Where’s the “Value”? A Meditation on Why the Twenty-First-Century CEO Is Different

Abstract

This essay asserts that the CEO of the twenty-first-century American (or, more broadly, Western) corporation has changed in ways that an executive counterpart from 50 years ago would not recognize. The CEO today focuses keenly on subjects, themes, and concerns that would have been regarded strictly as externalities by previous corporate generations. Along with a radical change in corporate values has come a notable flattening of erstwhile hierarchies.

Keywords: capitalist enterprise, capitalist management, firms, firm organization

JEL Classification: P12, M1, L22