By David J. James | Quoracy.com
In the age of sustainability disclosures and corporate transparency, the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) S1–S4 present themselves as technical instruments—legal scaffolding for social accountability. But beneath their regulatory veneer lies a deeper philosophical current: a challenge not merely to comply, but to go beyond expectations. To act, as Jesus once said, not just in reciprocity, but in grace. This essay traces the intellectual lineage of that challenge, from the Gospel of Luke to Carl Gustav Jung, through Eric Berne, and into the heart of modern ESG.
The “What Thank Have Ye?” Principle
Jesus’s words in Luke 6:32–35 are a direct rebuke to transactional morality:
“If ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.” (Luke 6:32–33, KJV)
This is not rhetorical flourish—it is a moral scalpel. It cuts through the logic of reciprocity and exposes the spiritual poverty of minimalism. The Gospel ethic is not “do what is required,” but “do what is redemptive.” It is a call to going beyond expectations—to act beyond what will be requited, beyond what is obligatory.
This principle, though theological in origin, has profound implications for public ethics. It invites us to measure virtue not by compliance, but by voluntary transcendence. And it is this very logic that animates the ESRS social standards.
ESRS S1–S4: A Framework of Going Beyond
The ESRS social standards—S1 (Own Workforce), S2 (Workers in the Value Chain), S3 (Affected Communities), and S4 (Consumers and End-users)—do not simply ask companies whether they obey national labour laws. They ask:
- What do you do for your people?
- How do you know it’s enough?
- What will you do next?
This is not a checklist. It is a moral inquiry. ESRS S1, for example, doesn’t just ask whether wages meet legal minimums—it asks whether they meet the standards of dignity, equity, and impact. ESRS S2–S4 extend this inquiry outward, probing the company’s relational ethics across supply chains, communities, and consumers.
In short, ESRS S1–S4 are not transactional—they are supertransactional. They reflect a public philosophy that demands more than compliance. They demand conscience.
Eric Berne and the Psychology of Transactionality
To understand the cultural shift from transaction to transformation, we must revisit Eric Berne (1910–1970), the Canadian-born psychiatrist who founded Transactional Analysis. In his seminal work The Games People Play (1964), Berne revealed how human interactions often follow predictable scripts—social “games” with hidden motives and emotional payoffs.
Berne’s insight was that much of our behavior is transactional: we act not out of freedom, but out of patterned expectation. We seek validation, control, or escape—not truth. His framework exposed the emotional minimalism of adult life, where even kindness can be strategic, and love can be a negotiation.
Berne was born Eric Lennard Bernstein to Jewish immigrants from Poland and Russia. His father was a physician, his mother a writer. Trained in Freudian psychiatry, Berne later broke with orthodoxy to develop a more accessible, behavior-focused model of human interaction. His work laid the groundwork for understanding why people settle for the minimum, and how they might break free.
Carl Gustav Jung: The Archetypal Depth Beneath
Berne’s intellectual debt to Carl Jung is unmistakable. Jung (1875–1961), the Swiss psychiatrist and former protégé of Freud, introduced the world to the collective unconscious, archetypes, and the process of individuation. He saw the human journey as one of integration—bringing shadow into light, reconciling opposites, becoming whole.
Jung’s upbringing in a Swiss Reformed household, with a pastor father and deep exposure to Christian theology, shaped his symbolic imagination. Though he distanced himself from dogma, his psychology remained steeped in Christian mythos. He saw Christ as the archetype of the Self—the reconciler, the wholeness beyond fragmentation.
Jung’s influence on Berne was not doctrinal but structural. Where Jung saw archetypes, Berne saw scripts. Where Jung saw individuation, Berne saw ego states. Both sought to liberate the human person from unconscious bondage—to move from reaction to reflection.
From Jung to Berne to ESRS: The Ethical Arc
The ESRS social standards, though born in Brussels boardrooms, carry the imprint of this psychological lineage. They challenge companies to move beyond the transactional games of corporate PR and into the individuated maturity of ethical transparency.
- Berne helps us name the games: “We comply, therefore we are good.”
- Jung helps us see the shadow: “What are we hiding behind our disclosures?”
- The Gospel helps us transcend both: “What thank have ye?”
This is not accidental. The ESRS framework reflects a secularized ethic of confession. It asks companies to disclose not just what they do, but why, how, and what next. It is, in effect, a public liturgy of accountability.
Philadelphia vs. the Gospel Ethic
In Greek, philia (from which Philadelphia derives) is brotherly love—reciprocal, familiar, safe. But the Gospel calls for agape—unconditional, sacrificial, unrequited. ESRS S1–S4, in their best reading, are a call to agape ethics in corporate life.
They ask:
- Not just “Do you treat workers fairly?” but “Do you elevate their dignity?”
- Not just “Do you avoid harm?” but “Do you seek healing?”
- Not just “Do you meet expectations?” but “Do you exceed them?”
This is the ethic of going beyond expectations. The ethic of grace. The ethic of “what thank have ye?”
Two Warnings
1. World Government by the Back Door
The ESRS framework, though framed as transparency, functions as a supranational governance tool. It standardizes moral expectations across borders, bypassing national sovereignty. Companies in Poland, France, or Germany must report in the same way—even if their laws differ. This is not democratic consensus—it is regulatory harmonization without direct mandate. It risks becoming world government by stealth.
2. A Supertransactional System Without Christ
ESRS S1–S4 establish a supertransactional system of righteousness—one that demands more than law, but rarely acknowledges its philosophical debt to Jesus Christ. It borrows the ethic of “going beyond expectations” while severing it from its source. In doing so, it risks becoming a secular substitute for grace—a system that measures virtue but cannot redeem failure.
And yet, the Gospel reminds us: His kingdom will come. Jesus will show us how, without Him, we failed even in the higher goals we set for ourselves. The “what thank have ye?” principle is not just a challenge—it is a prophecy. It reveals our need for a righteousness that is not measured, but given.
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