BUSM2575 Business in Society: how do you build the argument?

Direct answer: The course assesses whether you can question a social, political, economic or environmental issue through the lens of business citizenship, explain how firms respond to demands for sustainability and good governance, and argue a view about the future of business. Each assessment maps to these course learning outcomes.

The handbook entry for BUSM2575 Business in Society opens with a claim rather than a topic list: "Business has an urgent need to reconsider the way it interacts with and contributes to society" (RMIT University, n.d.). It then says that "Students will be asked to interpret this relationship in the context of environmental, regulatory, diversity, political, human rights, and consumer rights contexts" (RMIT University, n.d.). The verbs that matter are reconsider and interpret, which tells you that a summary of what a company says about itself will not reach the higher grade bands.

The RMIT course handbook lists the assessment structure.

Source: RMIT University course handbook, course 054378, read 2026-10-27.

The second written task and the presentation each carry 40% (RMIT University, n.d.), so the first task is the place to practise the analytical habits you will need later. CLO1 asks you to "Analyse and question major global or national social, political, economic or environmental issues facing the world today in the context of business citizenship" (RMIT University, n.d.), and the word question is a direct instruction to evaluate.

Direct answer: Identify every group that affects or is affected by the business, rank them by power and interest, and then judge whose claims the firm is actually serving. The analysis earns marks when it shows a conflict between stakeholders and explains which way the company resolved it, and at what cost.

Stakeholder theory is usually traced to Freeman (1984), who argued that managers should account for every group with a stake in the firm, not only shareholders. In a BUSM2575 Business in Society assignment, the theory becomes useful once you stop listing stakeholders and start comparing their claims.

A practical method is a three-step table. First, list the groups: employees, suppliers, customers, local communities, regulators, investors and, for many firms, workers in the supply chain. Second, describe what each group wants and how much influence it has. Third, state what the company has done for each group, citing evidence such as sustainability reports, regulatory findings or credible journalism.

Source: illustrative structure written by MAAS for this guide, not data on a real company.

The analysis becomes critical when the table shows that a low-power group carries most of the cost, and you can then ask whether the company's public commitments match where its resources go.

Direct answer: Use the pyramid to sort a company's actions into economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic responsibilities, then test the order. Ask whether the firm treats ethical duties as optional extras after profit, and whether its philanthropy is substituting for ethical conduct elsewhere. Evaluation of the ranking is what moves an answer beyond description.

Carroll (2016) restates the definition he first proposed: "Corporate social responsibility encompasses the economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary (philanthropic) expectations that society has of organizations at a given point in time" (Carroll, 2016). He adds that "the economic responsibility is a baseline requirement that must be met in a competitive business world" (Carroll, 2016). These two sentences give you a test: a firm that cannot survive economically cannot meet the other layers, but survival does not excuse ignoring them.

Corporate social responsibility has no single agreed definition, and Carroll (2016) notes that one review counted 37 different definitions. That variety is useful in an essay, because you can show which definition the company uses and what it leaves out. Carroll (2016) dates the modern era of the idea to Bowen's 1953 book, notes early critics such as Levitt in 1958, and explains that his four-part definition from 1979 was recast as the pyramid in 1991. He also reports more than 5,200 Google Scholar citations of the original pyramid article, which tells you a marker will expect you to go beyond restating it.

Carroll (2016) also reports an early survey of 241 executives who weighted the four responsibilities as follows.

Source: a 1985 survey of executives, as reported in Carroll (2016).

A strong paragraph compares this ranking with what the company you study actually does, and asks whether managers in its industry would weight the layers the same way today.

Direct answer: Choose the one or two Sustainable Development Goals the company's core business touches most, then test its claims against specific targets. For human rights, use the UN Guiding Principles to ask whether the firm prevents and remedies harm in its own operations and supply chain, rather than only funding projects elsewhere.

The Sustainable Development Goals set out 17 goals and 169 targets, adopted in 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda, which the United Nations describes as "adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015" (United Nations, n.d.). Many companies claim alignment with several goals at once. In BUSM2575 Business in Society, a better move is to pick the goal closest to the firm's main activity and check whether its reported results match a named target.

The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, endorsed by the Human Rights Council on 16 June 2011, rest on three pillars: the state duty to protect, the corporate responsibility to respect, and access to remedy (United Nations, 2011). They state that "These Guiding Principles apply to all States and to all business enterprises, both transnational and others, regardless of their size, sector, location, ownership and structure" (United Nations, 2011).

That scope matters for case selection. A small or local firm cannot be excused from the second pillar because it is not a multinational, and noting this shows the marker that you have read the framework rather than a summary of it. CLO2 asks you to "Understand how businesses can develop solutions to respond to increasing demand for sustainability, transparency and good governance" (RMIT University, n.d.), so end the section with a solution the firm could realistically adopt.

Direct answer: Agree one argument about the company or issue, then give each member a part of that argument rather than a separate topic. A presentation that evaluates one firm against one framework, with a clear recommendation about the future of business, meets CLO3 more directly than four disconnected summaries.

CLO3 asks you to "Articulate perspectives on the future of business and the implications for various industries" (RMIT University, n.d.). The handbook also describes the aim of the course as leading "students toward being active participants in interpreting and responding to the changing global business environment" (RMIT University, n.d.), which suggests the presentation should end with a position, not a neutral overview.

One structure that works: state the issue and why it matters now, present the stakeholder conflict, evaluate the firm's response with Carroll's pyramid or the triple bottom line, test its SDG or human rights claims, and finish with what the industry should do next. Rehearse the transitions between speakers, because those are the points where an argument usually breaks.

If your program also includes a corporate responsibility course, our BUSM4692 Global Corporate Responsibility guide covers how the same frameworks are applied at the multinational level. Students interested in purpose-led organisations can compare the approach in our BUSM7113 Leading Social Impact guide.