10th Anniversary of the Best 50 Corporate Citizens in Canada
Social economist Peter Drucker’s adage “what gets measured, gets managed,” was and is the driving force for our corporate rankings. Now, 10 years into the quest of calibrating corporate impact, we must ask: What has changed, and what needs to change?
Socialism collapsed because it did not allow the market to tell the economic truth. Capitalism may collapse because it does not allow the market to tell the ecological truth.
- Oystein Dahle, former VP of Exxon for Norway and the North Sea
Ten years ago, Corporate Knights ventured forth into the realm of corporate rankings—not the usual league of tables comparing revenues and profits, but the murkier space deep in the woods. This shaded area of corporate eco-social performance will answer civilization’s big question: Can we find a way to reconcile our capitalist system on this hot and crowded planet or does an age of Mad Max proportions await?
Some may ask: What does corporate citizenship have to do with the fate of humanity? Thirty years ago, states were more powerful than corporations, but no longer. In 1980, the market value of all publicly traded companies was one-quarter of global gross domestic product (GDP). Today, that ratio stands at eye level with global GDP at approximately US$60 trillion. What’s more, our largest corporations hold marionette strings extending into the heart of the democratic world’s super-structures; from 24 Sussex and the Beltway, to Whitehall and Elysée.
What companies do with social, ecological, natural and financial capital to thrive in the present and shape the future matters.
The nature of the quest has morphed along a continuum that started with corporate social responsibility, evolving to responsible business, and then to the cusp of clean capitalism—a daunting but more exciting age of opportunity that will reward companies that pursue profit concurrently with social and ecological prosperity.
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