Reconsidering the Meaning of Corporate Social Responsibility
In this chapter, the implications that a deconstructive and complex ethics hold for our understanding of corporate social responsibility (CSR) will be investigated. The chapter commences with an overview of the traditional characterisation of CSR, in orde
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Reconsidering the Meaning of Corporate Social Responsibility
Abstract In this chapter, the implications that a deconstructive and complex ethics hold for our understanding of corporate social responsibility (CSR) will be investigated. The chapter commences with an overview of the traditional characterisation of CSR, in order to demonstrate that this characterisation is informed by an equalising or commutative understanding of justice, i.e. repaying good with good. On this interpretation, CSR policies articulate the content of the social contract, which is premised on a commutative understanding of just relations between societal and economic interest groups. Derrida however offers a much more radical view of responsibility, one that transcends the reciprocal demands and expectations of a circular economy. Responsibility, on his take, becomes an expression of ethical complexity, which means that, in practice, responsible action always pushes the limits of its own expression. However, this understanding of responsibility cannot form the basis of a substantive ethics, and is often criticised for being practically useless. More specifically, critics are concerned that if a Derridean view of ethical relations and responsible action are irreducible, undecidable, and non-subsumptive, then it is not clear on what basis moral judgement can take place (the charge of relativism), or of what value business ethics can be (the charge of irreducibility). Both these charges are addressed in this chapter at the hand of a close reading of Derrida’s work, in order to show how these charges can be overcome, but also to illustrate the value that a complex deconstructive ethics holds for business ethics in general and CSR in particular.
Introduction In Part I of this study, the theoretical basis for a deconstructive, complex understanding of business ethics was developed. In Part II (beginning with this chapter), this basis is applied to prominent business ethics themes, in an attempt
M. Woermann, On the (Im)Possibility of Business Ethics, Issues in Business Ethics 37, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-5131-6_5, # Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
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5 Reconsidering the Meaning of Corporate Social Responsibility
to operationalise the insights gleaned thus far, and, where necessary, to extrapolate on these insights. It is specifically the idea of corporate social responsibility (CSR) that will receive attention, since our view of CSR informs our understanding of related themes such as corporate governance and accountability, stakeholder theory, corporate identity, and responsible leadership. Prominent views on CSR differ, and as such we cannot postulate a universal theory of CSR with which to compare a complex, deconstructive account of CSR. In order to proceed with some form of comparative analysis, the strategy that is followed in this chapter is to try and determine the central tenets of popular CSR accounts, in order to highlight how a deconstructive, complex view of CSR differs from these accounts. The criticisms routin
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