دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی مسئولیت اجتماعی شرکت اجباری - الزویر 2018

Abstract

The question we raise is what to do when companies fail to keep pace with societal expectations with respect to their corporate social responsibility (CSR). The response of the Indian government was to make it mandatory for large corporations to spend funds on CSR activities. In this paper, we investigate the success of this legislation both for the companies and the intended beneficiaries. We find that the impact of the legislation has fallen short of expectations both in terms of the volume of CSR expenditure generated and the activities to which it has been directed. In particular, we find that the legislation has had a negative corporate profitability which can impact on the willingness of companies to spend in this area. We conclude that greater care must be taken when implementing mandatory CSR if it is to be effective.

Conclusions

If it is deemed desirable for corporations to spend on socially responsible activities, then an important question to ask is whether they are expected to do so voluntarily and in sufficient volume for the appropriate purposes. The Indian government clearly thought otherwise when they legislated in August 2012 to mandate that large Indian companies must spend a minimum of 2% of their profits on CSR activities and then to amend this legislation in February 2014 to more precisely specify the areas where these funds must be allocated. We have used India as a case study of the success or otherwise of taking decisions relating to CSR expenditure largely out of the hands of management. Reports suggest that the legislation has generated a level of CSR spending that has fallen much below expectation (Singh, 2016).This is consistent with our finding that large mandated companies who were already spending on CSR activities actually reduced their spending as a proportion of profits while those who previously were not spending on CSR activities were somewhat reluctant to do so. The smaller companies who were previously spending on CSR activities actually reduced their expenditure once it was determined they were not required to do so. Finally, some of the small Indian companies who previously had not spent on CSR activities began to make minimal allocations.