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This paper aims to explore the drivers and barriers in the transition of the social responsibility agenda of large, emerging economy (EE) firms from non-strategic philanthropy to strategic corporate sustainability. This study also suggests a strategy that such firms may adopt for obtaining the desired corporate social responsibility (CSR) manifestation.

The paper follows an in-depth case study approach of a large, family-managed Indian firm in a pollutant industry – Sudarshan Chemicals. The article is based on direct observation and in-depth interviews with key stakeholders, namely, senior management, employees and the local community members (villagers) in the company’s plant in Maharashtra.

The study exposes a lack of alignment between firm size (large) and firm CSR manifestation (small) as the key challenge that EE firms face in transforming their social responsibility agenda. Stuck in the mould of non-strategic corporate philanthropy, even large EE companies are not exposed to the three essential elements of the Western conceptualization of CSR, namely, stakeholder pressure, environmental concerns and integration into core business. Sudarshan’s small-firm CSR orientation can be seen as symptomatic of most Indian companies which are family-led, family-managed businesses.

Faced with strong drivers to incorporate CSR, EE firms can strategize to leap-frog from philanthropy to corporate sustainability through obtaining the desired CSR manifestation.

The significance of this paper lies in the “on the ground”, detailed and empirical study of the drivers and challenges faced by a large Indian company, as it proactively sought to transition from the philanthropy orientation towards strategic CSR/sustainability. The paper identifies the major challenge large, Indian corporates are likely to face going forward, as they respond to drivers in a globalized business environment.

Despite the increased recognition and emphasis on corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a topic and highly formalised CSR control systems, numerous well-publicised problems and scandals often involving multinational enterprises (MNEs) continue to emerge. These companies are mostly extrinsically motivated in CSR. They operate with highly formalised CSR systems that, in many cases, miss the prevention of anti-social and illegal behaviour. This might reflect the failure of extrinsic CSR to integrate the ethical dimension and/or the failure of intrinsic CSR to formalise and thus benefit from economies of scale. Currently, the conviction is growing that if CSR is to have a meaningful impact, it should be a matter of intrinsic motives, morale and ethical values rather than a formalised management tool. This research aims to focus on a sample of small and large companies in Switzerland, aiming at a comparison of key motives for CSR related to actual CSR implementation, performance and company size.

The study examined two groups: seven owner-managers of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and seven managers of MNEs. Each group met for two focus group discussions that were qualitatively and visually analysed using MAXQDA.

The results show that CSR implementation in the examined Swiss SMEs is more related to moral commitment than to profit maximisation. These companies are often driven by soft assets, such as networks, by the nexus of mission and value set; by a system of initiatives and integrated behaviour; by proximity and informal, flat organisational structures; by the aspiration and ambition of craftsmanship or excellent service (instead of profit); by community involvement; by recruiting from the local community; by the willingness to grow slowly and steadily; by the avoidance of atomic markets; and finally, by the mental set up and sociological tradition of the stewardship concept. This contrasts with the extrinsically motivated approach of the MNEs under research. While MNEs follow their approach of “ethics for the firm that must pay”, the findings here identified potential transition cases of “ethics in the firm” and “ethics of the firm” within Swiss SMEs. This is consistent with others, resembling the need of this dichotomy to be revised.

The cross-sectorial approach limits the degree to which motives can clearly be attributed to actual CSR performance or company size.

The results imply that policymakers, public institutions, scientific community, etc. should be careful when establishing systems that favour financial returns from CSR engagement, because, first, other research showed that a behaviour attributed to extrinsic motives is mostly perceived as dishonest and misleading, for instance, consumers. Second, extrinsic motivation might crowd out morale and paying lead actors for behaving altruistically or philanthropically might decline their intrinsic motivation. Notably, the crowding out of intrinsic motivation by extrinsic incentives is a phenomenon well-researched not only in regard to CSR but in various other areas linked to human behaviour. This has important implications for nearly every business operation, especially for mergers and acquisitions, as well as for the growth of businesses.

It seems unsuitable to support social goods in intrinsic CSR by the implementation of a system of financial incentives (or consequences). Thus, an economic cost-benefit is inappropriate where CSR needs an ethical stand. The difference between extrinsic and intrinsic CSR is very difficult to bridge – both have powerful incentives and drivers preventing a potential cross-over.

In sum, this study showed that CSR is meaningful and justifiable even if it is not profitable in the first place or implemented in and managed through formalised systems. This leads to two conclusions: first, care should be taken when emphasising the extrinsic approach in relation to social goods and second, the cost of a possible mismatch in a climate of ethical principles might be substantial for societies’ moral inclination.

The role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) fulfillment is critical when building resilience of project-based organizations (PBOs). However, fulfilling CSR to build a highly resilient PBO remains a black box problem. This study explores the different CSR combinations that enhance PBO resilience.

This study defines CSR in terms of shareholder, employee, and social CSR, and analyzes corporate characteristics in terms of corporate scale and nature. Data are collected from Hexun.com and the China Stock Market and Accounting Research Database (CSMAR). The qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) method is used to analyze 48 listed construction and engineering companies from China to explore the CSR configurations for PBOs in enhancing organizational resilience.

A large firm size is a necessary condition for high organizational resilience. We find six paths to build high and non-high resilience in PBOs, and the driving mechanisms of high and non-high resilience exhibit an asymmetric relationship.

This study cracks the black box of CSR fulfillment and PBO resilience. It reveals the CSR configurations that enhance or inhibit the resilience of PBOs. It also provides scientific basis for PBOs in their fulfillment of CSR in response to crises, and the enhancement of organizational resilience. Future research can be expanded to other industries, as the study sample is only limited to civil engineering construction companies. Since this study uses cross-sectional data, time series can be introduced in the future to further explore the relationship between CSR and organizational resilience.

This study provides targeted suggestions that can help decision-makers of construction companies to determine how they can fulfill CSR to enhance organizational resilience. At the same time, it can provide intellectual support for PBOs to cope with systemic crises and promote the fulfillment of CSR.

In terms of theoretical value, on the one hand, this study verifies the relationship between CSR fulfillment and PBO resilience, revealing its mechanism of action and multiple paths; on the other hand, it provides a new way of thinking for management research methods and enriches the theoretical study of organizational resilience.

Prior studies on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and performance have frequently used unidirectional, single-equation regression although the literature recommends the reciprocal association of CSR with firm performance. This paper aims to elucidate the interactive relationship of CSR spending with financial inclusion (FI) and firm performance. The study also explores the moderating impact of the level of FI on the CSR-firm performance relationship.

This study uses a simultaneous equations model to capture the FI, CSR and firm performance relationships and apply a three-stage regression approach and generalised method of moments approach to address possible endogeneity.

The results confirm a positive association of CSR spending with performance but a negative relationship of FI with performance. This paper also finds that FI negatively moderates the CSR spending-performance relationship.

The positive impact of CSR spending and the negative impact of FI on performance in mandatory CSR regimes provides valuable input in policy formulation. The results of the study will also be useful to national and international organisations, such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

This study uses a simultaneous equations model to capture the reciprocal association of CSR spending with firm performance, whereas prior studies on CSR and performance have frequently used unidirectional, single-equation regression. This paper also finds that FI negatively moderates the CSR spending- performance relationship. Including FI and exploring the moderating impact of the level of FI on the CSR-firm performance relationship is novel.

The book chapter sheds light on specific institutional variables that have been shaping and molding corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices and expressions in the developing world. It argues that CSR strategies cannot be detached from context, and that institutional constellations exert serious pressure on CSR expressions in developing countries, which continue to take a largely philanthropic form. The chapter then dwells on how to transition from CSR as philanthropy to a more strategic approach and the important agency role of founders and top managers in enacting this transition.

This book chapter highlights the context-dependence of CSR practices and provides illustrations from the Middle East context and other developing countries. It adopts a mostly secondary review of available literature on the topic. It also outlines some guidelines about how to move beyond philanthropy that is largely prevalent in the developing countries to a more strategic approach, that is aligned with strategy and core competence (inside-out strategic approach) or relevant and pressing social needs in the country (outside-in strategic approach).

Institutional variables include cultural and religious systems, the nature of political systems, the nature of socioeconomic systems and priorities, as well as the institutional pressures exerted by other institutional actors, inclusive of development and welfare agencies, trade unions, business associations, and civil society organizations. National institutional environments such as weak and contracted governments, gaps in public governance and transparency, arbitrary enforcement of rules, regulations, and policies, and low levels of safety and labor standards affect how CSR is conceived and practiced in developing countries. Hence, CSR continues to be equated with philanthropy in the developing world, and substantive engagement with CSR is the exception rather than the norm.

To take CSR to the next level in developing countries, we need to accord systematic attention to strengthening the institutional drivers of CSR, and putting more pressure on companies to move beyond philanthropy, rhetoric, legitimization, imagery, and public relations to substantive engagement in CSR and genuine attempts at change and development. Practical guidelines and implications in relation to how to transition to a more strategic approach to CSR are provided.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relation between the investment horizon of institutional investors and corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Utilizing unique datasets on CSR and the investor horizon measures (Gaspar et al., 2005), the authors categorize institutional investors into long-term and short-term investors. This method captures the heterogeneity of investors.

The authors show that long-term institutional investors promote CSR engagement, while short-term investors discourage it. The authors further document that shareholders’ ownership horizon has implications on corporate decisions in the CSR framework. The presence of long (short)-term institutional investors is positively (negatively) associated with dividend payout, discourages (encourages) managerial misbehaviors and enhances (reduces) firm valuation, only for firms with high CSR performance.

Different from previous studies that treat institutional investors homogeneously, this paper provides empirical support that investors are indeed different in influencing CSR.

Few prior studies address the question of whether active engagement by institutional shareholders on CSR issues differs by the types of institutional ownership. The study attempts to fill this gap by examining the effects of institutions’ investment horizon, one of the major ways to classify institutional shareholders, on the CSR performance of firms.

The purpose of this paper is to address issues of practicing social responsibility (SR) in small business, where SR implementation challenges are unique. The discussion examines the difficulties encountered by small business owners adopting SR practices, and the various strategies they learned in the process.

A total of 23 small business owner‐managers located in Western Canada were interviewed in‐depth, individually, and in groups. Group interviews were useful for validating and extending the themes and contradictions that arose in individual interviews, particularly in identifying the most common SR challenges and frustrations, and to compare individuals' learning patterns and diverse strategies of response.

The paper findings show that owners learned SR by working through three main areas of challenge within everyday sociomaterial practices: positioning SR commitments and affiliations; balancing diverse stakeholders with SR ideals and costs; and negotiating value conflicts within SR practice, as part of “becoming” a particular enterprise of SR engagement.

The paper suggests that SR may be most fruitfully studied by examining the traces of the networks, linkages, and boundaries formulated through everyday interactions, focusing not just on the social networks and information exchange among humans, but more deeply on the sociomaterial networks within which new practices such as SR emerge. Second, the paper underscores the importance of conceptualizing SR “learning” more in terms of practices that emerge through challenge and conflict than in acquisition and application of new knowledge and attitudes.

This study aims to investigate how credit rating agencies and banks, important credit market participants, incorporate corporate social responsibility (CSR)-related information in their assessment of firm’s creditworthiness.

The authors collect stand-alone CSR reports published by Fortune 500 companies from 2002 to 2014 and use file size as a readability measure to investigate the impact of stand-alone CSR reports’ readability on firms’ credit ratings and cost of borrowing.

The authors find that firms with higher CSR report readability enjoy higher credit ratings and lower costs of bank loans, suggesting that rating agencies and banks perceive lower default risk for firms with more readable CSR reports. Further analysis indicates that the positive association between CSR report readability and credit ratings is more pronounced for firms with high CSR performance. Conversely, the negative association between CSR report readability and bank loan spreads is more pronounced for firms with low CSR performance and credit quality, suggesting complementary roles of rating agencies and banks in their use of CSR reports.

Overall, the results highlight the importance of improving the textual characteristics of CSR reports, especially readability, in reducing information risk in the credit market.

This study aims to examine the impact of Islamic teachings on environmental corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices in Bangladesh, a country where Islamic principles are profoundly influential.

Using a mixed-methods research approach (quantitative study with close-ended questionnaire and qualitative study with semistructure interview), this study aims to explore the role of individual characteristics and organizational contexts in environmental CSR practices. The study uses a robust analytical framework encompassing variance inflation factor, orthogonal loading, Cronbach’s alpha, composite reliability and average variance extracted to assess the reliability and validity of these metrics.

Thematic analysis reveals the motivations, attitudes and challenges experienced by organizational leaders in aligning Islamic ethics with environmental stewardship, whereas the quantitative results provide empirical support for the relationship between various organizational practices (denoted as M#1 to M#8) and environmental CSR.

The findings of this study illuminate the potential benefits of tailoring CSR policies to fit within specific religious and cultural frameworks, offering both theoretical contributions and practical insights.

This study aims to examine the association between board independence and corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting and the moderating role of stakeholder power on the association between board independence and CSR reporting.

Using a sample of 707 Bangladeshi firm-year observations, this study uses a content analysis technique to develop a 24-item of CSR reporting index. This study uses the ordinary least squares regression method to examine the relationship between board independence and CSR reporting.

The study finds that board independence does not influence CSR activities and relevant reporting in general. However, the non-influence of board independence and CSR reporting is offset by stakeholder power. Insider ownership, firm age, firm size, growth opportunities and market capitalisation have a positive influence on such reporting.

While this study suggests that stakeholders’ influence is an important factor in determining the firms’ incentives to disclose CSR information, this finding creates a new debate on the efficacy of independent directors and whether they are good monitors and are able to fulfil all the stakeholders’ expectations.

This study makes an important contribution to the literature on CSR practices by documenting that firms having powerful stakeholders induce the board and management to make more CSR reporting practices in the context of emerging economies.