Article s CSR

Introduction:
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is the responsibility of an organization for the impacts of its decisions and activities on society, the environment and its own prosperity, known as the triple bottom line of people, planet, and profit. Not only do responsible, sustainable and transparent approaches help build brand and reputation, they help strengthen the community and therefore the marketplace. A solid business plan, embedded into the business culture, reflecting organizational values and objectives through strategic CSR application, will help to build a sustainable and profitable future for all. Corporate social responsibility (CSR, also called corporate conscience, corporate citizenship, social performance, or sustainable responsible business/ Responsible Business) is a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into a business model. CSR policy functions as a built-in, self-regulating mechanism whereby businesses monitors and ensures its active compliance with the spirit of the law, ethical standards, and international norms. The goal of CSR is to embrace responsibility for the company's actions and encourage a positive impact through its activities on the environment, consumers, employees, communities, stakeholders and all other members of the public sphere.

How CSR Has Evolved through time:

Corporations use natural and human resources from their environment to run their business and generate profits, and they are responsible for the depletion of these resources and the negative impact caused by running of their business to environment and the community around their business. The CSR concept evolution started with the concerns related to the damage created by business on environment and society at large by way of activities linked to their business operation. Business are expected to clean up the mess they have generated to the environment, Until 1980s CSR was considered same as corporate philanthropy. The current CSR concepts started formulating in early 80s. In 1980s and 1990s examples like Shell spoiling the environment and violating the human rights in Nigeria, started a new wave of criticism which triggered a complete different thinking on CSR and hence many CSR definitions emerged during this period. On the other hand, companies like Nike and GAP Inc were hit by the bad repute of their suppliers violating labour laws and exploiting poverty and promoting discrimination. When the activist groups and governments felt that current laws governing environment, health, and safety and consumer protection are weak to handle multinationals, the United Nations took the initial step by providing a code of conduct for such trans-national companies. This step failed due to the lack of support from governments and opposition from different organizations. As a result a

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Article s CSR voluntary initiative, World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) was formed in 1991. This initiative was attacked because critics said that CSR actions should be mandatory instead of voluntary. Critiques argued that voluntary CSR cannot hold corporate operations accountable. Hence, CSR has continued to evolve rapidly over the last thirty years. Even though it is still favoured by corporate leaders, the old model of corporate philanthropy is looked upon more as a self-actualization gesture than as socially responsible attitude. For example Andrew Carnegie, the steel magnate who built libraries, universities and museums as a philanthropist polluted towns with smoke and debris and dealt harshly with workers as an industrialist even employing armed guards to shoot at strikers. In todays environment libraries or universities might not accept funding from a business known to pollute or be socially irresponsible. In 1999 students from a number of major US universities formed the Workers Rights Consortium (WRC) to protest against Nike and its sponsorship programmes because of human rights allegation

CSR theory to CSR practice:

The evolution from CSR theory to CSR practice can be broken down into several phases. 1. Pressure building up against the businesses 2. Wave of awareness by the society and the stake holders 3. Realization of the responsibility by the businesses 4. Development of Policies and identification of best practices 5. Implementation of the policies 6. Development of several programs to implement CSR Performance and Compliance evaluations.

CSR Approaches
Business Ethics Cleaner Production Environment Fair-trade Human Rights Labor Practice Workplace Safety Occupational Health Quality Management Supply Chain Integrity Triple Bottom line

How it is Currently Defined and Understood:

Over the period of the past thirty years, the term CSR has continued to adapt to the changing situation in businesses world over. The concept continues to go through its evolutionary march and so does its definition. No one definition describes CSR, but each of the following reflects a value-driven expectation that a business generates within its customers. A sampling is given below:

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Article s CSR CSR is the organizations social license to operate, and is important to legitimize business activity, particularly in the global activity where businesses are accused of practicing soulless capitalism. Corporations need to have powerful vision and highest values to go further than compliance with current regulations and best practice. Corporate Social Responsibility is achieving commercial success in ways that honor ethical values and respect people, communities, and the natural environment CSR means addressing the legal, ethical, commercial and other expectations society has for business, and making decisions that fairly balance the claims of all key stakeholders CSR when well practiced is about sound business practices and good management that deliver value to businesses and their shareholders, as well as to society at large. This vision of business hardly suggests that profits should take a back seat to other considerations. Globalization creates risk as well as opportunity and business leaders have considerable responsibility to help make it a constructive rather than a destructive force. Responsible behaviour toward employees, shareholders and communities is not a luxury for good economic times but a core concern at all times However, it has to be made clear that CSR extends beyond the random act of generosity to include such commonplace values as paying taxes, open disclosure, labour standards and customer sensitivity. It is time Pakistan has a mechanism for collecting and analyzing credible real-time data on accepted CSR variables within its multi-layered corporate sector. Only then can we see CSR becoming a strategic asset for increasing industry competitiveness and a socially responsive corporate culture.

Insurance against Bad News:

While corporations need to adopt common values that work across cultures and nationalities, they also need to be sensitive to local communities, cultures, norms and work practices. CSR is a corporate survival issue. In the e-information age any negative news can be a Tsunami for even the most stable of organizations, Good news are short lived but negative news has a long lasting negative impact on stakeholders. It can wreck market confidence, effect customer loyalty and enrage general public. The media highlights corporations for their failures rather than their successes and unethical behaviour even if it is unproven means a blot on reputation that takes a long time to clean, even with the most strident of remedial steps. The ensuing cost to competitiveness is not difficult to surmise. Being proactive and embracing CSR at the earliest possible is a good risk managing strategy for a company. In todays world social responsibility, corporate values and community initiatives have a major role in increasing profits through larger sale of product by responsible companies. Its the best management tool for voiding and mitigating business and marketing risks. Globalization creates risk as well as opportunity, and business leaders have considerable responsibility to help make it a constructive, rather than destructive, force," DiPiazza

References: Ambreen Ahmed, Corporate Social Responsibility In Pakistan And Its Implementation,
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Article s CSR
www.grli.org/index.php/.../doc.../28-csr-perspective-from-pakistan.

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