Group 3 companies.
We define group 3 companies as those who are considered by few of having committed ethical "sin and that are accepted by the majority as being
generally beneficent in purpose. This is not to say that companies in group 3 are objectively virtuous (if such an assessment were possible - see for example Lewis and Unerman (1999)), but that they are considered by many as being 566 generally benign. We selected two particular retailers to represent group 3:
Marks &spencer (who for most of the period 1974-1998 were, the authors would argue, thought of favourably) and Boots pic.