On Inventing the Purpose-Driven Enterprise

Kevin Levillain; Blanche Segestrin

doi:10.3384/VS.2001-5992.196187

Kevin Levillain MINES ParisTech, PSL Research University
Blanche Segestrin MINES ParisTech,  PSL Research University

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3384/VS.2001-5992.196187

Keywords: Profit-with-purpose corporations, mission, corporate law, corporate governance

Abstract

In this article we present the main lineaments for a reform of the business corporation introducing the purpose of the firm. In France, a report commissioned by the government recommends that two new concepts should be introduced in law: the raison d’être of the firm and “purpose-driven enterprises.” This reform partly originated in a research program carried out in France after 2009. The legal articulation of a so-called “purpose-driven enterprise” has now taken off, first in the US and now in France and elsewhere. It paves the way to introducing sustainability issues and new valuations processes in corporate governance.

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