CSR Strategic Approach, Financial Resources and Corporate Social Performance: The Mediating Effect of Innovation

Pasquale Ruggiero and Sebastiano Cupertino
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Pasquale Ruggiero: Department of Business and Law Studies, University of Siena, Piazza San Francesco 7, 53100 Siena, Italy

Sustainability, 2018, vol. 10, issue 10, 1-22

Abstract: Given the current undefined relational effect between corporate financial performance (CFP) and corporate social performance (CSP) and the potentially myopic behavior of managers, this paper answers the call from some scholars to contribute towards a better understanding of the relationship between CFP and CSR. Different from other papers, it does so by analyzing the role of innovation activities as a mediator between CFP and CSR, applying a regression and mediation analysis between firms’ financial resources, innovation initiatives, and social and environmental performance. The results demonstrate that innovation is a critical factor in the relationship between CFP and corporate social performance (CSP) as it enables organizations to respond to new economic, social and environmental challenges faster and better than organizations that are not able to innovate. Therefore, the investment of financial resources in innovation initiatives is one of the most important levers to pursue and to increase CSP.

Keywords: CSR; corporate social performance; innovation; global 100; mediation analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (34)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:10:y:2018:i:10:p:3611-:d:174641

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