Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a vital concept for sustainable business in today’s competitive and greener marketplace. CSR is an evolving concept with many meanings. Although CSR as a concept has gained immense popularity, there is a lack of agreement on what it really means. There are different expectations from different stakeholder groups, different standards, and different practices leading to a fragmented understanding of CSR.
CSR can simply combine a company’s management of economic, social and environmental activities. The Australian Treasury, in a submission to the Joint Parliamentary Inquiry on CSR, defined CSR as “a company’s management of the economic, social and environmental impacts of its activities” (Australian Government, Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services 2006).
The Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum defines CSR as, ‘‘CSR means open and transparent business practices that are based on ethical values and respect for employees, communities, and the environment. It is designed to deliver sustainable value to society at large, as well as to shareholders’’ (
http://www.iblf.org/csr).
According to business for Social Responsibility (BSR), a U.S.-based global business organization: CSR means ‘‘operating a business enterprise in a manner that consistently meets or exceeds the ethical, legal, commercial, and public expectations society has of business’’ (
http://www.bsr.org/).
The European Union (EU) also has been contributing to the universal debate on CSR, providing an analysis of CSR: ‘‘a concept whereby companies/ business firms decide voluntarily to contribute to the betterment of the social world and uplifting of society and a cleaner environment’’ (European Commission, 2001). The Green Paper published by the Commission in July 2001 stated that CSR is commonly defined as “a concept whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations and in their interaction with their stakeholders on a voluntary basis”.
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is responsible ethical and philanthropic actions which are above and beyond that are mandated by law. “Corporate responsibility involves a commitment by a company to manage its role in society – as producer, employer, marketer, customer and citizen – in a responsible and sustainable manner. That commitment can include a set of voluntary principles – over and above applicable legal requirements – that seek to ensure that the company has a positive impact on societies in which it operates.” (United States Council on International Business, Advancing Corporate Responsibility – A statementby the USCIB Corporate Responsibility Committee, November 2002.)
CSR centre of Bangladesh also define CSR as “CSR is about achieving organizational excellences in ways that honor ethical values and respect people, communities and the natural environment”
Earlier a few organizations focused on economic, responsibility, philanthropic, and legal responsibilities. But nowadays with the changing market situation this focus is shifting and including some other factors such as environmental, educational and health responsibilities. The social responsibility of business encompasses the economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary expectations that society has of organizations at a given point in time (Carroll, 1979).
A model dictating the way of practicing CSR can be presented as including economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic activities. Carroll (1991) presented his CSR model as a pyramid, as shown in the below figure.
So, from the above analyses it can be declared that Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a dynamic concept which is more reflecting the activities of the moral responsibility of companies for ecological and social consequences for ensuring sustainable development.
