Corporate Social Responsibility Sample 
International Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
Module Overview
This module introduces you to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). This is the idea that, in addition to their primary function of making money for the benefit of shareholders, businesses have a wider responsibility to the society in which they exist. Although some business people and economists continue to argue that this in not what businesses are for, and quote Adams Smith’s dictum that ‘I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good’, many businesses seem to be willing to adopt CSR.
Not that all businesses have always been exclusively focused on profit: as we will show in Chapter 1, the history of corporate philanthropy is a long one, and no-one denies that the owners of businesses – the shareholders – have a perfect right to do whatever they wish with their funds. Disagreements may arise, however, when managers – who have an agent-to-principal relationship with shareholders – take upon themselves the right to decide where these funds may be spent. It then becomes necessary for them to explain why CSR is a good idea for the business. This raises the question of whether CSR is, as the economist Milton Friedman has suggested, merely a practical way of benefiting the profitability of the company.
In any event, and as Friedman accepts, there are ground rules for all businesses in how they conduct themselves. The minimum package is always the requirements of law. Law may regulate a wide range of business’s activities, from employment practices to the use of and emission of dangerous materials and pollutants, to their impact on the environment. As you will discover, some companies tell us that their willingness to abide by the law is evidence of their social responsibility, but this is not so. It is generally agreed that CSR begins where the law ends.
This ties in with the notion of citizenship. A good citizen is not merely someone who conducts his of her life
Module Overview
This module introduces you to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). This is the idea that, in addition to their primary function of making money for the benefit of shareholders, businesses have a wider responsibility to the society in which they exist. Although some business people and economists continue to argue that this in not what businesses are for, and quote Adams Smith’s dictum that ‘I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good’, many businesses seem to be willing to adopt CSR.
Not that all businesses have always been exclusively focused on profit: as we will show in Chapter 1, the history of corporate philanthropy is a long one, and no-one denies that the owners of businesses – the shareholders – have a perfect right to do whatever they wish with their funds. Disagreements may arise, however, when managers – who have an agent-to-principal relationship with shareholders – take upon themselves the right to decide where these funds may be spent. It then becomes necessary for them to explain why CSR is a good idea for the business. This raises the question of whether CSR is, as the economist Milton Friedman has suggested, merely a practical way of benefiting the profitability of the company.
In any event, and as Friedman accepts, there are ground rules for all businesses in how they conduct themselves. The minimum package is always the requirements of law. Law may regulate a wide range of business’s activities, from employment practices to the use of and emission of dangerous materials and pollutants, to their impact on the environment. As you will discover, some companies tell us that their willingness to abide by the law is evidence of their social responsibility, but this is not so. It is generally agreed that CSR begins where the law ends.
This ties in with the notion of citizenship. A good citizen is not merely someone who conducts his of her life