A Csr Gap Analysis of the Gap

Such robust condemnations are a sign of the public relations issues raised by offshore manufacturing. In response to growing public repugnance at sweatshop labour, ethical concerns have shot up the retail agenda. All members of the British Retail Consortium, which represents 80 per cent of the country's retailers, have signed up to the independently audited Ethical Trading Initiative. The code of practice covers such issues as the free choice of employment, the right to collective bargaining, safe working conditions and payment of a living wage. "The ideas that workers in these countries are worse off because British companies are doing business with them is just wrong," said a spokesman for the BRC. "These are attractive jobs, which are well paid, and that is why people choose to do them."

Good company citizenship goes beyond simply meeting the letter of the law. A socially responsible company should be aware of the effects its decision-making has on the community around it. This is illustrated in part “A” of the unanimously adopted policies of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) Virtual

Good company citizenship goes beyond simply meeting the letter of the law. A socially responsible company should be aware of the effects its decision-making has on the community around it. This is illustrated in part “A” of the unanimously adopted policies of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) Virtual

The expectation that businesses behave responsibly and positively contribute to society all while pursuing their economic goals is one that holds firm through all generations. Stakeholders, both market and nonmarket, expect businesses to be socially responsible. Many companies have responded to this by including this growing expectation as part of their overall business operations. There are companies in existence today whose sole purpose is to socially benefit society alongside businesses who simply combine social benefits with their economic goals as their company mission. These changes in societal expectations and thus company purpose we’ve seen in the business community over time often blurs the line of what it means to be socially

On the other side, as the legal personality of the corporations evolved in the 1800s, enterprises were no longer responsible for serving the public interest. Consequently, any social welfare was symbolic and procured from the economic function of organizations (Banerjee, 2008). Furthermore, it seems that corporations are using CSR strategies as a window to present favorable images and obtain economic benefits. Historically the relationship between revenues and investment in CSR programs is a controversial issue. Furthermore, the power of the economic CSR rhetoric lies in the ability to validate particular ideologies to consolidate the power of larger corporations (Banerjee,

To prosper over time, every company must not only deliver financial performance, but also show how it makes a positive contribution to society. Companies must benefit all of their stakeholders, including shareholders, employees, customers, and the communities in which they operate” (Straub,

Sweatshops were first well known to the public eye when several major corporations’ exploitation of workers were revealed during the late twentieth century. Sweatshops generally are factories that provide workers with socially unacceptable working conditions, especially dealing with clothing items. With the expanding apparel industries around the world, more and more corporations are using sweatshop factories to their advantage. Numerous companies claim that they are not responsible for actions of those factories from which they purchase from because it is not part of their corporation. However, action needs to be taken by the government and individual corporations to improve the working conditions in sweatshop factories. Due to the harsh working environment, insufficient pay, and other factors that cause inhumane treatment of workers in sweatshops, the US government should improve working conditions for workers, have stricter regulations on sweatshops, and strive to improve the treatment of sweatshop workers across the globe.

The fashion industry fuels the message that “the way to solve your problems is to consume more.” Therefore, making people buy things they don’t really need. Currently there are “80 billion clothes sold a year” and “40 million garment workers.” This industry encourages people to buy things based of their wants and not their needs, sometimes people buy clothes they never wear in their life so this means that these poor people working in sweatshops are getting abused and producing clothes for no reason.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is something that affects all companies and should be an active factor in the company’s decision making. It is something all corporations need to care about. CSR is when business’ or corporations take part in an initiative or campaign for a cause that will benefit society and/or in some way make the world a better place (Taylor, 2015). Initially, Corporate Social Responsibility started to take shape around the 1950’s, but some say that it dates all the way back to the 1800s, the idea of CSR was seen (Carroll, 2007). One may think that because it is dated so long ago, it doesn’t have an important impact today nevertheless, it is proven that Corporate Social Responsibility is a pathway for entities to self benefit as they are in the process of benefitting society.

Two of the sources propose that labor campaign should focus on the main issues when dealing sweatshops, which is creating suitable work place for the garment makers. The article “Beyond Sweatshops: Employment labor market security and global inequality” states the overall goal is improving the labor standards which means we must “ extending thinking and activism into new areas of intervention and confronting tradeoffs head on” (Heintz 2004, p.225). As a matter of fact, Herman (2004) explains the generation the supplier’s codes of conduct’s purpose to increase awareness of working conditions and help taming it. There is the first generation of codes failed because it was not executed correctly, also viewed as rules rather than the expectation (p.447). The next generation was crafted for corporate to monitor, report and verify that and, third generation of supplier’s codes of conduct were obeyed and also providing a voice for the workers (Herman 2012 p.447 -448). The third generation’s foundation is wages to improve the lives of the workers. The evidence shows that steps are being taken to ensure the improvement in the worker

Strict deadlines have made them become the least ideal situation. Big corporations ask too much when involving their businesses. They demand fast production and for a cheap cost. This creates factories to sprout up everywhere, competing with one another to provide the best, quickest, and cheapest services for the companies. The second largest exporter for clothes was located in Bangladesh known as the Rhana Plaza. In 2013, 1,127 people were killed in the collapse of the Rhana Plaza.2 Most of them were young, single women who worked in the factory. There is much dispute about the cause of the collapse, but the main reason was due to negligence to the structure of the building. One article states, “Yet Mr. Rana and the factory bosses discounted any concerns and ordered their workers into the building the next morning” (Yardley, 2013). If the bosses would have taken more concern to their building then this never would have happened, and 1,217 people would still be living today. The only concern owners have is to make profit. They have no cares for those who work under them. As long as their products are made, they don’t care about the treatment of workers. The amount of deaths from the Rhana Plaza collapse is devastating, and the working conditions the women worked under is even more gruesome. Rarely when I put on clothes do I consider the conditions the people who make me clothes have to

With the company’s code of conduct including right things as part of business conduct, the crisis has only revealed that the inactions of the company are against the ethics it purports to uphold. In business operations, whenever the top management fails in attaining unquestionable integrity and high level of business ethics, it becomes an insurmountable feat to anticipate responsible behavior. Furthermore, the absence of business integrity is the fundamental cause of the crisis that rocked General Motors. It is of utmost importance for the company to foster high levels of business ethics as part of its social responsibility and to ensure that quality of products and safety of users are among top priorities in its core priorities. Similar to other companies that have faced such a crisis, GM is learning the social responsibility lesson in the hard

Current approaches to CSR are fragmented and/or disconnected from business goals. Many firms still consider CSR as another generic public relations problem in which media campaigns and CSR reports are used to paint the company as a positive ethical, social and or environmental advocator and supporter. For example, the annual reports discuss a firm’s sensitivities to CSR issues, but completely lack the entire story and offer no further forward commitments from the firm. Further, the ratings and rankings measurements are self-appointed by the firm, not always accurate to validate the work and direct impact to what they are measuring, and the criteria base varies widely and weighed differently in the final scoring. Worst of all the data lacks impartial auditors for validating the data to ensure the ratings have been accurately met, and data is statistically significant and a good proxy for what it is supposed to reflect. This has resulted in reactive initiatives designed to appease vocal

Both the definitions given highlight the “voluntary” part of the actions taken by firms, those which go beyond law requirements, and from this starting point Matten and Moon (Matten & Moon 2008a) define two types of CSR, “implicit” and “explicit”. Implicit CSR reflects the actions taken by the firms to respond to formal and informal institutions for society’s interest, and consists of values, norms, and rules which result in requirements for corporations. Explicit CSR describes corporate activities that assume responsibility for the interests of society. They normally consist of voluntary programs and strategies by corporations which combine social and business value and address issues perceived as being part of the social responsibility of the company, often in response to local communities or Non-Governmental Organizations’ pressures (NGO) (Matten & Moon 2008b).

The overwhelming facts point to a shady underworld of self-dealing and opportunistic exploitation of the poor and working class, which was until recently, well hidden from the commoner. The executives of WorldCom and Enron provide real world examples of unethical business practices, where the desire to make money for their shareholders transcended into an addiction to greed and self-dealing that were displayed by their, “excessive pay, perks, and golden parachutes”(Carson 392) at the expense of all stakeholders. All is not lost, there are corporations that pride themselves in their sound business model and commitment to ethical business practices. Such companies as Eaton Corporation, and Weyerhaeuser, who according to Ethisphere.com, a business ethics watchdog, are among the “2010 World`s most ethical companies.” (Ethisphere)