Democratizing Public
Benefit – Social Enterprise and Beneficiary Participation
Joseph Pileri, American University
The burgeoning field of social
enterprise attempts to compel businesses to create some “public benefit,” often
defined as a social or environmental benefit for one or more third-party
stakeholders, alongside pursuing profit. Social enterprise thus far largely
fails to include the meaningful participation of stakeholders and intended
beneficiaries in the pursuit of this public benefit. Decisions about the
definition, creation, and measuring of a public benefit are left to traditional
corporate governance mechanisms—boards of directors, company officers, and
shareholders. These mechanisms often depend on groups who neither comprise nor
reflect the interests of marginalized groups and other stakeholders.
In this paper, I suggest a model
in which stakeholders and beneficiaries are directly involved in the
decision-making process of these enterprises. I explain the justification for
including stakeholders and beneficiaries in the decision-making process for
social enterprises. I walk through options for granting explicitly-identifiable
stakeholders and beneficiaries decision-making authority. I also propose
practical legal structures that achieve these goals under existing law and
legislative changes that can bring about this kind of participation.
An Unfair Privacy Assault on America's Most
Vulnerable Entrepreneurs
Amanda Sprately, Georgetown University Law Center
Business registration and formation regulations disadvantage
low-resourced and traditionally marginalized entrepreneurs in greater
proportion than well-resourced and sophisticated entrepreneurs regarding personal
privacy. Low-resourced entrepreneurs starting a new business must frequently
provide sensitive personal data such as home address, home phone, personal
email and Social Security number to multiple agencies, including the relevant Secretary
of State for entity formation and business tax registration agencies at the
federal, state, and local levels. This issue is less acute for well-resourced
entrepreneurs who often act through an attorney, law, or accounting firm to
handle their legal, tax, and other documents or have the resources to purchase
expensive executive suite services or lease commercial property. The negative
consequences of business and tax personal information disclosure requirements
disproportionately impact low-resourced entrepreneurs. This differential impact
is problematic because it gives preferential treatment to one type of
entrepreneur over another, squelching diversity and innovation in
entrepreneurship. Furthermore, it is often low-resourced entrepreneurs who are
most vulnerable to exposure of their personal information for personal safety
reasons, low-resourced entrepreneurs are often less equipped to handle visitors
to their business address of record, and address insecurity among certain
low-resourced entrepreneurs creates an effective bar to accessing
entrepreneurship opportunities. This challenge calls for a re-examination of
basic business and tax registration laws, particularly at the state and local
levels, to consider what information is truly required by our government
agencies and whether it is appropriate for such regulations to
disproportionately burden entrepreneurs within our most low-resourced and
vulnerable communities.