Business Ethics Reframe: Shareholder vs Stakeholder Thinking

A board decision looks one way through Friedman's shareholder lens and quite another through Freeman's stakeholder theory. Describe the decision and you get both readings: maximise returns within the law on one side, obligations to employees, customers and community on the other. Useful when you need to argue a case to people who only see one of the two.

Reframe the following business decision through two competing ethical lenses: {BUSINESS_DECISION}. First, analyse it through the shareholder primacy lens, associated with Milton Friedman, which holds that a company's sole ethical obligation is to maximise returns for shareholders within the law. Second, reframe it through stakeholder theory, associated with R. Edward Freeman, which holds that a company has ethical obligations to employees, customers, suppliers, communities, and shareholders alike. For each lens, describe what priorities and trade-offs the decision-maker should consider, and what a morally justifiable outcome looks like. Then identify one moral consideration that neither lens adequately addresses, and explain what philosophical tradition could fill that gap.