The Paradox of Corporate Social Responsibility Standards

Simone de Colle (), Adrian Henriques () and Saras Sarasvathy ()

Journal of Business Ethics, 2014, vol. 125, issue 2, 177-191

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to provide a constructive criticism of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) standards. After pointing out a number of benefits and limitations in the effectiveness of CSR standards, both from a theoretical point of view and in the light of empirical evidence, we formulate and discuss a Paradox of CSR standards: despite being well-intended, CSR standards can favor the emergence of a thoughtless, blind and blinkered mindset which is counterproductive of their aim of enhancing the social responsibility of the organization. We analyze three problems that might underlie the Paradox—namely the problem of deceptive measurements; the problem of responsibility erosion and the problem of blinkered culture. We apply the philosophical tradition of American Pragmatism to reflect on these issues in relation to different types of existing standards, and conclude by suggesting a number of considerations that could help both CSR standards developers and users to address the Paradox. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Keywords: Corporate social responsibility; CSR Standards; American pragmatism; Paradox; ISO26000; Corporate accountability standards (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (25)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10551-013-1912-y

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