The View from the Boardroom - UNDP Trinidad and Tobago

The View from the Boardroom - CEO Study on Corporate Social Responsibility in Trinidad and TobagoCHAPTER 2Government, Consumers and Employees – The Drivers of CSRWould you welcome the development of a nationalCSR Policy as a standard-setting framework for thePrivate Sector?11.4%can and should do to encouragecorporate citizenship. Rather thechallenge is whether the governmentcan find ways to raise the strategicsignificance of corporate citizenship inaddressing social and environmentalchallenges, both to business as animperative and as an enabler of moreeffective government policy, bothnationally and on the global stage.” 2588.6%YesNoSector need to play a more activerole in honouring their obligationsas signatories to the social contract.Govind Maharaj, CEO of the TruValusupermarket chain operator EasternCommercial Lands Ltd. points outthat “people are at different levels ofhow they see CSR so to get everybodyto comply and to head in the samedirection at the same speed is goingto be difficult.” Nevertheless, theprospect of forging social partnershipsacross sectoral lines seems to be anidea that is increasingly embracedby greater number of companies inTrinidad and Tobago. Furthermore,becoming a protagonist of CSR itselfand intervening through policyinitiatives and other forms of ‘soft’regulations would give the governmentan opportunity to spearhead nationalefforts of ‘greening’ the economy inline with its own policy objectivesand responding to the evidentenvironmental vulnerabilities ofthe country. Reflecting on the roleof government in CSR in what hecalls ‘Third Generation CorporateCitizenship’, Simon Zadek remarksthat “the issue is not merely whetherthere are things that the governmentAs traditional dividing lines betweenissues, responsibilities, portfoliosand public versus private ‘turfs’ arebecoming increasingly blurred, CEOsare keenly aware of their changingrole in society and of the way inwhich political decision-makers andmembers of the public are viewingtheir contribution to the social andenvironmental development of thecountry. This is reflected in the 75.8%of all CEOs that have expressed theirbelief that companies are increasinglyexpected to take over parts of socialservice delivery previously reservedfor governments. In other words, therole of government is being re-definedas a result of the growing strains onpublic resources and its dependenceon the social engagement of privatecapital suggests the emergence ofa new division of labour betweencompanies and the state with the latterto provide the regulatory frameworkfor the former to deliver social goodsand services in particular areas.In many countries, an importantdriver for the CSR business caseis consumers. Businesses, manyCSR practitioners argue, havebeen prompted into changing theircorporate behaviour as well as thenature of their production processesand manufacturing conditionsbecause of the pressure generatedthrough ‘ethical consumerism’.The latter contains both a positive(‘reward’) and negative (‘punishment’)Rationale for Public SectorInvolvement in CSRThe defensive justifaction forpublic sector actors in middleandlow-income countriesrelates to minimizing thepotentially adverse effects ofCSR on local communities,environments and marketswhen it is imposed throughinternational supply chainsand investment.The proactive justification forpublic sector actors to engagewith CSR is provided by theopportunity to increase thedomestic public benefits ofCSR practices in economic,social and environmentalterms.Adopted from ‘CSR andDeveloping Countries – WhatScope for Government Action’,UN Department of Economicand Social Affairs, SustainableDevelopment InnovationBriefs, Issue 1, February 200725 Simon Zadek, Third Generation Corporate Citizenship – Public Policy and Business in Society, The Foreign Policy Centre and AccountAbility 2001, p.14.39