The essence of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is that businesses should be self-regulating in their strategic and tactical business models that ensure they are in compliance with the moral, ethics, and standards of stakeholder expectations and the law. The goal, of course, is to encourage moral actions so that it does not become necessary for governments to legislate compliance (Kotler & Lee 2003). CSR has been increasingly important in the global arena after the Enron scandal, and is a trend following transparency, the manner in which information is disseminated to all stakeholders, and to "self-regulate" behaviors so that they comply with the spirit and ethics of the law, as well as stakeholder expectations. Improving conditions and taking responsibility for corporate actions is done by encouraging issues surrounding sustainability, community involvement, doing what is right for all stakeholders, and acting in a way that ensures a win-win situation overall (Quazi & O'Brien 2000; Shah 2007).
CSR seems directly linked to the philosophical principles of utilitarianism and deontology how one serves the needs of the many for the best possible outcome in relation to either the means to the end (deontology) or the end result (act utilitarianism) (Deverette 2002). One superb environmental example was that of the BP Oil Spill "Deepwater" in the Gulf of Mexico. CSR would hold that BP and its suppliers have the ethical responsibility to take all appropriate steps to minimize
Corporations are encouraged to conduct their activities in an ethically responsible manner, however neither the corporate world nor academia has produced a single – all encompassing definition of corporate social responsibility (CSR). The basic problem is that there are too many self-serving definitions that often lean toward the specific interests of the entities involved (Van Marrewijk, 2003). There has even been a quantitative study conducted on the many definitions of the term (Dahlsrud, 2006).
Businesses, specifically larger corporations, play a major role in what occurs in society therefore, they are responsible to their stakeholders not only to pursue economic goals but the greater social good as well. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) means that a corporation should act in a way that enhances society and its inhabitants and be held accountable for any of its actions that affect people, their communities, and their environment. (Lawrence, 2010). Social responsibility is becoming the norm so much so that some businesses have incorporated it into their business model. There are three components of the bottom line of social
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into a business model. CSR policy functions as a built-in, self-regulating mechanism that has business monitors and ensures its active compliance with the spirit of the law, ethical standards, and international norms. CSR is a process with the aim to embrace responsibility for the company's actions and encourage a positive impact through its activities on the environment, consumers, employees, communities, stakeholders and all other members of the public sphere who may also be considered stakeholders. CSR is titled to aid an organization's mission as well as a guide to what the company stands for and will uphold to its consumers. Development business ethics is one of the forms of applied ethics that examines
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.
In this article, “The Truth About CSR,” authors Rangan, Chase and Karim stress the importance in aligning a company’s social and environmental activities with its business purpose and values (Rangan, Chase, & Karim, 2015, 41). Outcomes of CSR programs should be a “spillover” and not a primary focus of a business, expressing concern towards social responsibility and corporations failing to contribute to society accordingly (Rangan, Chase, Karim, 2015, 42). There is a great deal of importance in companies refocusing their CSR activities on a primary goal and in providing an organized process for bringing consistency and discipline to CSR strategies (42). Rangan, Chase and Karim want corporations to understand why it is important for them to evaluate their CSR activities and refocus them towards the goal of reinforcing the firm’s societal and environmental actions, while also ensuring their actions add to the overall purpose and values of the corporation. According to the authors, even though
Corporate Social Responsibility (“CSR”) is often described as the measures taken by companies to manage environmental, social and economic impacts of their business activities. Since the globalisation of economic and labour markets, CSR has become an argumentative topic. For companies to be considered as good in terms of CSR, they are required to go above and beyond of their legal requirements and take into consideration what is in the best interests of its stakeholders.
A combination of recent changed to the world scene and pressures from public opinion now requires corporations to take on a new role, social responsibility. Corporate social responsibility is a corporation’s initiative to monitor and ensure compliance with the law, ethical standards, and norms. It can also be defined as corporation’s actions that further social good and go beyond the interests of the firm in order to make the world a better place. Essentially a corporation should embrace the idea of corporate citizenship, the idea that businesses are socially responsible for meeting legal, as well as ethical and economic responsibilities placed on them by shareholders. Although this is an alluring concept, it is also a flawed one. It
Through globalization the gap between the rich and poor has increased, while the rich get richer, the poor get poorer. This can be one of the many reasons why companies choose to be more social responsible as CSR aims to reduce conflicts between stakeholders. Although, individuals are aware that more companies are producing social responsible goods, companies can benefit from CSR practices in different ways. When companies decide to be socially and environmentally active, not only will the society and the environment benefit from the companies ethical practices, but they can also differentiate themselves in today's competitive market.
Nowadays, the employment of ethical principles and standards to the decision and actions of business organizations-better known as Business ethics- is a crucial issue for its strategic management; businesses are expected to have a formal code of ethics or policy that encourages corporate environmental sustainability. To do so, businesses have used different frameworks such as the eco-efficiency, natural step, triple bottom line, ecological footprint and so on, in fact, along with the TBL approach the CSR programs are the most commonly used, it is defined as the “management of stakeholder concern for responsible and irresponsible acts related to environmental, ethical and social phenomena in a way that creates corporate benefit” (Vaaland et al., 2008, p. 931), and can help business to display a more congruent and coherent identity that consequently will lead to enduring and substantial relationships with stakeholders.
Social responsibility is an idea that has been of concern to mankind for many years. Over the last two decades, however, it has become of increasing concern to the business world. This has resulted in growing interaction between governments, businesses and society as a whole. In the past, businesses primarily concerned themselves with the economic results of their decisions. “Today, however, businesses must also reflect on the legal, ethical, moral and social consequences of their decisions” (Anderson 15). This paper will discuss the concept of corporate social responsibility. It will give the definition of the phrase, and identify some of the global factors that necessitate corporate social responsibility. It will discuss the importance of corporations setting up corporate social responsibility projects, and the impact these have on society. Social corporate responsibility and the maintenance of high ethical standards is not an option but an obligation for all business.
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the pledge a business makes where it promises to behave ethically and contribute to economic development while improving the quality of life of workforce and their family as well as the local community (Pride, Hughes, Kapoor 42). This practice helps to form or improve the positive image of the company. Businesses that follow the socially responsible model consider the impact of the company’s actions on society. This also includes promoting and supporting local, national and global causes, which is a part of CSR called corporate philanthropy, where businesses donate some of their profits or resources to charities (Taylor). Companies that show social responsibility this way must be devoted to doing so on a regular basis, because if don’t follow through with it, your organization may be viewed by the public as dishonest. Many critics of CSR believe that this model reduces the main goal of business, restricts the free market goal of maximizing profit, and also limits the ability to compete in a global marketplace (Pride, Hughes, Kapoor 47). Though critics may believe they are right, CSR gives companies a chance to address social issues caused by business’ and other factors and allows them to be a part
Corporate social responsibility is a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into a business model. CSR policy functions as a built-in, self-regulating mechanism whereby business monitors and ensures its active compliance with the spirit of the law, ethical standards, and international norms. The goal of CSR is to embrace responsibility for the company 's actions and encourage a positive impact through its activities on the environment, consumers, employees, communities, stakeholders and all other members of the public sphere. Furthermore, CSR-focused businesses would proactively promote the public interest (PI) by encouraging community growth and development, and voluntarily eliminating practices that harm the public
The popularity of CSR has grown substantially in the last couple of decades. Many people may have grown skeptical of business in the wake of corporate scandals such as Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom followed by the sub-prime mortgage market, which have all gained large amounts of negative publicity. Stakeholders are more aware of the performance of companies along a broader set of metrics that portray the company’s operations in a more comprehensive manner that provides information about social performances and environmental performances. Much of the concept of corporate sustainability is rooted in the notion of sustainable development with can be defined as the ability to meet the needs of the current population without compromising the ability of future generations to
While this variability will inevitably exist, I propose that CSR can generally be defined as voluntary practices through which corporations, businesses and organizations utilize their own resources and power to benefit society, the community, the environment, social causes
CSR is an important part of how a business operates in an ethical way, a corporation’s practices are deemed as ethical if it operates in such a way that is both clean and ecological to the environment, and one that abides by the law. By following this conduct, the corporation follows a much moral way of operating. A corporation that operates in harmful ways, such as exploitation, corruption