The ANR OSMosis project

The société à mission is a recent innovation in French law designed to provide companies with a responsible governance framework. Including social and environmental objectives in a company’s articles of association, already possible in several countries (United States, Italy), has so far received little empirical research, the literature being mostly limited to conceptual models of its potential strengths and risks. The project’s hypothesis is that the transformations induced by this legal status may be unexpected — at the level of both governance and activity — and hard to capture with conventional governance and management indicators.

The project develops tools and methods to track these concrete effects over time. It relies on a partnership between the CEM, a consulting firm and research teams with complementary expertise: strategy and credibility against « mission-washing », the functioning of governance bodies, changes in shareholding, and impacts on work and social dialogue. Data collected with the CEM (mission committee reports, opinions of independent third-party auditors) are combined with case studies and a quantitative comparison with similar companies without a mission.