This interpretation echoes Phillips’s (1997) “principle of stakeholder fairness” which
refers to the creation of obligations of fairness among persons voluntarily entering into
a mutually beneficial scheme, requiring sacrifice or contribution on the part of
participants. In other words, if the self-appointed stakeholders want the benefit of
influencing the decision-making process, they are under an obligation to participate
responsibly in that process. Stakeholders themselves have obligations – the
stakeholder concept does not create additional responsibilities for managers and
leaders alone.
Participants were asked if they regarded Parliamentary constituents as
stakeholders – are the two words simply interchangeable? The general consensus
was in the negative with some respondents also differentiating between the concept of
the “general community” and the constituency. Dunham et al. (2006) have recently
drawn attention to the vagueness of definitions of “community”, identifying different
types of communities of relevance to stakeholder management such as virtual
advocacy groups. The idea that “stakeholder” refers to people involved in specific
policy issues, who are more directly affected or have a greater degree of interest in the
outcome of a particular policy decision, was reiterated by two Liberal Parliamentarians
in this context. An ALP-aligned adviser said that stakeholders actively engage in
issues, something not necessarily the case with all constituents. A Labor MP pointed
out that even in the case of a project being undertaken in a particular suburb, only
some – not all – constituents would become stakeholders. The relevance of the notion
of “active publics” (Grunig, 1997) is again apparent here.
Although the term “stakeholder” was readily recognised by participants, a degree of
ambivalence about the merits of concept is apparent. Six participants – three Liberal,
three Labor – all stated that the word was either misused or over-used in the political
arena. A key concern was that by labelling certain groups as “stakeholders”, politicians
become beholden to them even though they may have little legitimacy or less of a claim
than other entities. For example, a senior Liberal Parliamentarian said that people
wanting to influence policy outcomes can claim stakeholder status and exaggerate
their association with an issue. Also, bureaucrats can claim that they have consulted
with “all the stakeholders”, or in other words, “we’ve covered all of our bases” when
that is not necessarily the case if the “stakeholders” in question are a relatively small,
self-appointed and potentially unrepresentative group.
Criticism was also apparent from the left side of politics. A participant affiliated with
the Green Party said that the word stakeholder was helpful at times, but its use implied a
“marketplace scenario where every proponent was on a level playing ground”, and this
was not necessarily the case. It is apparent this comment can be interpreted in
Habermasian terms, i.e. the “ideal speech situation” does not exist (Habermas, 1984). A
Labor politician said the term “stakeholder” was “too clinical and cold” a concept to
apply to politics, and preferred to speak in terms of community instead.
In summary, participants generally seemed to agree with Phillips et al. (2003) that
“non-stakeholder” should remain a meaningful term. To most informants, a
stakeholder is not just anyone. The key to identifying stakeholders is in terms of
their interest in a particular issue. Participants clearly thought stakeholder should
imply legitimacy (a legitimate interest) but were aware this was not always the case,
hence creating the opportunity for abuse. In the abstract, “stakeholder” implies “moral”
stakeholder – those who are affected by government. However, the following section
Stakeholders,demonstrate that those with power who can affect policy (strategic stakeholders)
are highly likely to be the ones to capture politicians’ attention in practice.