Exploring patterns of corporate social responsibility using a complementary K -means clustering criterion
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Exploring patterns of corporate social responsibility using a complementary K-means clustering criterion Zina Taran1
•
Boris Mirkin2,3
Received: 14 February 2018 / Accepted: 5 December 2019 The Author(s) 2020
Abstract Companies’ objectives extend beyond mere profitability, to what is generally known as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Empirical research effort of CSR is typically concentrated on a limited number of aspects. We focus on the whole set of CSR activities to identify any structure to that set. In this analysis, we take data from 1850 of the largest international companies via the conventional MSCI database and focus on four major dimensions of CSR: Environment, Social/ Stakeholder, Labor, and Governance. To identify any structure hidden in almost constant average values, we apply the popular technique of K-means clustering. When determining the number of clusters, which is especially difficult in the case at hand, we use an equivalent clustering criterion that is complementary to the squareerror K-means criterion. Our use of this complementary criterion aims at obtaining clusters that are both large and farthest away from the center. We derive from this a method of extracting anomalous clusters one-by-one with a follow-up removal of small clusters. This method has allowed us to discover a rather impressive process of change from predominantly uniform patterns of CSR activities along the four dimensions in 2007 to predominantly single-focus patterns of CSR activities in 2012. This change may reflect the dynamics of increasingly interweaving and
& Zina Taran [email protected] Boris Mirkin [email protected]; [email protected] 1
Department of Management, Marketing and Business Administration, Delta State University, 1003 W Sunflower Road, Cleveland, MS 38733, USA
2
Department of Data Analysis and Artificial Intelligence, National Research University Higher School of Economics, 20 Miasniskaya, Moscow, RF 101000, Russia
3
Department of Computer Science, Birkbeck University of London, Malet Street, WC1E 7HX London, UK
123
Business Research
structuring CSR activities into business processes that are likely to be extended into the future. Keywords Corporate social responsibility Quantitative patterns Cluster analysis K-means Anomalous cluster CSR trends
1 Introduction Issues of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and sustainability have become increasingly important for both academic research and business practice (Chen and Chen-Hsun 2017; Hult 2011). As society becomes more and more concerned with environmental and social issues, the public increasingly expects companies to behave in environmentally and socially responsible ways. Business communities have responded to these expectations (Sethi et al. 2017). Business-school accrediting bodies have begun to add ethics and sustainability to their accreditation standards (AACSB International 2017; IACBE 2017), and many companies have established sustainability-officer positions. The perceived urgency and importance of CSR at t
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