Richard Edelman Quotes

America's corporations learned long ago that equality is just good business and is the right thing to do.

People do care where their food, or other goods, comes from, not merely if the price is right. And that means no business can afford to ignore the impacts their buying practices have on producers and on the perceptions and choices of consumers.

Let's face it: we live at a time when government is less and less powerful, less and less effective, and the agent of social change, at least for the immediate future, is the corporation.

The Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention argues that no two countries that are both part of the same global supply chain will ever fight a war as long as they are each part of that supply chain.

Business leaders cannot be bystanders.

And also, more and more businesses really want to do the right thing. They feel better about themselves, their workers feel better, and so do their customers. I think this is equally true in the transnational corporations, but it is harder to express in those situations.

The U.S. is excellent at importing cheap products from the rest of the world. Let's try importing some human capital instead.

The model of Coca-Cola is local, whether it's investing, partnering, sourcing, producing, or selling. We market and distribute locally; we pay taxes locally. And it works.

Brands who come to China, often they just care about price - so they actually drive the suppliers to cut corners on environmental standards to win a contract.

Companies, to date, have often used the excuse that they are only beholden to their shareholders, but we need shareholders to think of themselves as stakeholders in the well being of society as well.

For years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors and vice versa. The difference did not exist. Our company is too big. It goes with the welfare of the country.

General Electric recognizes that as a major economic entity it has the stature and responsibility to form opinions.

We are surrounded by people with accents because America is a nation of immigrants. Beyond that, the people who made your iPhone and the shirt on your back are probably Asians, and we're really not that disconnected from each other; we have very intimate relationships with the world, whether or not we realize it.

A lot of people say that I'm an activist CEO. I just think I'm a responsible leader of a business.

A healthy corporation acts on the interests of its stakeholders and customers.

What we have to do is get the corporations to understand you must include African-American-owned media.

The competitive pressure to produce, buy, and sell to our global multi-national companies is so intense that contractors in supply chains are motivated to pay low wages, intensify exploitative conditions, keep workers fearful with insecure work contracts, or simply sack workers who have formed a union to fight back.

I want to see businesses identifying where the highest risks of modern slavery are in their business and supply chains and take targeted steps to address those risks.

Business need to go beyond the interest of their companies to the communities they serve.

There is one and only one social responsibility of business - to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.

Companies should increasingly see themselves as major corporate citizens with a wider responsibility to the community. Nothing less than their reputation - their image - is at stake.

There is only one social responsibility of business

Since when do corporations not have responsibility to the community? Since when to the not have responsibility to their employees?

How much harm does a company have to do before we question its right to exist?

Corporations are social institutions. If they don't serve society, they have no business existing