books, may never actually exist here on
earth: “But, said I, perhaps there is a paradigm laid up in heaven, for whom may want to look
at it, and by looking at it make himself [configure himself, i.e. the powers of his soul] after
it.” 32
Beyond this general counterargument there are some punctual critiques to each of the
conditions. Regarding the profitability compulsion, a common believe is that profitability
alone defines the business enterprise, the rest of conditions being accessory to this essential
feature. We already mentioned why this argument is profoundly wrong: the are many
profitable activities that are extreme harmful for the society and for those who incurred in
them.
Also, the business enterprise is one of the essential basic social institutions. Its proper activity
cannot be harmful to the other institutions or to society. As a society, we neither tolerate nor
support activities that could be extremely profitable but are also very harmful to society, such
as drug trafficking or kidnapping. Why should the law and the morality of society protect the
business activity if such activity goes against our interests?
It is a common mistake indeed to think that, given the reason why the profitability
compulsion is essential to the business enterprise, it could be its only function; a parallel
mistake is to propose that the profitability compulsion is not essential to the business
enterprise at all, since it is not the only function of the business enterprise —that there is no
compulsion. But unlike any other institution, it is essential to the business enterprise to seek
profitability, since profitability alone justify the risk taken by the investors and allows the
business enterprise to provide employment, to be a long-term investment vehicle and to be
sustainable.

32
ἀλλ᾽, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, ἐν οὐρανῷ ἴσως παράδειγμα ἀνάκειται τῷ βουλομένῳ ὁρᾶν καὶ ὁρῶντι ἑαυτὸν κατοικίζειν.
Resp. 592b3-4.

15
Also the analogy of the leaving animal and the corpse helps us to grasp the difference between
a healthy, an agonizing business and a “death business” —a corpse33. If a business is
struggling to remain afloat and has no prospects to become profitable again, it will soon cease
to be a business in a real sense. Is hard to judge when a business has or has not the prospect
of regain profitability, for the obvious reason that judgements about the future are always
uncertain; the future as such is unknown and unknowable. The point is to show the difference
between something was a business enterprise but is a business enterprise no more.
Against the second condition we face the undeniable fact of industries offering goods or
services that are socially harmful. A practical way to think about it is as a palette with two
extremes: on the right of the palette we could imagine those goods and services that are
unambiguously socially beneficial, services as nursing and goods as vaccines. On the
opposite left extreme, “services” and products that are unmistakably socially harmful, such
as the “services” of a contract killer or the “products” of the child pornography industry.
Within these two opposite extremes we could position each service and product on the
market, some more to the right others more to the left.
Using this strategy some hard cases come to mind, among them the tobacco industry, as well
as the alcohol, guns and the pornographic industry. Five other criteria could help us to
elucidate such instances namely: 1) the role of moderation; 2) the conditions of production;
3) the historical context; 4) the social costs; and 5) the idea of the lesser evil.
1) The role of moderation: a moderate consumption of alcohol is possible; but such
nuance makes no sense when applied to tobacco or child pornography.
2) The conditions of production: in the case of the tobacco industry need not to be
socially harmful; but this is not the case of the pornographic industry.
3) The historical context: the tobacco industry well precedes the knowledge about the
damage caused by smoking, but this do not absolve the tobacco companies for the
harm they’ve produced.
4) The social cost: the later does imply that the industry was well established before we
found out about its social cost. We need to consider also how high the social cost
caused by a given industry is and to ponder if this cost is tolerable or not. The social
cost of the gun industry in the US and its devastating impact in Mexico through the
drug wars may be reason enough to limit the production and sell of guns.

33
There is of course the case of the “undead” corporations: Corporations that have not filed for bankruptcy but
are unable to cover their interest expenses with their earnings before tax. These corporations are neither “alive”
since they operate at no profit; nor “dead” since they are not in the process of liquidation. Due to the ready
availability of ultra-cheap money to borrow, they are able to rollover their debt once and again with no prospect
of ever cover the principal or return to profitability. The phenomenon has been studied and commented on
extensively, see for instance: Buttonwood. The Economist. Jul.15.2017. (2017); Borio (2018); Andrews et. al.
(2017); Beck et. Prinz (2019); McGowan et. al. (2017); Tim Harford. Financial Times. Feb.22.2018. One key
structural issue that supports the existence of zombie corporation is that filling for bankruptcy is more expensive
for the managers of such corporations than remaining operational at a loss—in a zombie state. The financial
situation caused by the pandemic will only increase this problem. See: Markus Frühauf. FAZ. 06. May. 2020
and Financial Gillian Tett. Financial Times. 14.May.2020.

16
 5) The idea of the lesser evil: finally, we need to accept that some parasitic and profitable
activities are impossible to eliminate, and that it is better to try to regulate and limit
them through the rule of law; that is case with pornography and other profitable
venues related with the exploitation of human sexuality. The lesser evil is to regulate
such forms of commerce, since it is worst to outlaw them and let the black market
take full control of them.
On the condition related to employment according with human dignity critical attention tends
to concentrate on the dilemma of either paying fair wages or being profitable. Some
companies, so goes the argument, will not be able to pay fair wages and remain operational,
and it would be worse for their employees to lose their source of income as to earn less that
what would be fair. This critique misses the mark in two fundamental senses:
1) The first is that for an employment to go according to human dignity, wages are
indeed important, but they are not the decisive feature. The case of Nike in the nineties
and of Foxconn at the beginning of the XXI Century show that the main problems
affecting the employees were not the wages but the job conditions: working hours
and working spaces, safety issues and many other social conditions within the fabrics
and in the dynamic of production. 34
2) The second sense is that the dilemma is a self-made and nor a genuine one in a sense:
managers and directors at the business enterprises pretend that they are unable to pay
higher wages; that doing so will make them uncompetitive and force them to shut
down operations entirely. But sometimes such undesirable outcome can be avoided
by gaining efficiencies and reducing salaries at the top or even reducing margins.
The problem is indeed complex, but the core idea is the following: if a business enterprise
is unable to comply with the compulsion of profitability without exploiting its workers, it is
not a genuine business, because profitability is ultimately achieved by exploitation of the
workers, who are deeply involved in the generation of value.
The main critique to the sustainability condition is redundant: there is no need to state this
extra condition since its demands are already covered by previous conditions. The
profitability compulsion implies financial sustainability. Social and ecological sustainability
are themselves redundant, and both are already included in the condition of being beneficial
to society.
As we already saw financial sustainability is different from the profitability compulsion. The
financial sustainability points towards the future and the long-term perspective; whereas the
profitability compulsion is bound to the present and the short-term. Examples abound in the
financial sector of short-term highly profitable business operations, that were extremely
fragile and unsustainable in the long-term. Lehman Brothers leverage of almost 30 to 1 and
its continuous wholesale overnight financing was profitable for a while, until the market
conditions changed, and the money markets lost confidence in Lehman’s ability to honor
their short-term debt. Similarly, AIG’s selling of Credit Default Swaps (insurance to cover

34
For the case of Nike see Spar (2010); for Foxconn see Eccles (2011) and also Freeman, J. (2018) Chap. 7.

17
the eventual default of Collateral Debt Obligations i.e. debt packages of, among other kinds
of debt, mortgage backed securities) was supposedly an easy and profitable business; until
the CDOs defaulted and AIG was unable to cover even a small amount of the loses. With the
privilege of hindsight, we now know that such operations bore excessive risk from the
beginning; they were profitable but never financially sustainable. 35 Financial unsustainability
is always socially unsustainable; but not all social unsustainable profitable practices are also
financially unsustainable. A drug cartel, for instance, is socially unsustainable but neither
financially nor necessarily ecologically.
Just as financial sustainability puts the accent on the long-term perspective of a business
enterprise, in contrast with the short-term perspective required by the profitability
compulsion, so does the social and ecological sustainability values the future rather than the
present in relation with the second condition of being beneficial to society. Over the last two
centuries, exploitation of coal and oil greatly benefited society. Now however, it is
undeniable that the further increase of consumption of these energy resources will gravely
harm the ecosystem.
The sustainability condition opens us a glance into the future. The business enterprise is
orientated towards the future, since it strives after innovation and it aspires to be a viable
investment venue specially for long-term investments.
The demand to pay taxes is contentious among businesspeople. It is indeed striking to
contrast the ability and competence of some governments to come up with new taxes and
collect them, with their inefficiency and ineptitude to use them correctly. There is however
no way around it: the business enterprise needs the rule of law to operate and prosper. The
rule of law can only be established by the government, and the government needs taxes to
exist and fulfill its function. Know that, we should ask ourselves if there should be no
discretion when it comes to paying taxes. Radical answers to this kind of questions are
seldom right. Paying no taxes is certainly wrong, paying all taxes is sometimes impossible

III. The business of business is business

To be profitable is essential for the business enterprise, but it is wrong to assume that
profitability alone exhausts the essence of business, that the only business of business is
profit. As it happens with any other basic human institution, the business enterprise is a

35For two surveys of the extensive bibliography on the crisis see Kindelberger, C.P. et Aliber R.Z. (2011) pp.
9-10; and Shiller, R.J. et Akerlof, G.A. (2015) Ch. 2. Nt. 1. Pp. 189-190. In our opinion some useful works are:
Lewis (2010) to understand the genesis of the crisis; for one of the best day to day accounts of some of the
decisive weeks of the crisis see Ross Sorkin (2009); for two excellent explanations of the systemic aspects of
the crisis and its impact in the global economy see Wolf (2015) and Turner (2016); for a historical explanation
and an overview of the crisis see Tooze (2018); for the adequate response from the part of financial authorities
and governments see Bernake, Geithner et Paulson (2019) and for one of the most illuminating financial analysis
of the crisis see Dalio (2018) Part 2. For two excellent journalistic works on the impact of the crisis in the life
of regular people see Packer (2013) and Desmond (2016). Sadly, the present world economic crisis underlines
the relevance of these references.

18
prismatic entity, able to perform different functions and to generate several desirable
outcomes. When thinking about human institutions, the “Charybdis danger” of reductionism
and the equally destructive “Scylla danger” of hypertrophy must be avoided. Curiously
enough, they tend to come together, as in Homer’s Odyssey.
If we accept that the only function of business is to be profitable, it becomes easy to believe
that profitability should be the primal goal in every other institution. 36 By the same token, a
company lead only by the profit motive may outgrowth its proper size and become inefficient,
unable to innovate and to serve its clients. Ultimately, this hypertrophy of growing without
limits generates monopolies and enormous concentrations of power that are toxic to the
whole business ecosystem and to the whole system of basic human institutions.
The five conditions protect the business enterprise against both dangers of reductionism and
hypertrophy. They are not a set of values imposed from the outside, from another logic and
a higher moral authority. They do not fall in the false dichotomy between egoism and altruism
and the corresponding false dilemma of either achieving profitability or being beneficial to
society. The conditions arise “from inside”, from the design and inner-logic of the business
enterprise. The conditions are indispensable, then only if the business enterprise aims at being
the real thing —and not merely a shameful imitation, a simulacrum or an apparition, as the
shadow plays in Plato’s cave— will it ultimately fulfill its “business” in the society.

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(2018) 3: 9-16.

36
Rosanvallon (2011) part four, chapter four, has explored the consequences of this profit-logic out of its
proper realm. And also Sandel (2012).

19
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