Shareholder Activism and Alienation

Abstract

This article opens up the category of the shareholder, who conventionally sits as a stick figure at the heart of popular explanations for why corporations ruthlessly seek to maximize profits. Following the logic that a gift may be seen as an extension of the giver’s self, we take up the possibility that investment portfolios might be viewed as reflections or extensions of shareholder personhood. We examine how three shareholder activist movements in the United States—socially responsible investment, shareholder value, and responsible investment—address the relationship between shareholder personhood, values, and investments. The divergent ways in which these shareholder movements have grappled with the contradictory entailments of share ownership illuminate the contestation at the heart of corporate ownership over the nature of the capitalist person.

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