In this essay, I argue for the development of regenerative business leadership as a means of supporting systems-wide change. Doing so requires addressing a root problem: the tendency to anchor the purpose of business leadership primarily in profit and self-interest. I first examine how this profit orientation has often been attributed to Adam Smith, and I offer an alternative reading of his work centred on enlightened self-interest. I then draw on the tragedy of the commons and the interconnected “grand challenges” facing humanity to argue for a regenerative approach to business grounded in good growth. I briefly contrast good growth with degrowth, and explain why degrowth can, paradoxically, also be understood as threatening to human flourishing. To add empirical texture to these arguments, I summarise a case drawn from ongoing work. Throughout, I adopt an explicitly normative and optimistic stance, on the premise that addressing contemporary challenges requires the imagination and pursuit of radical hope in the possibilities such as regenerative business leadership.
Steve Kempster (Wed,) studied this question.