Corporate Social Responsibility

Petya Dankova, Ph.D.

Further Information to be found in the course list.

Lecture: Time and Place

Addressees

• Betriebswirtschaftslehre - Public and Non-Profit Management , Hauptfach, Bachelor of Science
• Volkswirtschaftslehre, Hauptfach, Bachelor of Science
• Volkswirtschaftslehre, Hauptfach, Diplom

Registration

Students officially registern at the first session on May 23.

Recognition

• B.Sc. VWL: BWL-Wahlmodul
• B.Sc. BWL (Public and Non-Profit Management): BWL-Wahlmodul
• B.A. Nebenfach BWL: BWL-Wahlmodul
• Diplom VWL: Fach BWL

Mode of Assessment

Annotation

The concept Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) regards the firm as a complex socio-economic system which concentrates the contributions of various stakeholders and provides synergy between them, thus achieving significant social and economic outcomes. Therefore, Stakeholder Management can be considered as the most appropriate practical tool for CSR.  The stakeholder management perspective is essential because it requires business decision makers to (1) identify the various groups or individuals who have stakes in the firm or its actions, de-cisions, and practices, and (2) incorporate those stakeholders’ concerns into the firm’s strategic plans and daily operations. Stakeholder management is an approach that increases the likelihood that decision makers will integrate ethical wisdom with management wisdom in all that they do. The course is aimed to discuss and analyse the stakes and interests of the different corporate stakeholder groups. After having visited the course the students are able to understand the different aspects of CSR with the aim to make it practical in different strategic and operational environments.

Schedule

Theme 1: Introduction   
1.1.    Some real stories           
1.2.    The Business / Society Relationship           
1.3.    The Role of Business within the Social System. The Social Contract   
       
Theme 2: The Corporate Social Responsibility Concept    
2.1.    Ethical dilemmas           
2.2.    Historical Perspective on CSR           
2.3.    Definitions and Viewpoints on CSR           
2.4.    Social Performance and Financial Performance Relationship           
2.5.    Socially Responsible or Ethical Investing       
   
Theme 3: The Stakeholder Approach to CSR       
4.1.    Origins of the Stakeholder Concept           
4.2.    Typology of Stakeholders           
4.3.    Strategic, Multifiduciary, and Synthesis Approaches           
4.4.    Three Values of the Stakeholder Model           
4.5.    Defining the Firms’s Stakeholders           
4.6.    Defining the Stakeholders’ Stakes           
4.7.    Opportunities and Challenges of the Stakeholders           
4.8.    Firm’s Responsibilities to the Stakeholders           
4.9     Stakeholder Management Strategies

Literature

1. Andriof, J. et al. (eds) Unfolding stakeholder thinking. Volume 1: theory, responsibility and engagement. Greenleaf, 2002.
2. Andriof, J. et al. (eds) Unfolding stakeholder thinking. Volume 2: relationships, communication, reporting and performance. Greenleaf, 2003.
3. Carroll, B.A. and A.K. Buchholtz, Business and Society: Ethics and Stakeholder Man-agement, 7th Edition, South-Western Cengage Learning, 2008
4. Crane, A., Matten, D., and Spence, L. (eds.) Corporate social responsibility: readings and cases in a global context. Routledge, 2008.
5. Elkington, J. 1997. Cannibals with Forks: The Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Busi-ness. Capstone: Oxford.
6. Freeman, R. E.,S. R. Velamuri, and B. Moriarty, Company Stakeholder Responsibility: A New Approach to CSR, Business Roundtable, Institute for Corporate Ethics Bridge Paper, 2006
7. Gaudier, M. 1999. Firms of the Future: Economic Efficiency and Social Performance, Bibliographical Series No. 19. International Institute of Labour Studies: Geneva.
8. Habisch, A., Jonker, J. and Schmidpeter, R. (eds) Corporate social responsibility across Europe. Springer, 2005.
9. Henderson, D. 2001. Misguided Virtue: False Notions of Corporate Social Responsibility. New Zealand Business Roundtable: Wellington.
10. Holme, R. and Watts, P. 2000. Corporate Social Responsibility: Making Good Business Sense. World Business Council for Sustainable Development: Geneva.
11. McIntosh, M. (ed.). 1998, 1999, 2000. Visions of Ethical Business. Three volumes. Fi-nancial Times Prentice Hall Publishing: London.