The 's Current Position On The Company 's Ethical And Social Responsibilities

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Examine Apple’s current position on the company’s ethical and social responsibilities, and determine whether or not the company has met these responsibilities. Provide two (2) examples that support your position. The origins of social responsibility are dated back in 1950, when Harold Bowen published a seminal work titled Social Responsibility of the Businessman. Although in the early 1940’s corporations were already talking about ethical and social responsibility, it was not until Bowen published his seminal work that a formal concept was defined. For this reason he is known as the Father of Corporate Responsibility. (Schwartz, 2011, Pg. 20). As many other large companies, Apple developed a commitment to responsibility. In order to…show more content…
As a result, Apple launched an investigation to find supporting evidence of these allegations (Prakash, 2012). In 2007 Apple updated the Code of Conduct, and included a section related to Supplier Responsibility, stating that “Apple is committed to driving the highest standards for social responsibility throughout our supply base. We require that our suppliers provide safe working conditions, treat workers with dignity and respect, and use environmentally responsible manufacturing processes wherever Apple products are made” (Apple, Supplier Responsibility). In addition, they started performing annual audits on their suppliers, and started publishing the results of these audits since 2008. These progress reports are available to the public online with the intention of demonstrating their high standards and improvement on work conditions and initiatives. In 2007 Apple launched the Supplier Employee Education and Development Program (SEED) to train supplier workers and managers. Apple claims that over 200,000 workers have participated in its training programs since 2007 with participation continuing to grow rapidly. Despite all the efforts made by the company in the last decade, Apple has continued to face issues in this matter. In 2010 one of Apple’s largest supplier in charge of the production of iPhones iPods, and iPads, experienced a series of employee suicides due to the stressful and exhausting working conditions. In response to these actions,
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