Lifeworth 2001 Review of Corporate Responsibility
Home | Introduction | January - March | April - June | July - September | October - December | Footnotes
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Introduction: from review to preview
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Introduction: from review to preview
Today most historians agree that the defining trigger for the First World War was Arch Duke Ferdinand's assassination. The idea that the human world has perceived another of those before-and-after moments in its consciousness quickly gained currency after September last year. It is possible that in the future someone will reassess our view of recent history without the 'burden' of messiness that comes with living in the moment and interpret events differently. For the time being we offer our subjective synopsis of the key events in the practice and theory of corporate social responsibility and corporate citizenship during 2001 and make suggestions as to their potential evolution in 2002. In this Annual Review of Corporate Responsibility 2001 we provide a depth of analysis that is sometimes lacking in practitioner publications, while avoiding the academic language which so often prevents research from reaching a wider audience. The Review is published by Lifeworth.com in association with Greenleaf Publishing and the New Academy of Business, and integrates the relevant quarterly reviews that appeared in the Journal of Corporate Citizenship - the leading academic journal in this field. We aim for this to be the first in a series of annual reviews.
The above represent the opinions of the authors and not those of their employers or the organisations associated with this publication.
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Naming ourselves
One of the most significant developments over the last year must be our emergence - heralded by this annual review - as a group (a travelling circus?) of practitioners, researchers and academics who have begun to relate our activities directly to a shared field known as corporate citizenship or corporate social responsibility - known increasingly by its acronym, CSR. Held with the container of a growing number of specialised CSR-related organisations as well as within academia, NGOs, businesses and government these professionals (ourselves included) have begun to build a shared discourse around what it means to be practising in this field. How and why this group has developed is probably quite contestable, although there must surely be some connection to the emergence of the issues of corporate responsibility and accountability in the mainstream. Facilitated by a wider reading of Naomi Klein's No Logo, which featured in the annual best seller list for 2001, the post-Seattle/Prague/Genoa climate raised awareness of issues surrounding globalisation and capitalism. It may not quite be a free flowing contribution - mainstream media, governments and increasingly academia have been slightly anxious of biting corporate hands that feed. However, a steady trickle of debate about the role of corporations in the various economic, social and cultural globalisations has been supplemented by practices of organisations to create a new stream of activity for professionals and organisations within which to move. more
"2001 was a honeymoon period for corporate responsibility advocates"
There is no doubt that 2001 was a honeymoon period for corporate responsibility advocates in the UK, much of Europe and North America. The increasing profile of this emerging 'profession' brings new risks, however. We are no longer being ignored, and with this we will increasingly be scrutinised and sometimes attacked. From all sides. On the one side there are the critics of corporate responsibility who see it as distracting business managers from securing profits for the owners of corporations. David Henderson's paper on corporate responsibility was cited in an article in the Economist advocating this perspective more
. On the other side there are sceptics, who see corporate responsibility as old-fashioned public relations (PR) with the aim of distracting society from the need for more effective regulation of corporate activity and transformation to an economic system grounded in the ecological realities of the planet. In the UK, sceptics cried fowl when the former director of Greenpeace UK joined the PR firm Burson-Marsteller, leading to a debate in newspapers about whether social and environmental activists can work with business, and the dangers of co-optation. An understandable initial reaction to criticism is to be defensive. Our hope is we might see more corporate responsibility professionals engaging with critics and sceptics. The critics make it more important for us to be clear on what we believe to be the business case for corporate responsibility. The sceptics make it more important for us to be clear on what we believe to be the people's case for corporate responsibility. We need critics and sceptics to help us reflect on our own practice, assumptions and interests, and to remind us of the chaos of contradictions that typify modern life."We need critics and sceptics to help us reflect on our own practice, assumptions and interests"
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United in learning
During 2001 the UN Global Compact quickly became a part of the landscape of corporate responsibility. 1
Another important theme from 2001 was the complex interaction between regulation, voluntarism, reporting and standards. The Royal Institute of International Affairs in London published a paper, which debated the need for tougher regulation of multinational corporations more
. The EU's green paper on corporate social responsibility seemed to emphasise the voluntary character of corporate work on the social and environmental impact of their operations and interactions with stakeholders more. Responses to the draft were varied as some organisations such as Amnesty International called for more use of the regulatory power within the EU. Meanwhile increasing numbers of multinationals engaged in processes for social and environmental reporting - processes deemed by some to offer a pathway to corporate transparency and accountability. Attempts to develop suitably accurate, comparable and defined measuring instruments and indicators for these reports were co-ordinated by bodies such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and The Institute for Social and Ethical AccountAbility (ISEA) more. However, even as we write the Enron/Andersen scandal is demonstrating that cosy relationships between auditors and their clients can threaten the legitimacy of these reporting processes. Thus, we are likely to see a continued debate over the appropriate role of governmental and inter-governmental institutions for corporate responsibility.Some suggested that a body such as the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) would be a legitimate and consistent conduit for channelling the codes and guidelines against which performance could be marked more
. The development of a Business Conduct Management System (BCMS) will be one of the key issues in 2002. As might the relationship of such standards to governmental regulation and multilateral trade agreements, especially as the World Trade Organisation (WTO) pursues a new round of trade negotiations. As governments increasingly support the uptake of voluntary codes of practice so the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) agreement and the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) will appear on the horizon as strategic concerns for corporate responsibility."WTO Agreements will appear on the horizon as strategic concerns for corporate responsibility"
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A case for global governance
Perhaps the most significant issue on the corporate responsibility agenda in 2001 was how pharmaceutical companies' patenting and pricing of HIV/AIDS drugs was helping or hindering the treatment of millions across the global South more
"There is a case for companies to work on the issues that concern anti-capitalist or anti-globalisation protesters"
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Into Africa
It may be in the African context that the corporate responsibility community will be most challenged to demonstrate its usefulness and validity in 2002. In response to the lost decades of development (the 1980s and 1990s), African heads of state have been developing a project to engender a renaissance in the continent's fortunes under the name of New Partnership for Africa's Development. This initiative emphasises the potential role of foreign direct investment in the process of helping Africa to play a more equal role in the global economic game. The challenges facing Africa are considerable - from a continued democratic deficit in many parts, continued poor health, lack of sanitation and to possible collapse of vital ecosystems. Despite the gloomy perceptions, Africa remains a continent with an incredibly rich social, cultural and ecological life. The international corporate community does have the potential to contribute to an African renaissance. However the possibilities of foreign direct investment are also double edged since Argentina's experience has shown that open markets do not necessarily mean improvements in quality of life. Ordinary Africans are in need of vital goods and services, but one of the last things that they need is a new colonial force of consultants, advisers and practitioners ready to give them 'help' that reinforce existing power structures and appropriate cultural, ecological and social resources for hyper-commercialisation in the west. In April 2002 the first Annual African Corporate Citizenship Convention 2
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Research changes
As the launch of the Journal of Corporate Citizenship indicates, increasing parts of the research community focused on the role of business in society. The approaches used in the academic community to inquire into and transform corporate responsibility have been very limited until now. Whilst many opportunities have opened up for researchers to work with companies most have tended to work largely within the frame of positivist science. The attempted use of value-free, objectifying voices and a focus upon quantitative research has meant that the output has tended to operate (either knowingly or unknowingly) in line with the patterns of power that already dominate. The approaches used in the academic community to inquire into and transform corporate responsibility have been very limited until now" Is it possible to envisage forms of inquiry, action and education that are collaborative as well as critical, in which we recognise and inquire into our subjectivity (instead of ignoring them) and transform ourselves as well as the powerful actors with whom we work? As academics we would do well to remember the assertion of Edward Said that the researcher should be there "to raise embarrassing questions, to confront orthodoxy and dogma (rather than produce them), to be someone who cannot be easily co-opted by government or corporations." Working in the field of corporate responsibility brings all civil-minded people closer to the threat of co-optation. This does not mean we should turn away from the challenge but instead that we should reflect upon and engage with the challenges of serving ourselves, our employers, our humanity and our planet. With an increasing professionalisation our community is building up its own set of vested interests. We hope that in the coming year the threatened loss of legitimacy becomes a starting point for us, as members of the corporate responsibility community, to take some time to consider our motives and driving forces and peer into the relationship between what we say we want and the outcomes of what we do in our professional as well as personal lives. "With an increasing professionalisation our community is building up its own set of vested interests"
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Spiritual awakenings
In 2001 God was given a bad name. Spirituality was drowned out by the noise of falling buildings, bombs and the angry or deceitful rhetoric of men seeking power. As we mentioned above, the longer-term effects of September 11th and the War in Afganistan cannot yet be known. Perhaps because these effects will depend on how we each choose to respond more
"The place of spirituality in the life of a business and business in the spiritual life of communities may become a new force in 2002 and beyond"
For something like four hundreds years Western society has thrived upon a view of the universe as dead and mechanistic; all parts of society have been imbued with the post-Newtonian perspective of a universe that works like a machine. This mechanistic worldview has allowed economics to furnish us with an understanding of business in which an external social and ecological environment is merely a static field from which an immutable firm could draw freely. The view has also highlighted the properties of the parts - businesses, individuals - in the whole. Any business practitioner or ecologist will tell you that this is not the case. Yet it is this mechanistic view of the firm that has dominated policy and academic circles.
Perhaps in the corporate responsibility movement we are seeing the intimations of a new guiding metaphor for our existence on the planet - a metaphor that highlights the centrality of relationship, of the interconnections between the parts and of processes and patterns. With such a metaphor the firm may no longer be seen as a dead contraption in a dead environment but maybe more akin to a living body in a healthy and vibrant ecology: employees running like blood throughout the business, in its head as well as heart; a local community that like skin surrounds the business completely; suppliers, contractors and distributors as separate entities in their own right but whom interact directly and continuously with the business, like a close relation or friend.
"How, then, might the transformation to such a organic metaphor be meaningful for ourselves in the corporate responsibility community?"
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Biographies
Jem Bendell is an activist, researcher, consultant and writer on globalisation issues. He has published two books and many articles on corporate responsibility and consults with inter-governmental, non-governmental and corporate clients on related issues. For a number of years Jem has been combining work on the inside with grassroots activism. www.jembendell.com Dr Rupesh Shah is currently working part-time for the New Academy of Business and part-time as a freelance action researcher. In his work he seeks to use a process of action research to look into the engagement between powerful actors as part of a transition for sustainable development and the emergence of a participatory worldview. This publication represents the opinions of the authors and not those of their employers or the organisations associated with this publication. The sponsors of this publication had no input concerning its content.
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