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The purpose of this paper is to explore how the communication of corporate social responsibility (CSR) contributes towards a favourable corporate reputation. It explores the communication strategies and channels organisations deemed reputable by stakeholders use to achieve an effective CSR communication.

To achieve this, a qualitative content analysis using the directed approach was conducted on the textual CSR communication materials of ten reputable organisations in South Africa based on the 2018 South Africa Reptrak survey.

Result showed that seven out of ten organisations use both self-serving and society-serving motive in their CSR communication, while the other 3 use only the society serving motive. The informing strategy was also more evident in the CSR communication materials than the interactive strategy. In terms of the communication channels, the study found that organisations mainly utilise controlled channels for CSR communication.

The literature reviewed and the findings of this study reveal a gap between the theory and practice of CSR communication. This drives the need for organisations to research and tailor CSR communication based on stakeholders' unique characteristics and preferences. The paper also contributes to improving the knowledge on the role different CSR communication strategies and channels play in CSR communication.

The chapter examines the employment of unique social media concepts (e.g., dialogue, engagement, mobilization, authenticity, influence, and transparency) for CSR communication among top companies in Latin America. A quantitative content analysis of 1,000 tweets from corporate official accounts of the top 25 largest firms in the Latin Trade ranking was performed. Tweets were randomly selected if contained hashtags or keywords related to CSR concepts (CSR, sustainability, citizenship, society, environment, etc.). Transparency was the social media concept most employed on CSR-related messages on Twitter. However, most of the companies did not include any of the social media features analyzed. The results of this chapter are consistent with previous studies that social media is used as another traditional informational channel. This work only analyzed tweets sent by Latin American companies, it did not take into consideration responses to messages (replies or retweets of the followers of each company). Future studies can examine stakeholders’ response regarding CSR communication for in-depth analysis of the use of social media by Latin American companies. Organizations and companies can benefit from the results of this work in order to craft effective content on social media that includes features and strategies that can resonance to different groups of stakeholders. CSR social media communication studies that focused on Latin America are scarce. Our study is pioneer in analyzing the usage of social media concepts for CSR communication in Latin America.

This study investigates the mechanism through which banks employ corporate social responsibility (CSR) commitment to engage in employees. The values of different types of CSR engagement (i.e. philanthropic CSR vs ethical and legal CSR) are distinguished and their influences on employee identification are analyzed. The moderation effect of CSR communication through corporate social media is examined in this context.

A sample of 254 respondents was collected through surveying the employees of one of the largest banks in Turkey.

Findings suggest that ethical and legal CSR is perceived more importantly than philanthropic CSR by employees in the banking industry. In addition, the level of transparency and frequency of CSR communication through corporate social media moderates the CSR types–employee identification relationship distinctively.

Special attention should be paid to the conditions under which CSR communication takes place effectively, as skeptics toward certain types of CSR initiatives may occur along with the disclosure of information about them.

If organizations use social media communication in a way that would bring the CSR interests of their employees to light, it is likely that CSR initiatives will become more meaningful and have a greater societal impact.

This study contributes to the CSR literature through identifying the value of different types of CSR initiative and confirming the importance of transparent and proactive CSR communication on employee identification in the banking sector.

Organization legitimacy is a general reflection of the relationship between an organization and its environment. By adopting an institutional approach and defining moral legitimacy as “a positive normative evaluation of the organization and its activities”, the goal of this paper is to investigate which corporate communication strategy adopted in online social media is more effective to create convergence between corporations' corporate social responsibility (CSR) agenda and stakeholders' social expectations, and thereby, to increase corporate legitimacy.

Using the entire Twitter social graph, a network analysis was carried out to study the structural properties of the CSR community, such as the level of reciprocity, and advanced data mining techniques, i.e. topic and sentiment analysis, were carried out to investigate the communication dynamics.

Evidence was found that neither the engaging nor the information strategies lead to alignment. The assumption of the more the dialog, the more the communality seems to fail to portray the complexity of the communicational dynamics, such as the persistence of different, or simply a dialog without alignment. Empirical findings show that, even when engaging in a dialogue, communication in social media is still conceived as a marketing practice to convey messages about companies.

This paper originally investigates organizational legitimacy in the context of social media by applying advanced data‐mining techniques that allow the analysis of large amounts of information available online.

The main objective of this study is to examine the presence and organization of information on corporate responsibility that is on the corporate web sites of companies that belong to the index of the Spanish stock market.

The authors have designed a specific tool to identify corporate responsibility issues and to analyse how information on such issues is organized and presented on corporate web sites. A content analysis methodology was applied to the web sites of the companies under study.

The results suggest that the companies that were studied assign great importance to corporate responsibility on their web sites, even though they disseminate on those sites a limited conception of what corporate responsibility is and focus mainly on the topics of social and environmental action. Another relevant finding is the highly dispersed nature of the information that is related to corporate responsibility on corporate web sites.

The study was conducted on a sample of companies from the Spanish stock market, and therefore the results are not necessarily representative of the entire Spanish stock market or of companies that do not trade on it.

This paper offers a specific methodology for the analysis of information on corporate responsibility and the organization of that information on the corporate web sites of all types of companies. The methodology and the results may be of utility to other researchers and will facilitate international comparisons of organizations regarding corporate responsibility and the manner in which information on this topic is disseminated to various stakeholders.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate how the 106 largest banks in the world use their corporate websites for corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication, identifying CSR communication patterns by continent.

An analysis of the location of CSR information on the banks’ corporate websites, a longitudinal analysis of the publication of CSR reports by the banks from 2000 to 2012, and a content analysis of the most current CSR reports in the recent period of study were undertaken.

Three-quarters of the banks communicate on CSR issues on their corporate website – either located in the section “About Us” or under a separate “CSR” heading which is directly accessible on the front homepage. Company reports published on the website are the most important vehicle for CSR communication. Their publication increased from six for the publication year 2000 to a peak of 63 reports for the year 2011. The reports’ titles are most commonly linked to the concepts of “responsibility” or “sustainability” and refer to ten main stakeholders and topics. In a comparison between continents there is a difference in the use of titles: European banks prefer the title “Sustainability Report”, while Asian and American banks in particular prefer the title “CSR Report”.

The paper focuses on corporate communications, and therefore does not address perspectives on CSR communication from other disciplines. Within CSR communication, sources of CSR-related information other than the corporate websites have not been considered.

This paper gives the first comprehensive picture of the trend in CSR communication on corporate websites in the global banking sector.

This chapter is to introduce to the reader the background, purpose, core themes and structure of the volume. Brief summaries of all the following chapters in the book are provided.

Literature review and desk research.

This chapter suggests that CSR communication as a cross-section of communication studies and CSR research should be highlighted as an important subject of inquiry to bridge the communicative gap between businesses and their stakeholders as well as the public at large. An initial theoretical framework on CSR communication is presented.

A general research direction is provided for CSR communication. It encourages more future scholarly studies in this emerging and fascinating field.

The overall purpose is to help grow knowledge and develop understanding of the ways in which businesses communicate CSR.

It is the first time in the field of CSR communication that a relatively comprehensive and systematic framework is presented. The chapters that follow in the book cover many contents of the framework.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication covered by the news media is considered as more credible and effective in shaping public perceptions toward corporations than CSR shared by corporations themselves. This is particularly true when CSR is about corporations with social stigma inherent in business practices. This study examines the CSR publicity of stigmatized industries from the journalism lens.

A content analysis was conducted with CSR stories from 2019 to 2020 by USA newspapers (n = 348).

Results of this study showed that the overall volume of CSR from stigmatized industries has decreased, with fewer responses to the recent pandemic. Further, the media brought promotional CSR activities and the business motives behind the activities into focus. Opposing patterns were found for CSR of non-stigmatized industries presented with philanthropic activities based on corporations' social motives to help communities. Similarly, economic and legal responsibilities reflected in the CSR pyramid were more prominently reported for stigmatized industries, and ethical and discretionary responsibilities appeared more frequently for non-stigmatized industries.

Integrating business and media literature, this study enriches scholarly discussions on media processes and effects for CSR communication. This study also provides practical implications for stigmatized industries by highlighting more authentic and careful approaches for CSR communication to earn positive publicity.

This study provides social implications by highlighting the importance of CSR communications through the lens of news media when corporations are socially stigmatized.

Stigmatized industries are known to be active in CSR communication to nullify social stigma surrounding themselves. The authors' findings provide empirical evidence suggesting that not all publicity benefits CSR communication for stigmatized corporations.

The purpose of this study is two-fold: (1) identify shifts in prioritization of corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues and (2) identify the CSR issues in which companies are currently involved, as indicated in their website communications. Corporate communications are also examined for possible variations of CSR focus between manufacturers, retailers and service firms.

In order to identify the CSR issues in which companies are currently involved and detect any shifts, a content analysis was conducted of the 2021 Fortune 100 company websites, specifically cataloging CSR communications. This data was compared with CSR communications on Fortune 100 company websites in 2015. CSR issues are also examined within each industry categorization: manufacturing, retail and service.

Findings indicate that companies have reduced the number of CSR issues prioritized in their website communications. In 2015, companies gave prominence to an average of seven CSR issues on their websites, today the average is three CSR issues. Today, the CSR issues prioritized most commonly are diversity and sustainability. However, these issues are prioritized by only half of the companies. Previously, the vast majority of Fortune 100 companies prioritized the same top issues. That is not the case today. This shift may suggest that companies are narrowing their focus to fewer CSR issues, perhaps those that align with company goals.

This study provides information to keep company executives and academicians abreast of prominent CSR issues and terminology found in the marketplace. As executives make choices about committing resources to social issues, knowledge of what the Fortune 100 is doing can help in that decision-making process.

The chapter addresses the use of corporate social responsibility (CSR) as an indicator of social change and progress towards sustainability by analysing how stakeholders shift their CSR perceptions in different economic conjunctures between visions that are closer to communication or to governance as structures of network interaction. A matrix is presented that defines four models of CSR perception by integrating theoretical approaches of CSR framed by market or by society, by communication or by governance. Stakeholders’ perceptions are then positioned in the matrix through qualitative analysis of the diverse definitions, constructions and positions with respect to CSR made and adopted by corporate agents, social stakeholders and communicators in their discourses. The study proves that changes in how actors perceive and explain self-governed CSR do not depend so much on economic factors as on the networks of stakeholder interaction through communication and governance. Mapping CSR stakeholders’ perceptions indicates changes and limiting actors, but is not enough to isolate the triggers of those changes. The maps provide a starting point for further exploration of (de)politicization, framing, and understanding of CSR communication and governance, and for the analysis of the limitations of the current model of CSR self-governance. The theoretical approach and methodology provide a framework that integrates communication and governance as relational structures of network interaction in CSR.