Quaker Business Method: A Contemporary Decision-Making Process?

Friends have a long tradition in the world of trade and business, as discussed throughout this collection. While Quaker entrepreneurs from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries such as Abraham Darby, Joseph Rowntree and George Cadbury continue to be studied widely today, the sustained influence of Friends on contemporary responsible business practice remains largely underexplored. In a Faculty publication at George Fox University, Anderson (1995), for instance, notes that “Quakers have influenced the field of business and other professions far beyond their numbers but the facts remain largely unnoticed”. While it is, frankly, a daunting task to try to capture the dense fabric of what characterises a ‘Quaker way’ of responsible business practice, the theology and process by which Friends conduct Meetings for Business deserves renewed attention given its potential relevance as a collaborative method of decision-making in today’s increasingly complex business organisations.