This study examines corporate stakeholder orientation across industries and over time prior to the introduction of mandatory CSR. We argue that CSO is a legitimacy signal consciously employed by firms to demonstrate their shareholder and specific non-shareholder orientations in the midst of institutional pressures emerging from country and industry contexts. Using a 7-code index of CSO on CEO–shareholder communications from India, we find that in general large firms in India exhibit a pre-dominant, significant and rising trend of pro-shareholder orientation in (...) the six-year period immediately preceding the CSR law. Yet, we uncover significant industry differences in CSO potentially driven by four key factors: the degree of competitive dynamics, nature of products and services, extent of negative externalities and social activism, and exposure to international markets. Our findings support the view that while some minimum threshold of regulatory intervention is required to balance the interests of business with society, legislation raises questions in relation to the usefulness of a uniform one-size-fits-all CSR across all industries. (shrink)

The paper addresses the problem of pursuing ethical business practices purely under the aegis of ‘integrity’, as frequently used to characterise morally desirable traits. Drawing on the work of philosopher Thomas Kasulis, the paper pairs ‘integrity’ with ‘intimacy’ as a critical concept, placing greater attention upon relational properties, helping to understand ethics as existing between individuals, things and the environment. The argument is that by paying careful attention to spatial and temporal dynamics and proximities of exchange, businesses can better maintain (...) and extend practices of integrity. It reminds us that ethics are developmental ; that the cultivation of ethics provides greater depth and ownership and pertains to matters of the body and habits. The paper contributes a way of reading exchanges in the marketplace beyond prescriptive accounts of integrity. Through the lens of both integrity and intimacy, it identifies how we actually ‘live’ or practice greater responsiveness to exchanges. (shrink)

This study examines the variations in corporate social orientations across developed and developing countries in the context of a legitimacy threat. Conceptualizing CSO as signals, the author develops and validates a seven-code index of CSO that identifies executive orientations toward multiple stakeholders. Using this index on CEO shareholder letters from the United States, Germany, and India, the author finds that firms signal a multi-stakeholder image toward employees, communities, and environment during good times to enhance their social license to operate, and (...) yet such signals are not carried through during the threat period. This disconnect in signaling in the wake of a legitimacy threat is indicative of decoupling in corporate orientations and exposes the multi-dimensionality of the CSO concept. By adding a cross-national and temporal dimension, this research contributes toward better understanding the complexity behind CSOs and opens new areas for future research. (shrink)

This article aims to advance the discussion of how multinational companies manage the tension between global integration and local responsiveness in their corporate social responsibility. In particular, it studies the relationships between headquarters and subsidiaries in a transnational CSR strategy and the types of coordination mechanisms used. Building on a qualitative study of a multinational bank, we find that in addition to formal and informal coordination mechanisms, a transnational CSR strategy cannot be fully understood without considering lateral learning and participatory (...) decision making. Further, we suggest that discussions about the transnational approach to CSR should not be disentangled from the question about a company's CSR orientation. Finally, we propose some characteristics of transnational CSR and discuss its theoretical and practical implications. (shrink)

This study aims to propose a framework considering both economic issues and environmental effects in technology evaluation in order to provide firms' decision makers a useful reference in adopting technologies that will enable them to fulfill corporate social responsibilities and get competitive advantages at the same time. Recently, the demands for technology evaluation have increased with the flourishing development of technology licensing, technology transaction or joint venture on the one hand and with the pressing needs of environmental protection for human (...) beings' sustainable development on the other hand. Under such conditions, it thus goes without saying that firms' decision makers are propelled to take into account both economic benefits and environmental effects in evaluating technologies by choosing low or nonpolluting technologies for manufacturing products. Although technology evaluation is not a new and emerging subject currently besetting scholars in the field of management, previous research on this topic has unwittingly left behind the pressing issue of environmental effects. Based on this observation, this study purports to develop a new framework for technology evaluation by taking both economic benefits and environmental perspectives into consideration. In it, we seek to demonstrate that our proposed framework will not only be a workable model but also can serve as a useful point of reference for technology appraisers and firms' decision makers. (shrink)

Despite a plethora of empirical evidence on the potential role of senior management in the success of corporate social responsibility in Western-dominated organizational contexts, little attempt has been made to document the various managerial mindsets toward CSR in organizations in Muslim-dominated countries in the Middle East region. To address this existing lacuna of theoretical and empirical research in CSR management, this paper offers a qualitative case study of CSR in three manufacturing firms operating in Iran’s auto industry. Based on an (...) inductive analysis of the qualitative data, three types of managerial mindset toward CSR are identified: conformist, self-seeker, and satisfier. While it is evident that these different mindsets of Iranian managers seek to serve managerial ends and short-term self-interests, they fall short of core values of Islamic ethics and CSR. (shrink)

Drawing on the author’s professional experience working inside a Japanese company, the essay examines the cultural construction of managerial responsibility in Japan, and explores the tensions between Eastern and Western notions of responsibility in the Japanese workplace. The author proposes two idioms that shape local notions of responsibility as “webs of engagement.” Based on the Japanese concepts ba and kokoro , these idioms suggest significant departures from Western notions of workplace corporate social responsibility. Since much of the literature on CSR (...) focuses on Western countries and examines the more public, corporate aspects of CSR, the article is meant as a contribution to a better understanding of managerial responsibility in an Asian context, and more generally of the relationship between culture and responsibility. Theoretically, the article draws on works in interpretive and symbolic anthropology, anthropological writing on Japanese culture and society, and cross-cultural CSR research. (shrink)

While corporate social responsibility is recognized as taking on various national meanings and practices, research has not sufficiently investigated how multinational companies simultaneously achieve global CSR integration and local CSR adaptation. Building on a qualitative case study carried out at ASICS, an MNC headquartered in Japan, we show how this organizational dilemma may be solved through hybridization work, a form of institutional work performed by CSR managers in subsidiaries to combine and adapt different institutional approaches to CSR. By developing the (...) notion of hybridization work, we contribute by revealing a set of practices that contribute to institutional change within organizations and enriching the study of CSR organizational change and international business by showing how hybridization Work leads to a greater organizational integration between core and periphery, and by identifying the triggering factors for subsidiary initiative in CSR. (shrink)