Abstract
This article examines the relationship between ‘business’ and ‘politics’ and sets out some arguments to show the relevance of politics to business studies. It then reports some research findings on the nature of business studies curricula and the perceptions of academics and students on the relevance of politics at undergraduate and postgraduate levels from a survey of UK universities.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
A related question is: why should anyone care about the answers to these questions? The interest of the authors in these questions comes from experience over many years of teaching politics in the context of a business faculty. There must be many others, though a small part of the politics profession, who spend some part of their time teaching on business courses and thinking about how politics can enhance the curriculum. Such enhancement would be to the benefit of students. However, if there is a need of such enhancement it might perhaps reflect reluctance within the politics profession to promote the subject beyond the department, or the need to be more effective in doing so.
The project was funded by C-SAP (Higher Education Academy Subject Network for Sociology, Anthropology, Politics) and Leeds Metropolitan University (C-SAP Project Reference 29/P/02). A full report of the findings can be found on the C-SAP website (www.c-sap.bham.ac.uk/resources/project_reports/findings/default.asp) or obtained from the authors. We are grateful to the students and academics who contributed their time to take part in the surveys. Warm thanks are also due to Vicky Harte who provided administrative and technical assistance.
See Leftwich (2004a) for a range of contributions on the nature of politics.
From 59 questionnaires sent – a response rate of 31 per cent.
In the undergraduate course-leader survey the list comprised twenty-six aspects reflecting a broad conception of the scope of politics. In the postgraduate survey the list was expanded to twenty-eight by the addition of ‘corporate social responsibility’ and ‘business ethics’.
‘strongly disagree’=−2, ‘disagree’=−1, ‘neither agree/disagree’=0, ‘agree’=1, ‘strongly agree’=2.
It is plausible that the words ‘active’ and ‘strong’ in these statements may have lowered the positive responses.
The most frequently given reason for not voting is ‘I don't feel I know enough about politics’ (34 respondents). This is a much more common reason than disillusionment with the political parties or the election system (‘I can't see any differences between the parties in what they stand for’; ‘None of the parties really stands for what I believe in’; ‘It makes no difference whether I vote or not’). Lack of interest is not a prime reason (‘I'm not interested in the outcome of the election’) although there is some indication of apathy (17 respondents say, ‘I feel that I should vote but I can't be bothered’).
It should be noted that for all these questions there is quite a high proportion of respondents who ‘neither agree nor disagree’ (ranging from 15.1 to 37.7 per cent).
Question 9 replicates 8 of the course leader survey except with the addition of two more aspects: ‘corporate social responsibility’ and ‘business ethics’.
However, the proportion that disagrees or strongly disagrees that politics should be a core subject is also a minority (35.1 per cent), while a third of respondents (34.2 per cent) neither agrees nor disagrees.
References
Giddens, A. (1999) The Third Way: The Renewal of Social Democracy, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Grant, W. (1993) Business and Politics in Britain, Basingstoke: Macmillan.
Hertz, N. (2001) The Silent Takeover: Global Capitalism and the Death of Democracy, London: Heinemann.
Klein, N. (2000) No Logo, London: Flamingo.
Leftwich, A. (ed.) (2004a) What is Politics?, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Leftwich, A. (2004b) ‘The Political Approach to Human Behaviour: People, Resources and Power’, in A. Leftwich (ed.) What is Politics?, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Luger, S. (2000) Corporate Power, American Democracy and the Automobile Industry, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Wilson, G.K. (2003) Business and Politics: A Comparative Introduction, Basingstoke: Palgrave.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wetherly, P., Barnett, N. what has politics got to do with business?. Eur Polit Sci 4, 358–370 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.eps.2210042
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.eps.2210042