Care of the Common Good as a Responsibility of Business Leaders. Catholic Social Teaching Perspective

Abstract

The aim of this article is to propose the adoption of a Catholic social teaching (CST) perspective as a universal approach to business ethics. We assume that the common good, as understood in CST, is an extension of the Aristotelian and Thomistic concepts of the organic relations between economics and ethics, which, prior to the Enlightment, was a basic rational way of management (oikonomia). We aim to show both the influence of religious ethics on the shape of economic life and the influence of the Catholic understanding of the common good on leadership. CST encourages business leaders to focus not only on the material, but also the transcendental aims of human work and life. From this perspective, the responsibility of a business leader can be understood as a practical realisation of the Commandment of Love and divided into three levels, each of which contributes to the common good. On the micro level, leaders are responsible for their own actions; on the mezzo level, they are responsible for the organisations they lead—especially for their employees—and on the macro level, they should be responsible for actions towards external stakeholders, which might ultimately be extended to the world as a whole. In this way, leaders can cooperate with God and contribute to the common good of their organisations, society, and humanity.

1. Introduction

The economic activities of humankind cannot be separated from the ethical systems that guide the behaviour of individuals, which are often determined by the religions people practice (Wilson 1997). Business ethics, as a set of moral orders or norms of everyday behaviour, covers the whole spectrum of interactions between firms, individuals, industries, societies, and states. Each religion has its own rules for the moral conduct of individuals and groups, which influence all their social and economic behaviours and approaches to issues. Those rules can facilitate entrepreneurial activities and encourage people to take initiative and create businesses. When inspired by the world’s major religions1, business ethics are first directed toward the faith community as a whole, then toward individual members within that community; the role of a leader is defined in accordance with the values and norms of the religious community. Business ethics inspired by Catholic thought proposes the universalism deriving from the classic perception of the relation between economics and ethics. By universalism, we are referring to the philosophical assumptions that shaped a rational approach to socioeconomic issues. The antecedent of CST is Aristotelianism, especially its reinterpretation by St. Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century, which is contemporarily developed as a part of personalism. In this Classical approach, a man was perceived as a political animal who has to live in a community. The natural social order enables the development of a man as a person and, at the same time, serves the interests of all people instead of merely select individuals or privileged groups, because the norms, values, and aims are oriented toward the common good. To Aquinas, every action—whether inside or outside the community—has to be consistent with religion.

In the Age of Enlightenment, an idea emerged in social thought that denied the existence of a social order as the effect of natural human predispositions and proposed the concept of the social contract. The state of nature, especially in Hobbes’ philosophy, is a general war in which the total freedom of egoistic individuals produces a widespread threat of death. The social contract and the acceptance of the sovereign’s authority are necessary to deal with all conflicts between individuals focused on their own aims, norms and values. Through the ages, the meaning of sovereign has evolved from a personal monarch to different collectives (e.g., general will of Rousseau) to impersonal forces, which Adam Smith called “the invisible hand” that guides the free market. The role of the invisible hand is to introduce harmony and regulate human behaviour, in order to satisfy the needs and desires of others, even if some people care only about their individual aims. In that way, the invisible hand separates economics from social ethics in the name of the free market game, which is a guarantee of solutions promoting the common good.

Religious framework serves as a counterweight to certain secular business principles and practices, and is dominated by an individualistic drive for success, which in turn determines the social standing of a leader. It is treated as scientific and universally sanctioned, in contrast to religious approaches limited to specific confessional communities. Many people believe that Christian values contradict business standards or hinder the development of capitalism (Arslan 2001). On the other hand, the notion of spirituality in management is gaining popularity recently because people look for a deeper sense of their work than only material outcomes. For those reasons, we want to show the responsibility of business leaders in the light of Catholic social teaching (CST). This perspective seems to be particularly valuable because it might be recognised as a foundation of contemporary post-industrial capitalism, in which, in accordance with the personalistic criterion, man is treated as an end in himself and never as a means to an end. Business leadership might derive from different philosophical and ethical notions as well as different religions systems, each of which proposes a specific model of understanding business and leadership (Weber 1905; Han 2013; Marbun 2013; Chon and Hao 2020; Watanabe et al. 2015; Szromek 2017; Pontifical Council of Justice and Peace 2012; Marek 2015; McGhee 2019; Arslan 2001; Epstein 2002; Ali et al. 2000; Worden 2003; Cui et al. 2015; Longenecker et al. 2004). In CST, we can understand leadership as responsibility for the common good. Furthermore, leaders inspired by Catholicism feel called by God to act as servants of every employee, independently of the employee’s religious beliefs, because as members of the organisation, all employees are important and only proper leadership allows them to develop their full potential that they can use for the sake of the organisation.

When considering CST as a system that influences social life and business ethics, one must understand its most important values and principles, which include first and foremost, the priority of the human person with her transcendental dignity; solidarity, understood as a fraternal relationship for the common good; the principle of subsidiarity, which guarantees the right and duty to participate responsibly in common decisions; and the principle of the common good, understood as defending the quality of human life, in the sense of both ecology of the natural environment and spiritual ecology, which postulates respect not only for the material, but also the higher moral and spiritual needs of a human life, both individually and collectively.

CST stresses the dignity of the working person and, as a result, argues that work should not be treated merely as a commodity that follows the laws of supply and demand. John Paul II emphasised that work is a human right, so it has to be properly remunerated, but at the same time an obligation “both because the Creator has commanded it and because of his own humanity, which requires work in order to be maintained and developed” (Pope John Paul II 1981, n. 16). Work is undoubtedly an important factor responsible for shaping human personality and character. Through their work, people develop themselves and cooperate with God in word’s creation. Thanks to work, they feel needed by society and contribute to the common good. The Vatican Council II (1965, n. 26) defined the common good as “the sum total of social conditions which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfilment more fully and more easily.” In that sense, the common good is much more than merely the sum of individual interests or simply an organisational asset. Levels of economic development measurably determine the extent to which societies prioritise the common good. The development of more complex and demanding forms of work that emphasise professionalism, education, solidity, and integrity should be perceived as the real capital that underlies economic development and serves the common good. The motivation for this is the sense of universal brotherhood, which results from the Christian idea of love of one’s neighbour and consequently depends on social solidarity (Kowalczyk 1998). In light of CST, a company is understood as a community of people who serve society as a whole (Melé 2012). A leader of that community is appointed to take care of the common good, as leadership is “an influence relationship among leaders and followers who intend real changes that reflect their mutual purposes that are compatible with, and enhance the common good of, all of reality” (Biju and Lochrie 2009, p. 64).

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how ethics inspired by Catholic thought can function in practice as a universal approach to business ethics. To this end, we will show the common good to be a central principle of social life, we will clarify the meaning of an enterprise in CST, and finally, we will demonstrate the responsibility of business leaders as a practical realisation of the commandment to love thy God and thy neighbour on three levels—leaders’ responsibility towards themselves, responsibility towards internal stakeholders, and responsibility towards external stakeholders.

2. Common Good as the Foundation of Social Life

The nature and essential characteristics of human beings determine the moral norms and rules of human societies. In CST, a person, created by God from genuine love in His image, has universal and inalienable dignity, which is a foundation of all human rights in economic, social, cultural, and political context. Francis (2020) teaches that respect of the human person’s dignity and guarantee of human rights leads to releasing human creativity through actions that contribute to the common good.

Christian personalism particularly emphasises the role of love in social life and perceives human freedom (Kowalczyk 2000) and justice—especially in a social sense (Kowalczyk 1998)—as love’s complement and confirmation. Freedom gives a person access to the just multiplication and distribution of goods needed for the proper development of human personality. The unquestionable right to freedom in social life, however, is not unlimited, because one’s own right to individual freedom implies the same right of other people. This is why this right cannot be understood in the maximally egocentric sense or violate the common good of a given community (Kowalczyk 1998, 2006).

CST emphasises the relevance of the common good by stressing the fact that man is an active subject, but lives and develops himself in a society that is the function of their activity rather than an individual, substantialist being.2 According to Saint Thomas Aquinas, the common good is more perfect and more divine than any individual good. As far as the aims of society—education, national security, etc.—are concerned, individual humans are subordinate to society. As far as human rights are concerned, individual humans are superordinate to society, which they treat as a means for human existence and self-betterment. Human solidarity is a moral attitude that manifests in moral and social actions and directs individual freedom toward the common good. Consequently, the anatomical structure of solidarity consists of two parts. The first part is manifested by individuals who are constantly ready to accept and realise the responsibilities that they share as members of a given community. The second part is one’s readiness to express opposition whenever the common good is being pursued by detrimental means (Wojtyła 1985).

The classical theory of social life stresses the primacy of one’s duty to the community or state. This duty is a consequence of the social nature of man. Throughout the following centuries, philosophical investigations of social life were devoted to the search for a form that would allow for the attainment of both immanent and transcendent social goals. This form has come to serve as a focal point in investigating such issues as family, district, city, country, law, system, power, economy, and culture, which all take part in the creation of axiological theses. These theses take their origin in values that are present in a given society—whether a polis, a republic, or a kingdom. Even though they differ from one another, in the case of the Roman civilisation, they are all connected to what Christianity calls the Cardinal virtues—justice, temperance, fortitude, and prudence. Shaping social behaviours and attitudes requires the particular moral duties of an individual to her community—and vice versa—to be determined. CST creates harmony between individual and collective life and refers to a systemic framework for a society governed by rules and laws that lead to an individual’s full development guaranteed by the accomplishment of the common good. According to John Paul II, solidarity—which objects to a vision of society as conflict and social relations as an uncompromising class struggle—is one of the best ways to serve and protect the common good (Pope John Paul II 1986). The relationship between the common good and solidarity is also a creative one. The bond that makes people one big family is a virtue that, in many ways, coincides with Christian love. Being a living image of God, each person is connected with others through solidarity and deserves the same love that God feels towards all of His creation (Pope John Paul II 1986). Novak (2009) sees solidarity as an accurate realisation of globalisation. Solidarity is a social virtue that evokes responsibility and individual conscience and at the same time enables people to live in communio with all people in God.

The essence of social life lies in advancing the common good. Social life may be perceived as an interpersonal relationship between at least two people. However, to be called a social relation, this relation has to be mutual (a reciprocal relation between the person A and the person B) (Kondziela 1969, p. 51). The relation that constitutes the basis of a social relation is called a categorical relation; this relation spurs social relations into being, but it does not affect the nature of the involved subjects. Thus, in contrast to transcendental relations, the categorical relation does not determine the nature of the social order.3 Transcendental relations, in turn, are part of the social nature of man, which holds ontological priority among other relations connected to the common nature responsible for the human predisposition towards social life, similar ways of acting, mutual dependency, or shared needs. To be considered the true cause of social life, transcendental relations must be perceived from both the ontological and the ethical point of view. Consequently, a Christian notion of the nature of social being would result in transcendence that could be understood in at least three ways: “(1) As a transcendental relation to the common good, that is one that shapes the inner structure of society; (2) As transcendental values revealed through the analysis of the common good, for common good implies an important reference to these values; (3) But also as a transcendence of an individual social being who, by giving themselves to community, surpasses themselves and is able to participate in the good approached by cooperating with others” (Majka 1982, p. 10).

Human acts of reason and will, with their cognitive and evaluative dimensions, not only establish facts, but also distinguish between moral good and evil. “Common good recognises the human as an ideal. This ideal is not a random goal one may—but not necessarily has to—choose, but it is an ethical imperative” (Kondziela 1969, p. 57). The first premise of CST assumes that one may create, on the basis of the personalist notion of the common good, a social theory that would explain both the nature and the dynamics of social life. Secondly, CST proposes an integral and harmonious vision of social and economic growth that is an executive norm of society’s common good. Finally, using an understanding of common good present in CST is the most natural way to overcome individualist reductionism and develop a moral virtue rooted in moral duty to the higher value order. This morality can both enrich and strengthen the sense of social responsibility that seems to be reaching a distinct global dimension. The common good as a constitutive element of a social group denotes consolidation of the members of a given group around specific values, i.e., members of a business organisation are focused on the realisation of its mission statement based on key values that determine their actions and decisions in particular situations.

Actions that take into account the common good allow humans to live in dignity because they offer choices and promote freedom. Bureaucracy, by imposing strict, rational rules on interpersonal relations within organisations, limits the role of individual will, which is often identified with emotions. Consequently, a dichotomy of human actions is established, dividing them into rational and emotional. People legitimise regulations, thus allowing them to affect their lives, either because they expect reward or fear punishment. Customs seem less important and are reduced to a few indicators of human interactions within the broader organisational culture. All this signifies an attempt at the rationalisation of emotions, stemming from the belief that the sphere of emotions is susceptible to rational management.

3. Responsibility of a Leader as Practical Love

Researching the notion of responsibility in leadership, one has to examine a great number of articles addressing various aspects of corporate social responsibility (CSR), which seems to be a popular notion in contemporary organisations. Both academics and practitioners coined plenty of CSR’s definitions, but for the sake of this article, we will understood it as “treating the stakeholders of the firm ethically or in a responsible manner” (Hopkins 2003). There is also a separate concept of responsible leadership (Pless and Maak 2011; Moody-Steward 2017) with its own assumptions and characteristic’ features and responsibilities of leaders. According to Pless, responsible leadership is “the art of building and sustaining social and moral relationships between business leaders and different stakeholders (followers), based on a sense of justice, a sense of recognition, a sense of care, and a sense of accountability for a wide range of economic, ecological, social, political, and human responsibilities” (Pless 2007, p. 451). In the same manner, Benedict XVI teaches that “business management cannot concern itself only with the interests of the proprietors, but must also assume responsibility for all the other stakeholders who contribute to the life of the business: the workers, the clients, the suppliers of various elements of production, the community of reference” (Pope Benedict XVI 2009b, n. 40). Both Pless and Benedict XVI consider a business leader to be responsible for a whole range of relations with stakeholders, as well as for numerous operations conducted by and within an organisation.

Although some scholars focus on responsible leaders, the dominant approach in management research concerns CSR and treats an enterprise as a subject of responsibility (Waddock and Rasche 2012; Lennick and Kiel 2010). Business organisations participate in local or even global markets, and their actions have a huge influence on both local and global economies. Their responsibilities consist of making decisions and facing their consequences, even if that means incurring financial loss. A company is responsible for proper asset management and for the entrusted capital, which implies that it must gain credibility and investors’ trust. While acting in a turbulent environment, enterprises are responsible for assessing the level of risk in order to minimise it and make decisions that are, on the one hand, economically beneficial and, on the other, reasonably safe (Komorowski 2011). In CST, however, the responsibility of an enterprise may be an oversimplification. The production of goods and services requires the cooperation of many people, because one person alone may lack sufficient tools, skills or money to make goods or provide services. Enterprises need leaders who plan, organise, and coordinate common efforts and recruit people to their vision, as well as take the risks necessary to achieve it (Jabłoński and Marek 2017). Only a human being, as a conscious agent, is able to take moral and legal responsibility for his actions. This is why it is possible to discuss the responsibilities of a leader who manages an organisation, follows proper procedures, and represents an enterprise in relationships with stakeholders (Fel 2006).

As stated above, in CST, a company is a community of people who serve to fulfil different needs of society. While in CST all people are our neighbours and we should love them as ourselves, in management theory, we can perceive the whole society as a company’s stakeholders who expect different benefits from this company (Gouldey et al. 2016, p. 14). Stakeholders may include employees, share owners, customers, lenders, suppliers, society (Freeman and Reed 1983), high schools, the media, the legal system (Sznajder 2013), and as a silent stakeholder, the natural environment (Jastrzębska 2015). All these groups have different interests and may differ in assessing the importance or relevance of the particular actions that an organisation undertakes. Internal stakeholders, such as managers or employees, expect a company to provide such benefits as job security, good conditions for personal development, decent remuneration, and a working environment where labour laws are respected; some external stakeholders, on the other hand—such as potential investors, creditors, and shareholders—focus on financial reports, profits and comparisons within the trade, while others—such as suppliers, distributors, banks, and other partners—focus on financial liquidity and reactions to market behaviour (Komorowski 2011). Leaders must maintain a balance between fulfilling the needs of internal and external stakeholders. What is more, they ought to take responsibility for striving to maintain proper relationships with all stakeholder’ groups, although this requires considerable effort.

Both leaders and internal stakeholders—particularly employees—act within their organisations, which operate as communities based on common values, norms, and trust built through years of cooperation aimed at achieving a shared vision. In the case of external stakeholders, building such a community is much more difficult. Leaders often differentiate between more and less relevant stakeholders. For instance, a leader may have good relationships with clients, banks, or suppliers, but at the same time, may not put the same effort into maintaining equally good relationships with local politicians or NGOs, as they do not see them as especially important for the prosperity of their company (Maak 2007). Responsible leaders, however, should build bridges between all stakeholders and should show each of them the importance of their role in advancing the common good through their cooperation with the organisation. They should build a reciprocal understanding between all engaged groups and the organisation; they should create a sense of inclusion and equality among the stakeholders, despite their obvious differences (Mària and Lozano 2010); finally, they should “create communities where everyone strives to give their best to deliver the value the firm promises” (Freeman et al. 2004, p. 364). Responsible leaders ought to find a balance between economic and social goals, economic, social, and environmental responsibilities, and the needs of internal and external stakeholders (Jamali et al. 2017). They should also be able to find an equilibrium between their responsibilities toward all stakeholders, taking into consideration such issues as security, profit, and growth.

In view of all the above, a leader takes care of the common good by finding an appropriate balance between the needs of different stakeholder groups. The Commandment of Love instructs you to “love your neighbour as yourself” (Mk 2, 31). When we conceive all stakeholders as a leader’s neighbours, we can divide a leader’s responsibility into three levels. These are the following: self-responsibility (micro-level) as love of yourself, the responsibility for the organisation and its employees (mezzo-level) as love towards close neighbours, and the responsibility towards external stakeholders (macro-level) as love towards distant neighbours.

3.1. Self-Responsibility of Business Leader

The greatest concern of business leaders should be the well-being of their employees. However, a person who takes responsibility for others must first be able to take responsibility for her own words, decisions, and actions, as well as their consequences. Only this way can leaders practically realise the Commandment of Love, as without taking care of their own needs; they will not be able to fulfil the needs of their employees. In other words, they won’t be able to love their neighbours as themselves. This is particularly important when leaders are also owners of enterprises, as it motivates them to be the “first employee” in an organisation, to show even higher engagement, and often to work overtime (Fel and Kupny 2000, p. 112). Only by demanding a lot of themselves may leaders be confident that their employees will meet their expectations and willingly participate in promoting the common good. “When organisational leadership embodies values like humility, stewardship and integrity, it does not only give leaders the moral authority to demand the same from their followers but it also shows the followers how to practice those values” (Mango 2018, p. 61). In order to become a respected and trusted leader, over and above the usual professional qualifications and abilities, one must also possess physical, psychological, intellectual, and spiritual integrity (Leśniak 2012). If one assumes that business and ethics should be tightly connected (Donarski et al. 2011), then leaders ought to act in accordance with proper values and represent high moral standards, as it is moral identity that leads to responsible leadership. “Leaders with moral identity meet internal and external stakeholders’ needs, they are good role models to the followers, they are visionary and they are change agents who lead with integrity” (Mango 2018, p. 64). Moreover, a virtuous leader is perceived as a fixed reference point that provides unchanging standards for making decisions and makes it possible to “effectively manage the turbulence and instability characterizing the current external environment” (Cameron 2011, p. 30). Moral integrity enables leaders to fulfil their promises and contribute to common good instead of deceiving and manipulating their followers in order to achieve personal gains (Biju and Lochrie 2009).

3.2. Responsibility towards Close Neighbours—Members of Organisation

In management theory, an organisation is understood as “a group of people working together in a structured and coordinated fashion to achieve a set of goals” (Griffin 2016, p. 3). An enterprise, however, is a particular kind of organisation with clearly specified goals. The three main aims of an enterprise are security, profit, and growth, all of which have to be achieved in order for a business to function properly. The most important aim is safety because it entails sustaining the company’s existence; without fulfilling this criterion, the organisation cannot function at all. If a company earns a profit, it has money to perpetuate its existence and invest in its growth, which is necessary to build competitive advantage in the market. Without constantly developing and adjusting products or services to the customers’ needs, an enterprise cannot be successful and is highly likely to go bankrupt (Kożuch 2011).

CST provides an insightful perspective on the functioning of enterprises. The main aim of a business entity in CST is not only to make a profit, but to create a community of persons, “who in various ways are endeavouring to satisfy their basic needs, and who form a particular group at the service of the whole of society” (Pope John Paul II 1991, n. 32). This is why business leaders “are challenged to combine the legitimate pursuit of profit with a deeper concern for the spread of solidarity and the elimination of the scourge of poverty which continues to afflict so many members of the human family” (Pope John Paul II 2004). These ideas are also present in humanistic management, where a company is perceived as a community of persons whose dignity is fully respected and recognised. At the same time, this social institution transcends the aim of profit maximisation by contributing to the common good (Calleja and Melé 2017; Melé 2012, 2016). Within a community, relationships should be built on mutual trust and work should be valued because of the subjects who perform it—human beings with all their attributes, such as dignity, will, knowledge, skills, competences, and motivation to cooperate in order to achieve a common goal.

Leadership requires two parties: leaders and their followers. Effective leaders should inspire their followers and should set a good example (Drucker 1996). While individual members of a company are chiefly responsible for their own actions and obedience to the rules, leaders create and implement the rules, take care of their followers, and set the direction of the whole company. According to Theory Y, “The motivation, the potential for development, the capacity for assuming responsibility, the readiness to direct behaviour towards organizational goals are all present in people” (Latham 2007, p. 32). People are responsible beings and do not require constant supervision, because they see work as an inherent part of their life that facilitates their development. Therefore, leaders cannot be focused only on measurable effects of work, but they should take care of work conditions that help employees to find a deeper sense in their work, develop their virtues, fulfil spiritual needs and leave them decent time to rest (Naughton 2019). This approach is convergent with CST, in which people, in cooperation with God, change both the world and themselves through their work. Seen as a vocation (Novak 1998), work might be perceived as a way to achieve a transcendental aim—sanctity. In this sense, both leaders and employees realise the first Commandment of Love through their work. They use and develop talents which they obtained from God and cooperate with Him in world’s improvement. All these arguments demonstrate that encouraging followers to take conscious decisions aimed at the common good of a community is more important for a leader than just a measurable effects of their work, which require meticulous control over all tasks.

Leaders should know how to “lead others to lead themselves” (Manz and Sims 2001, p. 7); in other words, they should know how to share power and responsibility. Their followers perform many different roles within an organisation, but the most important are those of co-workers and co-leaders. The former requires taking part in everyday organisational activities and conducting the tasks one was entrusted with. Some members’ reluctance to participate may have a negative effect on the organisation’s performance. Being a co-leader, on the other hand, is connected with leaders sharing power, responsibility, and authority with their followers (Mango 2018). In CST, the participation of employees in management is regulated by the subsidiarity principle, according to which “employees at a lower level who are trusted, trained, experienced, know precisely the extent of their responsibilities, and are free to make decisions, can fully use their freedom and intelligence, and thus are enabled to develop as people; they are indeed ‘co-entrepreneurs’” (Pontifical Council of Justice and Peace 2012, n. 50).

The subsidiarity principle might be applied to business through empowering leadership and servant leadership. Empowering leadership is defined as “the process of influencing subordinates through power sharing, motivation support, and development support with intent to promote their experience of self-reliance, motivation, and capability to work autonomously within the boundaries of overall organisational goals and strategies” (Amundsen and Martinsen 2014, p. 489). This means that sharing power is a way of motivating people and encouraging them to make autonomous decisions, thus taking responsibility for their own actions. It does not mean that leaders burden their followers with complete responsibility. Rather, leaders are responsible first and foremost for choosing the right person for a delegated task. However, leaders may delegate tasks only if they know their followers’ knowledge, abilities, and potential. Therefore, to ensure the achievement of organisational goals, leaders should delegate “responsibility and authority to the lowest organisational level where a competent decision can be made” (Amundsen and Martinsen 2014, p. 487). In this way, tasks are delegated wisely, and followers, noticing that leaders entrust them both with tasks and the power necessary to accomplish them, take partial responsibility for the company’s actions.

Servant leadership is even more important than sharing power and delegating tasks to followers because its aim is to prepare followers to become servant leaders themselves. The motivation of a servant leader is intrinsic and derives from the need to serve others. A servant leader has a clear vision of the future and knows how to gain the trust of followers and persuade them to participate in the realisation of that vision, even if this requires taking acceptable risks to achieve common goals (Greenleaf 1977, pp. 81–85). Followers and their needs—especially the most vulnerable and unprivileged—are far more important for a servant leader than his own personal goals and gains. This is why the first dimension of servant leadership is forming relationships with followers, which consists of getting to know them by spending time with them, listening to their concerns, and forging interpersonal bonds. Secondly, a servant leader empowers followers, for instance by letting them participate in managerial decisions and, consequently, sharing power and responsibility. Thirdly, a servant leader serves by providing working conditions that facilitate growth and development, and promotes their followers’ success. Other dimensions of servant leadership are connected with the leaders themselves. The leaders have to behave ethically and in accordance with personal and organisational values, and they must possess conceptual skills that enable them to reach the intended results. Finally, servant leaders, being also responsible for the community beyond the organisation, encourage their followers to engage in projects outside the workplace, where they can guide people on how to use their talents and abilities (Hunter et al. 2013). In that way, they can contribute to the common good of their organisation, as well as common good of the society and humanity as a whole.

3.3. Responsibility towards Distant Neighbours—External Stakeholders

The third level of leaders’ responsibility is taking care of external stakeholders who can be perceived as distant neighbours. This is possible only if an enterprise operates well and its leader has enough money to maintain its existence, pay employees’ salaries, and invest in the company’s development. Scholars analysing CSR cannot agree whether it consists only of the responsibilities demanded by the legal system or also includes voluntary actions that require more than simply obeying rules and regulations. This difference may be observed in the contrast between two perspectives: Carroll’s (1979, 1991) CSR pyramid—which lists four levels of responsibility: economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic—and business responsibility (BR) theory, which supplements Caroll’s pyramid with corporate citizenship and social entrepreneurship. BR is a notion based on business ethics that, to avoid a “purely social bias”, stresses the responsibility towards environmental stakeholders (Laasch and Conaway 2015).

According to Carroll, not all CSR dimensions are equally important for external stakeholders. Only economic and legal responsibilities are demanded by society and sufficient for a given organisation to be perceived as a socially responsible entity. The basic level, as a vital condition of enterprise’s existence, is economic responsibility. Generating profit is necessary to remain competitive in the market and to build the credibility and trust needed in relationships with contractors (Carroll 2016). “If financial wealth is not created, it cannot be distributed and organisations cannot be sustained”, and for this reason, the best leaders “use resources effectively and maintain reasonable levels of revenue, margin, market share, productivity and efficiency” (Pontifical Council of Justice and Peace 2012, n. 52). Only a profitable firm can pay taxes, create new jobs, and help others. To perceive a firm as responsible, society also demands that it fulfil legal responsibilities that consist of obeying all laws and regulations at local, national, and international levels and of respecting human rights (Jutterström and Norber 2013). These two dimensions require compulsory actions, without which an enterprise cannot be perceived as an honest and responsible business partner; therefore, for some scholars, they are so fundamental that they do not even consider them as elements of corporate responsibility.

However, truly responsible leaders cannot stop at this level, but have to meet ethical standards as well, even if these standards are not demanded but only expected by society. They cannot compromise ethical norms in order to achieve a business goal; they should act in a moral and ethical way, and moreover, they should recognise the fact that “business integrity and ethical behaviour go beyond mere compliance with laws and regulations” (Carroll 2016). It is not obligatory for a company to respect ethical norms, but using them in organisational practices is beneficial for organisations, as there is a large group of consumers who behave according to the rules of ethical consumption (Bylok 2016). These consumers expect organisations to act as good citizens, which means taking care of their employees, local societies, and natural resources. If an enterprise violates ethical norms, these consumers often boycott its products and services. Globalisation and the rapid flow of information may contribute to even more severe losses, both financial and reputational, as worldwide consumers may unite in boycotting a given organisation’s products (Zasuwa 2017).

Corporate citizenship is based on the sense of belonging to a broader community. Business entities may be perceived as good members of local, regional or world communities, in relation to which they have some responsibilities (Laasch and Conaway 2015). As a good citizen, a profitable enterprise contributes to the local budget by paying taxes, obeys labour and consumer laws, respects ethical norms in relations with all partners, and supports local initiatives by donating to various local organisations and events.

In CST, a vital part of being a good citizen is taking responsibility for the natural environment. Genuine care about natural resources has its source in the biblical imperative to “fill the earth and subdue it” (Gen 1:28). God entrusted the earth and its development to man, who should manage it as a guardian rather than a destroyer or exploiter who uses natural resources only for immediate consumption (Pope John Paul II 1979, n. 15). Pope Francis (2015, n. 11, 13) encourages people to practice “integral ecology”, where a whole human family cooperates towards achieving sustainable and integral development of the Earth, instead of acting like sovereigns or consumers who overuse natural resources for their own gain. He also observes a close relationship between social and ecological problems, as well as the co-dependence between human beings and the natural environment (Pope Francis 2015). Man has to realise that, despite transcending nature, humans are an integral part of the natural world, so harmful actions towards the natural environment are simultaneously detrimental to mankind (Wicker 2017).

God entrusted humans with the task of stewarding the Earth. Therefore, natural resources may be perceived as a “social mortgage” because God created them for everybody—both poor and wealthy, powerful and weak. Contemporary people have to take care of the resources and use them wisely to make sure that they can be used by future generations as well (Pontifical Council of Justice and Peace 2012, n. 56). Every person, and every leader in particular, should “exercise responsible stewardship of creation, in order to protect it, to enjoy its fruits, and to cultivate it, finding the resources necessary for everyone to live with dignity” (Benedict XVI 2009a). That attitude may be perceived as an expression of genuine care and responsibility for the planet and future generations of people. One may argue that business leaders cannot be held responsible for the planet, as that is the domain of political leaders or international organisations, but this is only partially true. Even though leaders must make numerous decisions in order to satisfy needs of a particular group of stakeholders, the choice depends on them. They can choose solutions that “promote a sustainable use of natural resources”, are innovative, and have minimal impact on the environment, while simultaneously remaining profitable. In the end, “it is a matter of openness to different possibilities that do not involve stifling human creativity and its ideals of progress, but rather directing that energy along new channels” (Pope Francis 2015, n. 191).

The dimension shared by CSR and BR is business philanthropy. Philanthropy is a manifestation of love, as the word “philanthropy” literally means “love of mankind”, and the act of philanthropy shows the generosity of a giver (Acs and Phillips 2002, p. 190). Business philanthropy can be understood as “a voluntary allocation of a firm’s resources to activities that are not business related and for which there are no clear social expectations as to how the firm should perform” (Wartick and Wood 1998, p. 75). Those activities go beyond a mere division of stakeholders’ groups and seems to be the most direct way of realisation of Commandment of Love, because they are oriented on people who are not interested in a company’s performance and usually cannot return received support. In practice, business philanthropy is manifested through donations of money, products, or services, through voluntary actions of an enterprise’s members, or through other contributions that catalyse stakeholder or community development (Carroll 2016). Corporate philanthropy may take different forms, depending on the motives behind a firm’s decision to support a given activity. They enumerate three kinds of motives: philanthropy as a commercial marketing tool oriented at long-term material gains, community-oriented investments meant to strengthen an organisation’s competitiveness at the same time as fostering its business environment; and most altruistically, a company’s commitment to the common good. The benefits of corporate giving may be both material (reduced taxes, increased sales) and non-material (higher brand recognition, better firm reputation, prestige, etc.), but it is often difficult to measure the direct effect of a given donation. Nevertheless, the marketing orientation of business philanthropy raises the most doubts, as this is highly comparable to sponsorship, and financial and marketing gains are more than expected, so for some scholars, it does not fulfil the features of philanthropic giving (Gautier and Pache 2015; Morison and Mujtaba 2010). Responsible leaders should encourage their followers to devote their time and skills to their companies’ philanthropic programs. Thanks to voluntary actions, employees are given the chance to utilise their skills to help people in need, and, instead of focusing on their own interests, contribute to the common good and make other people happy.

A relatively new aspect of business responsibility is social entrepreneurship. This venture-based approach, which has been gaining popularity since the beginning of the twenty-first century, aims at solving problems of stakeholders such as poverty, a lack of educational opportunities, or environmental issues (Laasch and Conaway 2015). Social enterprises, similarly to other companies, have to earn money in order to function, but their main goal should always be focused on social values. Furthermore, the measure of their success is not profitability but the level of progress toward solving social problems. In some cases, the cessation of an enterprise might be its biggest success, because that means that the problem was solved completely. High profits, on the other hand, might be an indicator of an insufficient focus on realizing the social enterprise’s mission (Jamka 2011). Social enterprises recognise the superior importance of people and their needs. This recognition drives the enterprises’ attempts to reintegrate people into the job market by teaching them to fish, rather than merely giving them a fish. When employed in such an enterprise, a person changes her approach to life. Passivity is replaced by activity; instead of looking for help, one becomes capable of helping oneself, and one stops being an enterprise’s customer and becomes instead its member and partner (Zadroga 2017). This kind of logic is concurrent with CST’s principle of the priority of labour over capital. As Pope John Paul II (1981, n. 15) stated, “the person who works desires not only due remuneration for his work; he also wishes that, within the production process, provision be made for him to be able to know that in his work, even on something that is owned in common, he is working ‘for himself’ […] he also wishes the fruit of this work to be used by himself and others, and he wishes to be able to take part in the very work process as a sharer in responsibility and creativity at the workbench to which he applies himself”.

Through work oriented toward important social goals, people fulfil their need to serve others and facilitate social change. This may be the reason why many people prefer a position in a social enterprise rather than in a conventional company. Young people, women, or ethnic minorities interested in social change more often decide to realise their dreams through a social entity (Terziev and Arabska 2016), and in this way, manifest their creativity and contribute to the development of a local community. Social economy demands voluntaristic thinking. Eager to change their lives, people take responsibility for themselves, and thus willingly and consciously decide to change their lives by becoming leaders of social enterprises. From the perspective of CST, each person, within her capabilities, might take civic initiatives—such as running a social enterprise—out of a genuine desire to build the common good, especially when she seeks the good of her neighbour, which she perceives as part and parcel of her own wellbeing (Zadroga 2009).

4. Conclusions

Given the influence of religious systems on business ethics—especially on the roles of business leaders—we wanted to show Catholic Social Teaching as a universal perspective that can not only be implemented by Catholics, but that can also serve as an alternative to secular frameworks. The CST framework enabled us to portray leaders as managers who contribute to the common good by taking responsibility for their own actions; their followers, enterprises, and widely recognised external stakeholders; and ultimately, for the whole world. Endowed with such a demanding task, leaders can practically realise the Commandment of Love and strive not only for immanent aims of their business entities but also realise transcendent aims of their lives, including sanctity. We aim to contribute to the literature on spiritual leadership and to the understanding of common good and responsibility of business leaders. We believe that a CST perspective might be beneficial for many leaders independently form the religion they confess.

Further research might pursue comparisons between theories of leadership derived from the different values systems present in various religious systems. We are convinced that, in the contemporary world, the need for spiritual leadership is growing, because merely material aims of work are insufficient to the needs of many managers and employees. People look for a deeper sense of their deeds, and including a spiritual dimension in human work enables a person to satisfy many needs and answer many questions that are neglected in purely secular notions of business ethics.