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To succeed in today’s dynamic and unpredictable business world, businesses are increasingly required to gain the trust of and inform the society in which they operate about the social and environmental consequences of their actions. Corporations’ claims regarding the responsibility and ethicality of their actions, however, have been shown to be contradictory to some degree. We define corporations’ deceitful implementation of their corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies as pseudo-CSR. We argue that it is the moral characteristics of individuals, i.e. employees, managers and other decision-makers who ignore the CSR policies, which produce pseudo-CSR.

This is a conceptual paper.

The authors conceptualize the gap between true CSR and pseudo-CSR on a cognitive individual level as “moral laxity,” resulting from organization-induced lack of effort concerning individual moral development through ethical discourse, ethical sensemaking and subjectification processes. The absence of these processes prohibits individuals in organizations from constructing ethical identities to inhibit pseudo-CSR activities.

This paper contributes to the literature on CSR by augmenting corporate-level responsibility with the hitherto mostly neglected, yet significant, role of the individual in bridging this gap.

This study aims to analyze the relationship between companies’ business ethics (BE) and corporate social responsibility (CSR), with particular reference to policies toward employees, with the aim of understanding if and how the two concepts are linked and to foster a better management of the company-employee relationship through BE and CSR policies.

Through a content analysis, the authors study three issues related to employees disclosed in Code of Ethics (CE) and CSR report of a sample of Italian companies. Next, using a multivariate regression model, the authors examine the relation between the BE and CSR initiatives, related to employees.

The findings show that CE and CSR initiatives are negatively related. They are distinct concepts, but since the authors find that they are connected, they must also be considered in terms of their mutual dependence. To standardize practices toward employees in a code may induce the need to establish additional corporate social responsibility initiatives that elicit legitimate stakeholder satisfaction.

The analysis focuses on employees, whereas several other CSR aspects that can be explored. Furthermore, additional investigation (through questionnaires or interviews) could deepen this analysis. Furthermore, it might be interesting to consider different countries or more variables, such as cultural differences or different regulations.

The results of this research reveal that BE and CSR initiatives require precise and personalized observations to be properly understood; however, as they are linked, they must also be studied in their mutual interdependencies; this can be very useful to define governance bodies and organizational procedures devoted to BE and CSR issues.

This research provides a tool for evaluating and monitoring CSR and BE principles and can be adapted to many business contexts and refer to different stakeholders.

The existing literature on BE and CSR presents opportunities for further study, as these concepts are often studied without insights into their mutual impacts.

In recent times the government has emerged as an enabling and empowering facilitator promoting the adoption of corporate social responsibility (CSR) by businesses to leverage economic competitiveness and growth. India provides a unique context to explore the mandated role of government in relation to CSR specifically within the context of understanding its effective use to resolve grand challenges which the country is facing at present. Grand challenges are complex social, economic and environmental problems which require innovative and collaborative solutions. In this chapter we explore extant secondary data, related to CSR and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to examine whether mandatory CSR implementation which has been unfolding in India over the last few years has been effective in addressing India's grand challenges. Specifically, it focuses on the role of the Indian government, at the national and state levels, in directing CSR activities towards the SDGs.

Considering the significance of the human resource management (HRM) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) relationship, the aim of this research is twofold: first is to measure the cultural differences between HRM, CSR and sustainable performance relationship (study 1) and second is to identify the how HRM instigates CSR and sustainable performance (study 2) in the hospitality industry of UK and Pakistan.

A mixed-method approach was used to collect the qualitative and quantitative data from upscale hotels. In Study 1, a multi-respondent and time-lagged strategy was employed to collect the data from 162 Pakistani and 290 UK upscale hotels. In Study 2, in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted to understand the HRM–CSR–performance nexus.

The results of Study 1 highlight the significant cultural differences in the relationships of HRM–CSR–performance, while Study 2 explains that ethical culture, shared objectives, transparency, training and development, and economic incentives are the factors that push the employees to take part in CSR-related activities and attaining higher sustainable performance.

This study addresses the debate on the difference between cross-cultural studies related to implementing Western theories in shaping, developing and implementing business strategies, including CSR, HRM and sustainable performance in an Asian context.

This paper aims to provide a critical synthesis of the interface of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and peer-to-peer (P2P) accommodation to offer insights that contribute to theory and practice of CSR in hospitality.

By using key CSR models, this paper reflects on the nexus between CSR and P2P accommodation (with a focus on Airbnb) to identify opportunities and challenges with regard to CSR implementation in P2P accommodation and, thereby, progress the research agenda on the topic.

This contribution will hopefully enable policymakers to improve the accountability of stakeholders related to P2P accommodation in terms of the sector’s impacts on local communities while contributing to the progression of the research agenda on CSR in hospitality.

Because this contribution is meant to be a “critical reflection paper”, the main purpose is to flesh out a commentary offering recommendations on how to account for CSR in relation to P2P accommodation and primarily Airbnb. As such, this paper aims to prompt future empirical research on the topic. Naturally, the major downside of this type of paper is the lack of an empirical approach.

This paper advances theory on hospitality-related CSR, enabling policymakers to improve the stakeholders’ accountability related to P2P accommodation in terms of the sector’s impacts on local communities.

Despite the increasing importance of CSR in hospitality, minimal academic attention has been paid insofar to CSR in the P2P accommodation sector. This inattention is surprising given the rapid expansion of the sector which, in turn, has imposed significant pressures on local communities.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) in India includes education, environment, healthcare and rural development. In post-liberalized India, the healthcare sector (services and facilities) has grown in leaps and bounds over last two decades. The purpose of this paper is to reveal and explain the CSR profile of select healthcare companies of India and reveal gaps and scope of healthcare activities with a special consideration towards maternal health.

Primary data are collected from seven listed companies of Goa state which were willing to participate in the study. In total, 67 companies constituting the Healthcare Sector Index of Standard & Poor of the Bombay Stock Exchange are considered as secondary source. Data of 59 companies that come within the threshold of Companies Act, 2013, are studied. CSR guidelines (with a turnover of Rs 10bn or a market capitalization of Rs 5bn or a net profit of Rs 50m) are taken as an initial frame of reference.

In total, 89.83 per cent of these companies have initiatives related to health care. Structured companies (contribute to the company’s overall mission and goals) with CSR policy have committee size varying from three to five directors with an independent director. During 2016–2017, they were mandated to spend Rs 4.2613bn out of which only 74.59 per cent was spent. Geographical spread of CSR initiatives is skewed, with majority of companies focussing on the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat, whereas the states of Odisha and North-Eastern being neglected. The focus areas of CSR are education, healthcare and rural development. The variation of MMR in different states of India is an indicator for corporate as to which state needs more attention. The corporate sector in India needs to focus on SDG3 target of MMR and move towards a newer dimension and direction.

The originality of this paper lies in the recognition of the initiative of Government of India of weaning out CSR activities outside the purview of business sense and towards instilling a social sense in company behaviour. This is a dimensional and directional change in the evolution of CSR practices in companies and countries. To this end, 59 healthcare sector companies under the threshold of Companies Act 2013 were studied and results were outlined.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) aims at upholding socio-economic condition of deprived communities prevailing in society as well as bringing profitability for corporate companies themselves. This study investigates to what extent the CSR initiatives of financial institutions in Bangladesh have been able to reach out to deprived communities and support various dimensions of financial inclusion (FI) in the country.

In this study, both supply-side and demand-side data are included and discussed rigorously as tools to cross-check the result. Both qualitative and quantitative data are incorporated, and graphs and tables are used to represent the critical information better. A triangulation of in-depth interviews with secondary data is used to ensure rigor and trustworthiness. The triangulation approach works as a method to verify secondary data by interviewees in this study.

The result shows a positive geographical and demographical penetration of CSR activities, but it does not necessarily bring FI in all cases. This study identifies some key issues that prevail in the current context of Bangladesh, such as usage, distance, quality and cost of financial products.

This study makes use of both supply-side and demand-side information and thus explain the reasons behind the involuntary exclusion of financial services.

With the increasing awareness of sustainability and its importance around the world, corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Africa also requires attention. Based on the stakeholder theory, this study aims to determine the relationship between CSR information received by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and CSR's diffusion and the mediating role of environmental awareness in Angola as a country representative of the African context.

The empirical study analyzes managers' perceptions of 131 SMEs in Angola. The partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) is the method to assess the relationship between CSR information and its diffusion and the mediating role of environmental awareness SMEs in Angola.

The authors found strong evidence that CSR diffusion, and disclosure as one of CSR's related actions, heavily depends on the information received and managed by the firm. The authors also confirmed that environmental awareness puts pressure on SMEs to increase the SMEs' diffusion efforts.

The study points out the role of managers in promoting a responsible orientation of businesses in Angola for preserving the environment and improving the competitive success of SMEs.

The social, economic and legal contexts of Angola are vulnerable. The findings raise concerns about whether governments and regulatory efforts improve the development of the strategies toward social responsibility of African firms and whether these firms also increase the role of SMEs in producing positive outcomes through CSR.

The results of this study contribute to a better understanding of the features of the strategic orientation of SMEs in Angola, necessary to enhance CSR and protect the environment. The conclusions highlight the potential role of managers in promoting a culture of ethics, social innovation and successful competition change in businesses.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between perceived corporate social responsibility (PCSR) and perceived organizational corruption (POC) in a developing country context. The research suggests mediating roles of perceived ethical leadership (PEL) and job satisfaction (JS) in the PCSR–POC relationship.

Data were collected through survey questionnaires. The sample consisted of 434 employees working in private and public organizations in Kosovo. Regression analysis was conducted by using a serial mediation model.

Applying a social learning framework, this study provides evidence that employees’ perceptions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) are positively related to perceived ethical leadership and job satisfaction and negatively related to perceived organizational corruption. Furthermore, results confirm that the relationship between CSR perception and organizational corruption perception is mediated by ethical leadership perception and job satisfaction.

Armed with the findings, organizations can adopt CSR practices to positively influence employee behaviors and attitudes. From these results, it is possible to better comprehend the role of CSR in dealing with relevant aspects such as corruption at the organizational level, especially in developing and emerging markets.

The findings of this research indicate that employees in socially responsible organizations perceive less organizational corruption. Adopting a more ethical and responsible management approach might represent a promising solution to fight the corruption phenomenon inside and even outside organizations. These results should serve as reflection for both managers and public authorities.

With regard to CSR, previous studies have investigated different employee outcomes but never considered the potential impact on corruption at the organizational level. Furthermore, this study extends the literature by conceptualizing perceived ethical leadership and job satisfaction as mediators between perceived CSR and organizational corruption perception, in a developing country context where the concept of CSR is still less investigated.