The practice of stakeholder dialogue between multinationals and NGOs

This paper looks for patterns in the emerging dialogue practice between multinationals and NGOs (non‐governmental organizations). It examines what drives the practice, where stakeholder management is located in the organizational structure, how topics and partners for stakeholder dialogue are selected, which types of dialogue occur and what outcomes they have. The practice is evaluated in terms of the strategic management model and the sustainability model. While strategic management considerations may be recognized in all elements of the dialogue practice, sustainability considerations are less prominent. It is concluded that corporate stakeholder dialogues with environmental NGOs have a high instrumental value for strategic management. For corporate environmental sustainability, however, current dialogues are a possible but not a necessary instrument. Nonetheless, the apparent learning process among the individual participants might be the added value of stakeholder dialogue in sustainability terms.