Project overview

Dr Mark Hayes, Clifford Longley and representatives of the Blueprint for a Better Business, the Common Good Foundation and CAFOD, to take another look at Company Law reform in the light of Catholic Social Thought.

The central idea draws on Catholic Social Thought to make the moral claim that workers enjoy a natural property right in the business of a company, that they possess an inalienable membership, just as their property in themselves has become inalienable since the abolition of slavery. The modern company is in its legal structure a poor reflection of the human association that produces goods and services and serves customers and society. Part of the job is to articulate clearly the implications for Company Law of recognising such a property right within mainstream companies (as opposed to worker co-ops, charities, etc).

Key elements:

  • Making a clear distinction between the company itself (a legal construct) and its business, for the purpose of defining the ‘success’ that directors have a duty to promote

  • Defining qualifying employees as members of a company that employs them

  • Making parent companies liable for their subsidiaries

  • Prohibiting hostile takeovers and requiring employee consent by ballot to takeovers recommended by the directors

  • Prohibiting further demutualisation and encouraging conversion to co-operative and mutual forms of incorporation

Outputs and impacts

The project Steering Group published an interim working paper: 'Redefining Corporate Purpose: The Need To Recognise Membership Through Work'.

Further information

Contact CCSTP to find out more about this project.