United States of America: Internal Commitments and External Pressures

Jennifer J. Griffin and Ben Vivari
Additional contact information
Jennifer J. Griffin: The George Washington University
Ben Vivari: The George Washington University

Chapter 11 in Global Practices of Corporate Social Responsibility, 2009, pp 235-250 from Springer

Abstract: With the varied definitions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) we examine the motivation for firms' CSR activities, how firms credibly demonstrate CSR, and firms' CSR reporting. These three topics, i.e., why firms participate, how firms participate, and CSR reporting rubrics, help describe and explain the core question of this chapter: what is the practice of CSR in the United States (US)? We argue that the practice of CSR in the US is evolving and accelerating at an uneven pace across industries and within firms because of differences in beliefs in CSR, leadership, employee pressures, government demands, and community input. This chapter suggests examining specific stakeholder relations and how firms co-create value that leads to a more nuanced view of CSR. The practice of CSR in the US continues to be a matter of choice within a market-driven economy. This freedom to choose underlies many CSR activities. CSR for consumers may include better, safer, and quality products. For employees, CSR is about pride, retention, and being an employer of choice. CSR is a differentiator from rival firms—especially in fiercely competitive markets. For policy makers, CSR is about building trust, credibility, and repetitive access. For suppliers, CSR is about being the partner of choice. And for communities, CSR is about pride, sponsorships, and inclusion. CSR in U.S. firms is the sum of these stakeholder systems plus the innovative creativity resulting in new product/markets to serve shifting social demands.

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility; Socially Responsible Investment; Corporate Social Responsibility Activity; Corporate Social Performance; Corporate Philanthropy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-540-68815-0_11

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783540688150

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-68815-0_11

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Books from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().