Dr. Kapteina on Corporate Democratic Action (CDA) at the ZHAW International Business Seminar Series

On 21 October 2025, Dr. Benedikt D. S. Kapteina, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Chair of Business Administration, esp. Responsible Management, at TU Dresden’s International Institute (IHI) Zittau, delivered a lecture in the ZHAW International Business Seminar Series, hosted by the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) School of Management and Law in Winterthur, Switzerland. The invitation was extended by Prof. Christopher Hartwell, Head of the International Management Institute, and Prof. Christian Vögtlin, Head of the Center for Corporate Responsibility at ZHAW.

The ZHAW School of Management and Law is one of Switzerland’s leading business schools and a key European hub for research and dialogue on management, sustainability, and corporate responsibility. Its International Business Seminar Series brings together scholars and practitioners to explore emerging challenges at the intersection of business, politics, and society.

In his presentation titled Corporate Democratic Action: Business Engagement in Times of Democratic Backsliding, Dr. Kapteina examined how corporations respond when democratic norms and institutions come under pressure, and how some firms adopt civic roles by defending democratic values, countering disinformation, and strengthening deliberative capacities.

The talk drew on two complementary research projects. The first, conducted with Rolf Brühl (in memoriam, ESCP Business School), Markus Scholz (TU Dresden), and Georg Wernicke (HEC Paris), investigates how companies in Eastern Germany engage politically to defend democracy amid polarization and populism

The second project, undertaken jointly with Iwan Alijew (University of St. Gallen) and Christoph Deppe (University of the German Armed Forces Hamburg), examines how firms navigate polarized public debates and disinformation. Drawing on interviews with senior executives and analyses of corporate campaigns during the 2019 European elections, it highlights how companies act as communicative agents supporting democratic discourse across Europe.

Together, these projects form the foundation of the Corporate Democratic Action (CDA) framework, a concept that positions corporations as potential democratic actors.

The event sparked a lively discussion on the civic responsibilities of business in times of democratic backsliding, underlining the growing relevance of this line of research within debates on corporate democratic responsibility.

For the Chair of Business Administration, esp. Responsible Management, at TU Dresden’s International Institute (IHI) Zittau, the contribution exemplifies its international research collaborations and its commitment to advancing knowledge on the normative, institutional, and democratic foundations of responsible management and corporate practice.