Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
CSR - here to stay or a fad that will fade away?
Jönköping University, Jönköping International Business School, JIBS, EMM (Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Management).
Jönköping University, Jönköping International Business School, JIBS, EMM (Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Management).
2006 (English)Independent thesis Advanced level (degree of Magister), 10 points / 15 hpStudent thesis
Abstract [en]

There is a shift of values in the Western society of today from material to immaterial values Löhman and Steinholtz (2003). This changes together with the interest among people in Sweden and in the rest of the Western world to travel and experience new cultures the developing world has come closer. This has raised the awareness of the role of companies re-garding social responsibility since most companies have suppliers, producers or some other kind of involvement in developing countries. Today several companies are engaged in corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues. However, the topic of CSR has to a large extent divided a large part of the Swedish business world due to the strong opinions regarding this topic.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how the concept of CSR is perceived by Swedish corporations and what implications it yields. This will be done by comparing the views of three different groups: managers in Swedish small and medium sized enterprises (SME’s) and managers of Swedish large sized enterprises (LSE’s), responsible for CSR implementation, supplemented with the view of independent thinkers.

To perform the study a qualitative method has been used. Eleven interviews have been conducted with company representatives as well as independent thinkers that are involved in or have a great knowledge in the field of CSR. The respondents have been divided into three groups: ethically driven SME’s, LSE’s working with CSR and independent thinkers.

The concept of corporate social responsibility is perceived very differently in between the three groups. The views are split regarding their fundamental understanding of CSR, which is reflected in their relation to stakeholders as well as their thoughts about the future development of CSR. The motives, ideological and commercial, for working with CSR also dif-fers and some external thinkers believe that there are no motives for engage in CSR at all. The ethically driven SME’s have built their core business on social responsibility and is therefore the backbone of the companies. The LSE’s core business is not built on social responsibility, but rather on demands from the customers, who they regard as a critical stakeholder group. Some of the independent thinkers instead adhere to the shareholder approach and reject the concept of CSR. Nevertheless, all of the respondents agree on why CSR has developed, which is due to globalisation.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2006. , p. 75
Keywords [en]
Corporate social responsibility, CSR, stakeholders, business ethics, Sweden, SME’s, LSE’s
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-541OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hj-541DiVA, id: diva2:4252
Supervisors
Examiners
Available from: 2006-09-01 Created: 2006-09-01

Open Access in DiVA

fulltext(2770 kB)1794 downloads
File information
File name FULLTEXT01.pdfFile size 2770 kBChecksum MD5
433f0df15d0f7deee09b0d8ec10cb05a58878361c8241178c91c759a4ba84f0898f8ab85
Type fulltextMimetype application/pdf

By organisation
JIBS, EMM (Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Management)

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar
Total: 1895 downloads
The number of downloads is the sum of all downloads of full texts. It may include eg previous versions that are now no longer available

urn-nbn

Altmetric score

urn-nbn
Total: 990 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf