Private Law Theory

ABSTRACT
Corporate purpose became a central focus of business practice and academic research. This paper presents a longitudinal empirical study (2018-2022) of 20 FTSE100 companies, analysing corporate documents to understand the concept of corporate purpose. Although corporate purpose has been widely examined, its practical operationalisation remains underexplored. This study addresses that gap by offering a structured account of how UK companies define the concept of corporate purpose and how this understanding is implemented in practice.

This empirical study is organised into two stages – Stage 1 and Stage 2 (comprising 2a and 2b) – each employing content analysis of corporate documents. Stage 1, a qualitative component, examines how leading UK companies articulate and understand corporate purpose by analysing websites, articles of association, and disclosures under Principle B and Provision 2 of the UKCG Code. It establishes the conceptual and empirical baseline for assessing in Stage 2 whether companies genuinely ‘walk the talk’ and move beyond a shareholder‑primacy orientation. Stage 2 – a quantitative study comprising two components – evaluates companies’ stated purposes against evidence from their Strategic Reports, focusing on non‑financial disclosures under the CA 2006 and Provision 5 of the UKCG Code. Stage 2a involves a leximetric-inspired compliance performance exercise (measuring compliance with the relevant provisions), while Stage 2b consists of an empirical claim-testing procedure (focusing on company’s concrete actions and tangible examples), which we term a ‘stakeholder claim benchmarking’ exercise. Overall, the two-stage empirical design provides a deeper, evidence-based assessment of how corporate purpose is implemented in practice.

Taken together, our results indicate that although companies invoke corporate purpose extensively and meet reporting expectations, substantive alignment between stated purpose and actual corporate behaviour remains uneven. Purpose plays an increasingly prominent role in corporate narratives, but its effectiveness as a driver of stakeholder‑oriented governance still depends on the extent to which companies translate rhetoric into measurable action.

Chałaczkiewicz-Ładna, Katarzyna and MacNeil, Iain and Esser, Irene-Marie, Defining Corporate Purpose: From Concept to Practice (Part 2) (Forthcoming in the Nature of the Corporation, EUP, edited collection) (March 6, 2026).