Cramer - CRS

IRRI-KIIB COLLOQUIUM :

New ways of entrepreneurship: II "Corporate Social Responsibility. Less government with more results?"
The Royal Institute for International Relations, Brussels Von Mises Institute, Brussels 22/09/2004

THE SELFREGULATING ROLE OF INDUSTRY IN CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Prof. dr. Jacqueline Cramer,
National Initiative for Sustainable Development (NIDO) and the Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is gradually becoming more and more widespread. It is a trend that reflects changing social attitudes towards the responsibilities held by firms towards the societies in which they operate. More than before, firms are now expected to account explicitly for all aspects of their performance, i.e. not just their financial results, but also their social and ecological performance. CSR involves finding a responsible balance between the concern for economic prosperity ('Profit'), ecological quality ('Planet') and people's well-being ('People'). Openness and transparency are the new key words.

CSR does not stop at the border. Particularly the larger companies invest worldwide. Certainly when it comes to foreign offices in developing countries, the question arises how companies can bring their social responsibility into practice. Not only larger companies but small and medium-sized companies are increasingly confronted with the international context in which they conduct business. Through the globalisation of the economy, companies are increasingly involved in a network of international chains of suppliers and customers. How companies can conduct business responsibly in such international chains is one of the core questions companies must be able to provide an answer to within the context of CSR.

A growing group of companies acknowledges this trend towards corporate social responsibility. However, they are faced with the problem how to put this concept into practice. What does it really mean for companies to shift their attention from financial to sustainable profit, they question. This problem triggered the National Initiative for Sustainable Development (NIDO) to launch a program in the Netherlands under the title 'From financial to sustainable profit' (running from May 2000 - December 2002), followed by another program under the title 'Corporate Social Responsibility in international context' (running from January 2003 - September 2005). Within these two programs more than 40 companies representing different sectors and sizes, were actively participating.