When I first came across the term Inclusive Capitalism (IC) I was drawn to it emotionally; if not intellectually. It struck me as a very odd proposition. It sounded ‘good’, and has high face validity, but it was easy to see just how erroneous the term is and how little substance lay behind it. Capitalists should always aim to maximise returns but how can they possibly motivate the populace to share that goal if it is in some way excluded? How can maximum returns be achieved if the world’s human capital is under-utilised? What chance does IC have of meeting its commitment to “Improve Workforce” if the workers feel cheated?
Surely the capitalist system only got this far with absolute inclusivity at its very heart and soul: that is the only legitimate form of capitalism. The advent of the Coalition for Inclusive Capitalism is an open admission that the present system has now lost that legitimacy. However, it fails to recognise, at a much deeper and more philosophical level, that when a fundamentally sound system has lost its way it needs to be repaired, not replaced by empty rhetoric.
The world is only just beginning to wake up to the fact that capitalism was always a global human system but one where many of the humans involved had no say. The UK, Europe and America were the greatest beneficiaries of capitalism; at an earlier time when no one worried too much about its social legitimacy. It was also a time when a much smaller population posed less of a threat to its own existence. Factoring these new conditions into the existing capitalist system is the way forward. That is why the Maturity Institute adopts a whole, multi-discipline, human system approach to what is the crux of the problem.
The Maturity Institute is also a professional development institute for a new generation of leaders and managers who can manage this more complex state of capitalism. As its Chair, I am acutely aware that we will be judged by the company we keep: that is why we keep aiming at the very highest, professional standards. As far as I know, there is no other professional institute, business school or coalition taking on the true extent of this challenge.
Comments are closed