Amazing - an almost perceptive Observer editorial

"Big business: There is profit to be made in decency", is the title of today's lead editorial in the Observer. The infantile subhead rather spoils it, though: "If governments and companies fail to behave responsibly, the stage could be set for an environmental, social and economic dystopia".

 

Waddaya mean "if" and "could be"? It's a silly sub, anyway, because the leader is entirely about corporate governance and eschews the usual doomsday hyperbole. The conclusion, for once, emphasises that individuals not only can but should act according to their principles instead of yapping for "the government" to do it. 

Large businesses are complex, multifaceted organisations and few, if any, could claim to be beyond reproach. But it is not just the men and women running our largest companies who need to think more deeply about the need to balance profit and consumerism against the environment and human rights. We all do, as shoppers, pension fund members, employees and small investors. We blame business leaders for putting the planet at risk, for exploiting poor people in the developing world and for paying themselves too much, but most of us don't bother to act by voting at a company AGM, protesting to our pension fund trustee or checking on the supply chain of our T-shirts and gadgets. Companies can be a force for good. We must expect it of them and punish them if they are not.