Joshua Fershee ponders the question:
I continue thinking about Chancellor Chandler's opinion in eBay v. Newmark, and I still find myself troubled by the determination that, by embracing it's "community service mission," craigslist was being run improperly as corporate entity (see my prior post here). To recap, Chancellor Chandler explained that by choosing "a for-profit corporate form, the craigslist directors are bound by the fiduciary duties and standards that accompany that form. Those standards include acting to promote the value of the corporation for the benefit of its stockholders."
He then raises the stakes by ponding a thought experiment involving Ben & Jerry's. Personally, as a shareholder wealth maximization guy, I find both the intent and, especially, the rhetoric of CSR tiresome and mendacious. As a contractarian, however, if Ben & Jerry went public with a CSR provision in their articles, I'd have no objection. The problem is when supposedly profit maximizing firms decide to go soft.
