Corporate Social Responsibility Essay Example for Free

Corporate Social Responsibility EssayDefinition-Carroll, 1979 2008, 500 The fond responsibility of business encompasses the economic, legal, ethical and discretionary expectations that a society has of organizations at a given point in time. EU Definition of CSR A design whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations and in their interaction with their stakeholders on a voluntary basis. The World Business Council for Sustainable teaching (WBCSD) Corporate Social Responsibility is the continuing commitment by business to behave ethically and suffer to economic development while improving the part of life of the workforce and their families as well as of the local community and society at largeConcept-Corporate Social Responsibility is a management concept whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations and interactions with their stakeholders. CSR is generally understood as being the way t hrough which a company achieves a balance of economic, environmental and social imperatives (Triple-Bottom-Line- Approach), while at the same time addressing the expectations of shareholders and stakeholders. In this sense it is important to draw a distinction between CSR, which can be a strategic business management concept, and charity, sponsorships or philanthropy. Even though the latter can also fall in a valuable contribution to poverty reduction, will directly enhance the reputation of a company and strengthen its brand, the concept of CSR clearly goes beyond that.The pyramid of CSROne of the most popular concepts of CSR was developed by Archie Carroll in the early 1990s. It is known as the pyramid of CSR. The pyramid suggests that CSR is composed by 4 opposite kinds of social responsibility. These responsibilities are economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic. Caroll considers them to be basic economic responsibilities. The aim of economic responsibility is to provide good s and services for consumers and to gain profit out of it. (Crane, Matten, Spence, 2008, p. 62) overdue to capitalism the idea of profit transformed into the extent of maximizing profits upon all other aspects. Society sanctioned businesses for their idea of maximizing profits and in this context governments legislated ground rules according to which businesses must operate. The rules indicated companies to comply with regulations and to fulfill legal obligations.Even though norms like fairness and justice are well lucid in economic and legal responsibility, ethical responsibility goes beyond the law and regulations. It embodies values, norms and expectations from stakeholders, like consumers, employees and a shareholder, for what they believe is fair and right. For a company ethical components of CSR pet acting morally and ethically and going further than compliance with laws and regulations. (Caroll, 1991)However, ethical responsibility is intertwined with the legal conception and is pushing toward more regulations and higher expectations. The last and smallest work of the pyramid is philanthropic responsibility. Philanthropic responsibility means for the company to be a good corporate citizen. Taking this challenge into account the company has to contribute to arts, education and the community and, therefore, endorse human welfare or goodwill. Philanthropic responsibility is sometimes put on the same level as ethical. However, the disagreement is that it is not seen as unethical behavior if businesses do not contribute their money to humanitarian programs.