General Motors Corp., which until several years ago led not only the U.S. economy but the global economy as the world's largest automaker, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on June 1, concluding a corporate history that spanned more than a century.

That GM was eventually forced into bankruptcy despite massive injections of taxpayer money demands we rethink our concepts of what a corporation is, what the responsibilities of management should be, and who its stakeholders are.

"Stakeholder" is a term used to differentiate company parties from "stockholders." They include not just shareholders, but other parties needed for a company to exist: customers, employees, regulators and members of the local community.