Citizenship, Identity and the Corporation: Exploring New Avenues of Political Mediation

Abstract

The questions of whether corporations can or should be regarded as citizens, and in which communities such citizenship should be acknowledged or contested, have received growing attention (Gerencser, 2005; Moon, Crane and Matten, 2005; Norman and Néron, 2008). A parallel debate on the role of corporations in governing the citizenship of individuals, through the transfer of authority from government to business in the privatization of public services, public-private partnerships, market-based regulation, and corporate social responsibility initiatives has also emerged as a major research theme across the social sciences (Cashore, 2002; Hall and Biersteker, 2002; Knill and Lehmkuhl, 2002; Matten and Crane, 2005; Ronit, 2001; Rosenau and Czempiel, 1992; Scherer and Palazzo, 2011). In both cases, however, the conceptualizations of citizenship deployed to make sense of these changing social, political and economic dynamics have relied heavily on notions of formal citizenship status (should corporations be granted the status of citizens?) and concomitant rights and duties (if so, what are their entitlements and responsibilities?). To date, the major shifts evident in the citizenship literature towards claims based on identity and difference (e.g. Isin and Turner, 2003; Isin and Wood, 1999) have made little or no impact on the study of business citizenship.