Public Policy in Developing Society Goals - Essay Example

College: Public Policy Introduction Public policy is relevant in developing society goals of a given country, organization, institution, religion as well as governance. However, the concept of societal responsibility is more concerned with businesses. As the other meaning suggests, societal goal is also known as corporate social responsibility (Deery & Mitchell, 1999). At the expense of individualistic goals, social goals are directly linked with mater s related to health, education, fairness and prosperity. Social goal responsibility is the art putting goals of a certain co-corporate, institution knowledge or prosperity to be of collective concern within the community or society. This is generally speaking out the message of ‘we’ and ‘us’ rather than ‘I’ and ‘me’. Since the public policy is centered at the needs of the majority, then social goals becomes of great concern within an organization. Just like in a classroom, pupils or students usually have a collective goal of passing exams through discussions and consultations. While the only way of ensuring collective success in a society or a business organization is through the involved individuals having a collective goal at the expense of targeted and non-targeted society (Kimberly & Tamar, 2009). On the other hand individualistic goal is centered on one’s interest and desire that all opportunities that come on the way are utilized individually. This is directly linked with personal development and success. Therefore, public policy has more to do with promoting societal goal oriented programs rather than individualistic. Methodology This research study was conducted using qualitative data from library written materials like journals and electronic research like websites. However, some organizations hold their internal information private and hence full information is not available. Literature review According to John Long & Nerida Aitken, individual agreement is works well for employers as compared agreements of collective interests. Citing an employee pay in Australia, the employees covered by workplace agreement earns much better that those guarded by federal enterprise agreements. In addition the individualistic goals lowers the cost concerning company activities like documentation, transaction costs e.tc. Hence it is a more efficient way. It is also noted that individualism is equal to flexibility. The term flexibility can be used in wide range of issues including remuneration, operational requirements implementation of change by a company. However, individual practices do not necessarily warrant flexibility or individualized activities (Diener, 2009)). Practically, flexibility is dependent on the nature of the company enterprise, the proposed form of flexibility, the way in which the management and the employees are related as we as the number of employees and their benefits. This means that sometimes some employees of the company may decline to cooperate or to sign workplace policies offered by the state (Long & Aitken, 2001). The way individual agreements discussed and formed, are just done on individual basis. In addition, within an individualistic agreement their may still exist a collective ideology. However, concerning the individual agreements by the top management team, they will all have uniform individualistic idea concerning all the entire employees with some disagreements on the payroll, description of job as well as the length of working hours (Long. J & Aitken. N, 2001). Individualistic goals are important in fostering increased commitment at work places. The is usually increased interaction between the individual employees and the employer hence individualism strengthens the psychological contract at the work place (Brown, W. 1999). This usually explains the role the employees in the company as well direction and stability of the business. On the issue of societal goal within a company, the employees can create a sense of mistrust to the employer if the perceived societal agreements are ignored (Long& Aitken, 2001). Individualist goals have made union to be irrelevant at work places. For instance, the Union membership is below 25% in Australia as compared to A few years ago where it was more than 60% (). The reason to the decline of most labour union is due to chage in the national policies, structural alterations and effect on labour market, high competition in product markets and the escalating change in technologies including changes in business work values (Deery & Mitchell, 1999). Finally individualism is more appealing because there is minimal interference from the third parties. For instance, a dispute in the workplace agreement on payment can be resolved by the workplace-state agreement or else proceed to the industrial magistrate court. However, individualism is limited in a number of ways. First, individualism is usually politically sensitive. For instance, in Australia, there political ideologies suggesting that industrial relation is part public which can be distinguished by the Liberals and the Labor party (Brown, W. 1999). Therefore, continued interruption of political entities in the workplaces makes it difficult for making human resource improvements. Individualism may also encourage self interest at the expense of the loss of the company and creation of deficiencies in the team competencies. For example, strong emphasis on rewards, incentives and sanctions that are linked to individual goal may result to low performance of employees and hence undermining and damaging the performance of the company (Brown, 1999). However, in dealing with societal goals, the economists of the free market argue that most of their profits are usually channeled to the stakeholders but nothing else (Deery, & Mitchell,1999). But when it comes to promoting societal interests, there is a criticism that it is the money that would have been used to pay part of the salaries of the company workers as well as a portion of the stakeholders. Hence, the introduction of public policy to promoting societal goals would be considered as an indirect way of imposing tax on the investors. In particular, promoting of societal goals is now widely considered in the business or company strategic plan. Supporting the general interests of the public improves the companies’ image and thus would limit the government to impose some strange regulatory policies of their businesses programs. In conclusion, we have seen how societal or corporate social responsibility programs and individualistic goal are interlinked. In part has its own role to play within the society as an individual or as a whole. Individualistic goals are mostly centered at the entire organization with individual or personal interests while societal or community goals are important within collectivism interest of the company employees as well as extending and hand to the entire society issues (Deery & Mitchell,1999). Hence, public polices should add more energy in strengthening societal goal View of public policy basing on Classical and Keynes economics According, to the Keynes theory of economics, the actual measure of a county’s prosperity is determined by its national income from the total individual income from different pockets ranging from businesses of purchases and sales. This means that supply is equal to demand Hence the issue of national prosperity is determined by the use and consumption of goods. This theory argues that limited utilization of goods is the key cause of unemployment. Hence the government is supposed to step in to solve such problems unlike the classical economists’ theory which opts that the market should be left on its own to adjust and the situation would become in order (Lawrence & Weber, 2004). On the other hand the Classical theory of economics argues that unemployment is caused by supply excesses due to high price level of labour. On the basis of supply and demand, when the wages are increased by social and political influences, there would be reduction in demand and excess supply would imply unemployment. Hence classical economists think that low economic power of the nation should be left a lone so that it would able to regulate itself and reach at an equilibrium wage for the workers as the economy improves itself with increasing employment. But in the real sense, this theory is not practical because it impossible for the economic imbalance to reach at equilibrium by itself without programs that rectify the causes of economic reduction (Skinnland, 2010). Observation Different countries have range policies that reflect each regions unique scope of political, social and economic composition in relation to the national policy. There are three main trends that are observed in the study. Voluntary structure or the necessary standards that directs the companies to implements activities that are socially sound i. Raising awareness by national campaigns on the importance of societal goals. ii. Government to raise funds to the private sectors for effective implementation of corporate social responsibility programs. Fig 1. Showing examples of indicators from four different communities in the U.S. and Canada as adapted from Online Appendix – Full EAG Perspectives Region Indicator Boston, MA www.bostonfoundation.org Percentage of residents without health insurance Median home price vs. median household income Income disparities between top and bottom fifths of population Unemployment by race and ethnicity Spartanburg County, SC www.spcf.org Wages by sector Median family income Rate of home ownership Amount of charitable giving King County, WA www.communitiescount.org Amount of affordable housing Income distribution Involvement in community organization Calgary, AB www.sustainablecalgary.org Income equity: gap between rich and poor Housing affordability Transit usage for work trips Food bank usage (Skinnland,2010) Fig 2. Showing Aligning Business Goals with Social Goals of Communities Social Goals Inform Influence A company’s Sphere Sphere of Influence of control Outcomes in communities are affected by many variables, e.g., demographic trends, economic trends, political decisions, etc. (Skinnland, 2010 p. 2) Discussion Figure 1 showing typical results as measured from the community level and they can be directly linked to local business policies that can be practiced in different areas as follows; executive compensation, compensation for those who are less skilled and low level entry on work, family policies concerning leave, policies on company employee volunteer, healthcare policies, employee transport and parking policies, employee diversity and discrimination policies as well as other policies concerning the social well fare of the employees and the community. Figure 2 shows the alignment of business goals in relation with the community societal goals and how the entire company goals and programs are connected to the outcomes as per the scale of the internal community. On the other hand, the social and the economic health of the community is influenced by different factors , policies as well as the activities of those business companies being the material outcomes within the communities in which the businesses function (Lawrence & Weber, 2004). An idea of social goal provides that all individuals of organizations, companies or even small businesses, should do what is ahead of them to improve humanity. Such social responsibility may include reducing hunger in the world or protection of the environment. However, when we revisit the idea of classical economist Milton Friedman, the main aim of the business is earn profits. Thus, due to other collective goals by the society most businesses have taken a step forward in adopting policies that promote societal goals (The New York Times, 2007). For instance, according to Inc website the case study in USA, about 91% of the United States businesses were prompted to take part in activities that that ideally promote societal goals like charity work. According to the University of Miami; Corporate Social Responsibility, small and large scale businesses have done a great job assisting the community to realize its societal goals after the introduction of free enterprise in UK. For instance, the Barclay’s as well as Cadbury’s community actually supported the creation of many historic towns in England (The New York Times, 2007). The philanthropy activities of business companies to support societal goal like world peace, hunger and measures to eradicate HIV/AIDS pandemic is not only meant to benefit the society but also to benefit the company in turn. In addition, dealing with environmental issues are new opportunities to the business hence companies should be involved more in corporate social responsibility if their market is strong and secure (Brown, 1999). Relevance of societal goals to businesses Engagements of the public sector hence gaining an opportunity to learn about the government; in many cases private sectors are usually not aware of the useful government policies that can benefit them. The companies should make an investigation and incorporate useful national policies like the corporate social responsibility so that they help the country in realizing long-term development (The New York Times, 2007) Align societal practices with national strategies as well as local priorities. Most governments have an elaborated national development strategies of which undergo regular updates with alignment of other broad initiatives like the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Once the companies are supports the governments’ policies and strategies, then it would be also easy for them to align their own societal goal initiatives. Most governments have incentives and grants. Direct association of the private companies with the government would promote corporate social responsibility programs as well as attracting more investor power leading a more sustainable business environment (Kimberly & Tamar, 2009). Support for public policy that promotes societal goals. Many government regulations and voluntary programs are usually derived from the collaborative dialogue between the government and companies. Hence the private sectors are in a better position to influence the government on proper corporate social responsibility initiatives. Concerning the concept of sustainability, various systems including business companies are the practioners of societal interests. Businesses are created within societies that are practically in interaction with economic, environmental as well as social concerns in different ways. The existence of businesses within the society requires that societal values to be expressed in a formal aspect mainly through policies (Keith, 2001). However, it has become very difficult for some companies to understand fully about societal values because most of them are managed by laws and regulations and also pressure from the stakeholder expectations about the company operations on environmental concerns. Many companies express their societal goal objectives by promoting various programs like channeling grants to local organizations or support employee volunteer activities in various local charity works. The feedback is then gained by the companies by community indicator programs. These are quantitative measures that describe an economic, environmental as well as social condition. For instance they include the level of education in the society, poverty levels, use of energy per capita, environmental degradation among others. these indicators helps the companies to have insight of the resulting health and well being conditions within the community. Therefore the information assists the corporate entities to understand the trend of the community social progress over time thus determining what the priorities and goals of the community are. In addition, from the business point of view, the indicator information also helps the companies to introduce desirable products that the community can all benefit (Kimberly & Tamar, 2009). Conclusion The increasing call for public policy to guide the organizations’ social responsibility programs is a typical concept that was stressed by the Keynes theory of economics. While it is considered that taking the views of classical theory means that individualism would prevail much because every body would be looking at personal prosperity as the classical theory is indefinite in nature. Hence, public policies should energize their efforts to societal goals which are responsible in increased food production, decreased famine, increased GNP per capita as well high incomes and better living standards. This is a more practical solution of unemployment by fulfilling corporate social responsibility interests (Kimberly & Tamar, 2009). References Brown, W. (1999) Individualisation and Union Recognition in Britain in the 1990s in Employment Relations Individualisation and Union Exclusion, The Federation Press, New South Wales. Deery, S. & Mitchell, R. (1999) "The Emergence of Individualisation and Union Exclusion as an Employment Relations Strategy" in Employment Relations Individualisation and Union Exclusion, The Federation Press, Sydney, p.3. Skinnland, K. Are Social Goals Relevant to Business Accessed on 12th April 2011 from http://www.gemi.org/metricsnavigator/eag/Are%20Social%20Goals%20Relevant%20to%20Business.pdf Long, J. & Aitken, N. (2001). The Pros & Cons of Collectivism vs. Individualism, Part 2, 30th Convention, Busselton Fitzgerald ,M.23/12/2007 The New York Times Capital ideas of Societal Goals The New York Times: Capital Ideas and Social Goals. Kimberly. A & Tamar. B, (2009). Public Policy and the Promotion of Corporate Social Responsibility, University of California, San Diego Diener, E.(2009).Well-being for public policy. London: Oxford University Press. Preston,L.E. & Post J.P.(1975).Private management and public policy: the principle of public responsibility nnew York: Prentice-Hall. Post,J.E .,Lawrence,A.T &Weber ,J .(2002).Business and society: corporate strategy, public policy, ethics New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. Lawrence ,A.T & Weber,J.(2004).Business and Society: Stakeholders, Ethics, Public Policy .London: Tata McGraw-Hill Lynam, S.(2006).Community development and public policy, Brisbane: Combat Poverty Agency. Read More

 

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