Every corporation and organization has stakeholders: individuals and groups to whom they owe consideration in governance decisions and who, in turn, can exert influence on the corporation and other stakeholders. Legitimate stakeholders include the owners, managers, employees, consumers, taxpayers, community members, supply chain members and society as a whole. The problem is that the interests of these stakeholders are often in conflict with one another. Although the legitimacy of stakeholder interests is well established, how to unravel the morass of conflicting stakeholder interests is not so clear due to the fact that stakeholders often argue from positions of their own self-interest. We propose an approach inspired by John Rawls' idea of fairness that proposes an original position behind a veil of ignorance. Stakeholder interests can be assessed and weighted more fairly if we begin with the assumption that we do not know which stakeholder group we will ultimately occupy. Thus, when specific governance decisions are being considered, the relative weight of stakeholder interests can be established with fairness without the confounding influence of arguments based on self-interest.

The requirement of the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business to include business ethics in the curriculum has prompted business programs to teach ethics either integrated across the curriculum or in standalone classes. The question addressed here is how to engage students in thinking deeply and empathetically about ethical issues impacting corporate social responsibility (CSR). This research focused on using a thought experiment developed by John Rawls in which students examined CSR issues from the perspective of six stakeholder groups. A pre-test/post-test design measured the effectiveness of an instruction module on CSR coupled with an active exercise using Rawls’ veil of ignorance and original position. Results indicate that students placed greater responsibility on the stockholders and board of directors after taking this module. The implication of the Rawlsian technique to use stakeholder empathy is discussed as a tool for engaging business ethics students.