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This paper aims to reflect briefly on some of the major principles that have emerged from the developing policies, practices and debates about corporate citizenship in the last ten years or so.

Considerable scholarly work has been conducted on corporate citizenship in the past, and will continue to be done in the future. This paper is deliberately written for a non‐scholarly audience.

Ten principles are outlined, all of them focusing on developing a cultural aspect of corporate citizenship as good business.

The basic premise of this paper is that significant cultural change, through corporate citizenship will only take place by business implementing policies, and practices based on the sort of sound (but basic) principles presented here. These ten principles, in this format, are original to this paper.

This paper aims to examine the extent of corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in regional Japan. It also aims to examine the impact of firm size, industry, CSR awareness, firm origin and firm’s strategic focus on CSR.

The study measures the CSR performance using a CSR index and seven sub-indexes designed on the global CSR standard – ISO26000. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey of 146 firms. The indexes were analysed using Kruskal–Wallis one-way ANOVA and Mann–Whitney U tests.

The results indicate that CSR performance of firms in regional Japan is low across all main areas of CSR and is significantly lower in SMEs relative to large firms. Further, CSR performance of SMEs differs across various industries and firms established in the region display significantly lower CSR performance compared to their metropolitan counterparts.

Little research exists on the role SME’s play in improving CSR practices in Japan, especially regarding SMEs in regional areas. The findings highlight the need for improving CSR performance of SMEs and promoting the use of ISO26000 as a guiding tool for measuring CSR performance.

This paper is one of the first papers that critically examine the CSR performance of SMEs in regional Japan. It highlights that despite the recent CSR boom and regulatory initiatives in Japan, CSR performance of SMEs in regional Japan remained low.

Marketing: New Service Launch; Relationship Marketing; Direct Marketing.

This case could be taught in marketing management, services marketing or strategy courses, in the product development or service launch modules at the graduate level; alternatively it could also be used in the promotion module for the illustration of direct marketing (DM) tool application; and it could also be used as a capstone case for the introductory Principles of Marketing course at the undergraduate level.

The case examines the launch of a new air ambulance service in Karachi, Pakistan; a venture of Akbar Group Jet services; Princely Jets (Pvt) Ltd. The case describes the first mover advantage of the service and the marketing strategy recommended by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Mr Ghouse Akbar. The major concern is whether the strategy is forceful and compelling enough to secure approval from the board. The major issues include the role of DM processes and relationship marketing tools to encourage a value-added premium service which had no precedence of demand and practice. Concepts to thrash out in class also include customer profiling and segmentation along with how best to create awareness and generate a sustainable basket of customers for the high-price value-added low-use service.

Discuss and illustrate the importance and benefit of market research information for making a decision; how to create awareness and customer recognition and cultivate demand for a new and unsolicited service; identify appropriate and effective promotion tools to achieve required customer demand, brand recognition and customer value; how to launch a premium priced unsolicited service in a niche market?; and exhibit the synthesis of the four P's in a new product launch marketing strategy.

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This paper examines whether long-term foreign investors may force firms to use a costly dividend to mitigate inefficient managerial behavior. The authors also hypothesize that the relation between foreign investment horizons and payout policy depends upon the extent of the corporate governance. The authors find that firms held by long-term foreign investors make dividend more often in the subsequent years. The authors also find that foreign investors with long-term investments do not cause firms to pay dividends when firms have strong corporate governance. It suggests that long-term foreign investors serve as a substitute for strong corporate governance with respect to controlling agency conflicts.

The purpose of this paper is to critiques corporate public relations from the perspective of philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre.

It uses an essay format.

The essay is critical of proposed “communitarian-style” initiatives to take advantage of what are referred to by some public relations theorists as “consumer communities”.

The essay details a more appropriate ethical approach to public relations by corporations.

This is the most extensive application of MacIntyre's ideas to public relations.

Managers of corporations that are facing fading product-market domains are often inertial in their response to such decline or engage in endgame strategies within these markets. For managers operating in dynamic markets, however, such responses are often ineffective. Rather, such markets often demand a corporate entrepreneurship response whereby managers move their businesses into new market opportunities as the value of current market domains inevitably begins to fade. The emphasis is on exiting from declining markets while simultaneously capturing and exploiting opportunities in more promising markets. In this chapter, we describe the recombinative organizational form (i.e. structure and process) by which this can occur. We focus on the modular organizational structure (i.e. modularity, relatedness, and loose-coupling) and corporate dynamic capabilities (i.e. probing, patching, and recoupling processes) by which managers can cope with the inevitable decline that is the nature of dynamic industries. An example from recent empirical research provides an illustration of such corporate entrepreneurship.

The issue of corporate governance — the legal/political issue most likely to affect major corporations in the near future — arises from what large portions of society and many key members of the policy community perceive to be the illegitimacy of corporate management in a democratic, pluralistic society. Concern focuses largely on how corporate decisions are made by management and particularly by corporate boards of directors.

Purpose – This chapter examines Talisman Energy's operations in the Sudan, as part of the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company (GNPOC). It seeks to demonstrate that international corporate culture precludes ethical decision-making and practices by placing would-be ethical actors in untenable situations.

Methodology/approach – A case study approach is adopted. It analyses various lawsuits brought against Talisman by the Presbyterian Church of Sudan, who claim that Talisman aided and abetted the government of Sudan in genocide during the various protracted conflicts of a violent civil war.

Findings – By reviewing Talisman's corporate social responsibility reports, we find that locating corporate charters in the hands of nation-states entails an inherent tension that can only be resolved by either implementing an international corporate charter in the case of multinationals, or abandoning the corporate charter altogether

Practical implications – We argue for immediate application of the International Criminal Court in The Hague against corporate enablers of government violence against its peoples.

Originality/value – In the case of Talisman in the Sudan, international corporate culture and lack of support from its operating partners did more than discourage Talisman from implementing ethical practices; it prevented Talisman from acting ethically. In particular, it prevented Talisman from using the economic importance of GNPOC to the government of Sudan to disallow the government from using Talisman's infrastructure or oil revenues in military campaigns against the peoples of Sudan.

Recent corporate scandals such as WorldCom, Enron, and others suggest a failure of corporate governance, that is, of the allocation of power and its lawful use and accountability within the corporation.

This chapter presents a game theoretic model for analyzing the power dynamics among the three groups responsible for oversight in the Anglo-American corporate model – namely the Board of Directors through its audit committee, corporate management, and the external auditors.

The chapter shows, among other findings, that the current governance structure results in an extreme imbalance of power among the three groups that not only permits but even induces management to conceal necessary financial data and often to ignore the long-term interests of the firm.

The chapter also derives changes in principles of governance that can right such imbalances and prevent defalcations from taking place through institutionalizing effective ex-ante checks and balances of power in addition to the ex post measures that come into play only after a wrong has been committed and which are the case with recent exchange rules and Congressional enactments.

None.

No prior analysis along these lines.