Turning Stakeseekers Into Stakeholders
许多跨国公司面临新兴“寻利者”的挑战，通过利益相关者参与将其转化为利益相关者。本文以壳牌为例，从政治联盟视角分析企业如何应对利益相关者影响。
Many firms, especially transnational corporations, find it increasingly difficult to predict and handle conflicts with external interest groups. In addition to a set of established stakeholders, they face a complex arena of newly emerging “stakeseekers” who also claim to have a stake in the corporation's decision making. Corporations seek to establish relationships with such groups to anticipate and prevent conflicts that could otherwise wreak havoc on their reputation. Through stakeholder engagement, stakeseekers may be turned into stakeholders. It has been argued that in the process, critics are simply co-opted. However, corporate objectives are not necessarily monolithic. Conceived as a political coalition of various interests, the structure of the corporation often reflects societal divisions. Parts of the corporation can thus serve as sounding boards for external claims. Referring to the case of Royal Dutch/Shell in particular, this article shows how a political coalition perspective on the corporation may help to understand and analyze the politics of stakeholder influence.