Corporate Social Responsibility Lecture Notes Lectures Notes Lecture 1 6
Corporate Social Responsibility Lecture Notes Lectures Notes Lecture 1 6
Corporate Social Responsibility Lecture Notes Lectures Notes Lecture 1 6
lOMoARcPSD
lOMoARcPSD
Business ethics: the study of business situations, activities, and decisions where issues of
right and wrong are addressed.
Morality: is concerned with the norms, values and beliefs embedded in social processes
which define right and wrong for an individual or a community
Ethics: is concerned with the study of morality and the application of reason to elucidate
specific rules and principles that determine right and wrong for any given situation.
Ethical theories: the rules and principles you can use to determine right and wrong.
Ethics rationalizes morality, to produce ethical theory, that can be applied to any
situation.
Why is business ethics important?
- Power and influence of business in society
- Potential to provide major contribution to society
- Potential to inflict harm
- Increasing demands for stakeholders
- Lack of business ethic education or training
- Continues occurrence of ethical violations
- Evaluating different ways of managing business ethics
- Interesting and rewarding
Ethical impacts of globalization:
- Stakeholders: globalization provides potential for greater profitability, but also greater
risks. Lack of regulation of global capital markets, leading to additional financial risks
and instability.
- Employees: corporations outsource production to developing countries in order to
reduce costs in global marketplace. This provides jobs but also raise the potential for
exploitation of employees through poor working conditions.
- Consumers: global products provide social benefits to consumers across the globe,
but may also meet protests about cultural imperialism and westernization.
Globalization can bring cheaper prices to customers, but vulnerable consumers in
developing countries may also face the possibility of exploitation by MNCs.
- Suppliers and competitors: suppliers in developing countries face regulation from
MNCs through supply chain management. Small scale indigenous competitors
exposed to powerful global players.
- Civil society (NGOs, etc.): global business activities brings the company in direct
interaction to local communities with possibility for erosion of traditional community
life; globally active pressure groups emerge with aim to police the corporation where
governments are weak and tolerant.
- Government and regulation: globalization weakens governments and increases the
corporate responsibility for jobs, welfare, maintenance of ethical standards, etc.
Globalization also confronts governments with corporations from different cultural
expectations about issues such as bribery, corruption, taxation, and philanthropy.
lOMoARcPSD
Lecture 2
Can a corporation have social responsibilities? Milton Friedman argued against this notion.
He said corporations dont have social responsibilities. Three main arguments:
1. Only human beings have a moral responsibility for their actions
2. It is managers responsibility to act solely in the interests of shareholders
3. Social issues and problems are the proper province of the state rather than corporate
managers
Arguments against Friedman. Why do corporations have social responsibilities?
- Business reasons (enlightened self-interest)
o Extra and/or more satisfied customers
o Employees may be more attracted/committed
o Pre-empt legislation
o Long-term investment which benefits corporation
- Moral reasons:
o Corporations cause social problems
o Corporations should use their power responsibly
o All corporate activities have some social impacts
o Corporations rely on the contribution of a wide set of stakeholders in society,
not just shareholders.
Carrolls four-part model of corporate social responsibility:
Corporate social responsibility: includes the economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic
expectations placed on organizations by society at a given point of time.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Philanthropic responsibilities
Ethical responsibilities
Legal responsibilities
Economic responsibilities
(desired)
(expected)
(required)
(required)
lOMoARcPSD
Differences between CSR in the US and elsewhere in the world exist with respect to all CSR
levels:
- Economic responsibility: focus in the US on shareholders/France has extensive
responsibility for employees; India has tradition of investment in the local community
- Legal responsibility: state seen in Europe as key enforcer of rules/elsewhere
government seen with more skepticism (e.g. corrupt, interfering with liberty)
- Ethical responsibility: wide range of local ethical values and preferences; expectations
vary
- Philanthropic responsibility: Europe tends to compel giving via legal
framework/elsewhere (e.g. US, India, China) companies are expected to share their
wealth.
Stakeholder theory of the firm theory developed by Edward Freeman (1984).
Stakeholder: any group or individual who can affect, or is affected by, the achievement of the
organizations objectives.
According to Friedman, businesses should only be run in the interests of their owners.
Others have a legitimate claim on the corporation:
- Legal perspective: stake in corporation already protected legally in some way
- Economic perspective: externalities (outside contractual relationships) and agency
problem (short term interests of owners vs. long term interests of managers,
employees, customers etc.
Saliency: the degree to which a firm positively responds to a specific stakeholder request.
A distinction can be made on the basis of:
1. Power: relative access to resources for the stakeholder group with respect to the firm
being targeted
2. Legitimacy: degree to which there is a general perception of assumption that a
stakeholders actions are desirable, proper or appropriate
3. Urgency: the degree to which a specific stakeholder request calls for immediate
action
There are different forms of stakeholder theory (Donaldson & Preston, 1995):
1. Normative stakeholder theory: attempts to provide a reason why corporations should
take into account stakeholder interests
2. Descriptive stakeholder theory: attempts to ascertain whether (and how) corporations
actually do take into account stakeholder interests
3. Instrumental stakeholder theory: attempts to answer the question of whether it is
beneficial for the corporation to take into account stakeholder interests.
Normative ethical theories: theories that propose to prescribe the morally correct way of
acting.
Descriptive ethical theories: theories that seek to describe how ethical decisions are actually
made in business.
Traditional ethical theories: generally offer a certain rule of principle which one can apply to
any given situation. These theories can be differentiated into two groups:
1. Non-consequentialist ethics
2. Consequentialist ethics
lOMoARcPSD
Egoism: an action is morally right if the decision-maker freely decides an action to pursue
either their (short-term) desires or their (long-term) interests
- Adam smith: pursuit of individual interest morally acceptable as invisible hand of
market creates benefit for all
- Relies on free competition and good information
- enlightened egoism
- However, markets do not function perfectly
Utilitarianism: an action is morally right if it results in the greatest amount of good for the
greatest number of people affected by the situation
- Also called the greatest happiness principle
- Based on cost-benefit analysis
Problems with utilitarianism:
- Subjectivity: this has led to refinement of the theory
o Act utilitarianism (the individual act): looks to single actions and bases the
moral judgement on the amount of pleasure and the amount of pain this single
action causes
o Rule utilitarianism (general rules): looks at classes of action and asks whether
the underlying principles of an action produce more pleasure than pain for
society in the long run
- Issues around quantification and distribution of utility
Ethics of duties: categorical imperative (Kant)
- Maxim 1: consistency act only according to that maxim by which you can at the
same time will that it should become a universal law: if everyone would behave like
that
- Maxim 2: human dignity act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own
person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only: show
some respect
- Maxim 3: universality act only so that we will through its maxims could regard as
universally lawgiving (would others agree?): dont tell anyone please...
Ethics of rights and justice:
Natural rights: certain basic, important entitlements that should be respected and protected in
every single action.
- Based on consensus about nature of human dignity
- Strongly based in western view of morality
Justice: the simultaneously fair treatment of individuals in a given situation with the result that
everybody gets what they deserve
- Fair procedures (procedural justice)
- Fair outcomes (distributive justice)
There are some limitations of these traditional theories:
- Too abstract
- Too reductionist
- Too objective and elitist
- Too impersonal
lOMoARcPSD
Lecture 3
Motivation/principles Action = non-consequentialist ethics (Duties, Rights&Justice)
Action Outcomes = consequentialist ethics (Egoism, Utilitarianism)
lOMoARcPSD
lOMoARcPSD
lOMoARcPSD
a. social contract and individual rights: individuals go beyond indentifying with others
expectations, and assesses right and wrong according to the upholding of basic
rights, values and contracts of society.
b. Universal ethical principles: individuals will make decisions autonomously based
on self-chosen universal ethical principles, such as justice, equality, and rights,
which they believe everyone should follow.
Business ethics management is the direct attempt to formally or informally manage ethical
issues or problems through specific policies, practices and programmes.
Typical components of business ethics management:
- Mission or values statements
- Code of conduct
- Hotlines, special staff, consultants
- Risk management
- Stakeholder dialogue
- Auditing and reporting
Codes of ethics are voluntary statements that commit organizations, industries, or
professions to specific beliefs, values, and actions and/or set out appropriate ethical behavior
for employees.
There are 4 main types of ethical codes:
- Organizational or corporate codes of ethics
- Professional codes of ethics
- Industry codes of ethics
- Programme and group codes of ethics
Prevalence of codes and ethics:
- Increasingly common
- Substantial rise in usage
- Almost all large US firms have a code of ethics
- Was less prevalent in Europe
Global codes of ethics: can organizations devise one set of principles for all countries in
which they operate?
- Consider some examples
o Gift giving in Japan vs. the UK
o Equal opportunity commitments in India vs. UK
- MNEs should be guided by 3 principles:
o Respect for core human values
o Respect for local traditions
o Belief that context matters when deciding right and wrong
- Global codes should define minimum ethical standardso E.g. OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprise, UN Global Compact
Areas of assessment:
- Ethical: often a focus on internal management systems
lOMoARcPSD
Social accounting is the voluntary process concerned with assessing and communicating
organizational activities and impacts on social, ethical, and environmental issues relevant to
stakeholders.
Why do organizations engage in social accounting?
There are both practical and moral reasons. Four main issues:
- Internal and external pressure
- Identifying risks
- Improved stakeholder management
- Enhanced accountability and transparency
Disincentives for social accounting:
- Perceived high costs
- Insufficient information
- Inadequate information systems
- Lack of standards
- Secrecy
- Unwillingness to disclose sensitive or confidential data
UN Global Compact
Human rights
1. Businesses should support and respect the protection of internationally proclaimed
human rights
2. Businesses should make sure that they are not complicit in human rights abuses
Labour standards
3. Businesses should uphold the freedom of association and the effective recognition of
the right to collective bargaining
4. The elimination of all forms of forces and compulsory labour
5. The effective abolition of child labour
6. The elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation
Environment
7. Businesses should support a precautionary approach to environmental challenges
8. Undertake initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility
9. Encourage the development and diffusion of environmentally friendly technologies
Anti-corruption
10. Businesses should work against all forms of corruption, including extortion and
bribery.
Lecture 4
Corporate governance: the process by which shareholders seek to ensure that their
corporation is run according to their intentions. It includes processes of goal definition,
supervision, control and sanctioning.
lOMoARcPSD
In the narrow sense it includes shareholders and the management of the corporation as the
main actors. In a broader sense it includes all actors who contribute to the achievement of
stakeholder goals inside and outside the corporation.
The crucial problem in corporate governance is the separation of ownership and control.
Peculiarities (=merkwaardigheden) of corporate ownership:
- Fragmented ownership
- Divided functions and interests
There is a principal-agent relation with corporate governance.
Principal = shareholder
Agent = manager
seeks remuneration, power, esteem etc.
Principal
Agent
seeks profits, rising share price, etc.
Ethical investment: the use of ethical, social and environmental criteria in the selection, and
management of investment portfolios, generally consisting of company shares.
SRI = sustainable and responsible investing.
The main concerns with the SRI movement are:
- Quality of information: most information is provided by firms themselves and is difficult
to verify
- Dubious criteria: e.g. also companies who produce oil
- Too inclusive
- Strong emphasis on returns
Friedman: the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits.
That means:
- Use resources and capabilities to increase profits for shareholders
- Stay within the rules of the game
lOMoARcPSD
lOMoARcPSD
(working time, unauthorized use of company resources for private purposes, fraud,
theft, embezzlement)
Discrimination in the business context occurs when employees receive preferential treatment
on grounds that are not directly related to their qualifications and performance in the job.
Managing diversity is a prominent feature of contemporary business.
Reverse discrimination: in some cases people suffer from reverse discrimination because
policies prefer certain minorities. Justification for reverse discrimination:
- Retributive justice: past injustices have to be paid for
- Distributive justice: rewards such as job and pay should be allocated fairly among all
groups.
Stronger forms of reverse discrimination are illegal in many European countries.
Right to healthy and safe working conditions is one of the very first ethical concerns for
employees. There is a network of health, safety and environmental regulation (HSE). The
main issue here is enforcement and implementation. Newly emerged HSE issues relate to
changing patterns of work.
The ethical issues are in context of:
- Excessive working hours and presenteeism:
o Thought to impact the employees overall state of physical and mental health
o Presenteeism: phenomenon of being at work when you should be at home
due to illness or even just for rest and recreation.
- Flexible working patterns: non-standard work relationships
o Part-time work, temporary work, self-employment and teleworking
o Less secure legal status for periphery workers
o Potential for:
Poorer working conditions
Increased insecurity
Lower pay
Exclusion from training and other employment benefits
The freedom of conscience and freedom of speech in the workplace are normally guaranteed
by governments. There are situations in business where freedom of speech might face
certain restrictions, for example speaking about confidential matters related to the firms
R&D, marketing or accounting plans:
- This is usually unproblematic, since most rational employees would find it in their own
best interests to comply with company policy
- Some cases where those restrictions could be regarded as a restriction of employees
rights
Different cultures will view employee rights and responsibilities differently. This means that
managers dealing with employees overseas need to first understand the cultural basis of
morality in that country. This raises the question of whether it is fair to treat people differently
on the basis of where they live. Two views:
- Relativism: view of ethics must always be relative to the historical, social and cultural
context
- Absolutism: ethical principle must be applicable everywhere
lOMoARcPSD
Lecture 5
Ethical issues with consumers
Commonplace argument is that businesses are best served by treating their customers well.
So, why are there continued ethical abuses of consumers and poor reputation of marketing
and sales professions? Examples of organizations accused of treating customers in a
questionable manner are:
- Multinational drug companies
- Fast food and soft drink companies
- Banks and credit card companies
Consumer rights can be seen as:
- Inalienable entitlements to fair treatment when entering into exchanges with sellers
- They rest upon the assumption that consumer dignity should be respected, and that
sellers have a duty to treat consumers as ends in themselves, and not only as means
to the end of the seller.
Ethical issues:
- Marketing management
o Product policy
Product safety (right to safe and efficacious products)
Fitness for purpose
o Marketing communications
lOMoARcPSD
Deception
Misleading claims (right to honest and fair communications)
Intrusiveness
Promotion of materialism
Creation of artificial wants
Perpetuating dissatisfactions
Reinforcing stereotypes
o Pricing
Excessive pricing (right to fair prices)
Price fixing
Predatory pricing
Deceptive pricing
o Distribution
Buyer-seller relationships (right to engage in markets)
Gifts and bribes
Slotting fees (right to make a free choice)
Marketing strategy
Targeting vulnerable (right to be free from discrimination)
Consumers (right to basic freedoms and amenities)
Consumer exclusion
lOMoARcPSD
the ethical problem of race to the bottom: lower costs are often accompanied by sweatshop
conditions:
- Poorer labour conditions
- Less environmental protection
- Lower attention to health and safety
Civil society
It is seen as the third sector:
- State sector (government)
- Market sector (business)
- Civil society sector (NGOs, pressure groups, charities, unions, etc.)
There are different NGO tactics:
1. Indirect action: sometimes criticized for providing misleading information
2. Violent direct action: often illegal, tends to generate the most publicity. Is this action
civil at all?
3. Non-violent direct action:
o Demonstrations and marches
o Protests
o Boycotts
o Occupations
o Non-violent sabotage and disruption
o Stunts
o Picketing
Government
Unlike many other stakeholders, government in principle represents an entire community
since it is elected by the citizens of a certain town, region, country or even continent. There
are elected representatives of citizens interests.
The main source of ethical problems around government stems from fiduciary relation to
society in general. Government has a bipolar situation, it is between business and society.
Lecture 6
Individual factors that influence on ethical decision making:
- Personal values: significant influence; some empirical evidence citing positive
relationship
- Personal integrity: significant influence likely, but lack of inclusion in models and
empirical tests
- Moral imagination: a new issue for inclusion with considerable explanatory potential
- Locus of control: limited effect on decision-making, but can be important in predicting
the apportioning of blame/approbation.