CSR and Competitiveness European SMEs - KMU Forschung Austria

18 CSR and Competitiveness - European SMEs’ Good Practice - Consolidated European Report
European Awareness Raising Campaign on CSR for SMEs including a wide range of events
throughout Europe as well as the establishment of an informative website 16 . Furthermore, DG
Enterprise realised the “Responsible Entrepreneurship” project which identified case studies
from SMEs across Europe as well as the “Mainstreaming CSR among SMEs” launched in
September 2005 – whereof the study on hand is a part of. A recent initiative of the DG
Enterprise and Industry is the European Responsible Entrepreneurship Bulletin (first issue: 1 st
quarter 2007) which is a quarterly e-newsletter aiming to exchange information and ideas about
responsible entrepreneurship, corporate social responsibility and small and medium-sized
enterprises. 17
A specific initiative of the European Union in the field of CSR already mentioned (see chapter
3.1) was the European Multi-stakeholder Forum on CSR, being active between 2002 and
2004. It was chaired by the European Commission and consisted of European representative
organisations of employers 18 , business networks 19 , trade unions 20 and NGOs. The Forum
aimed to foster CSR and promote innovation, convergence as well as transparency of CSR
practices and tools through improving knowledge and exploring possibilities for establishing
common guiding principles at EU level.
Next to this forum, there exists a comparably wide range of supra-national networks in the
field of CSR, some of which will be presented in the following, giving a brief clue on the
heterogeneous approaches taken towards CSR:
• The European Alliance on CSR initiated in 2006 is a political umbrella organisation for
new or existing CSR initiatives by large companies, SMEs and their stakeholders
aiming to give a new impulse to make Europe a pole of excellence on CSR. It should
lead to new partnerships and new opportunities for all stakeholders in their efforts to
promote CSR. 21 The Alliance is supported by the Union of Industrial and Employers’
Confederations of Europe (UNICE), the European Association of Craft, Small and
Medium-sized Enterprises (UEAPME) and CSR Europe.
• CSR Europe is a business network consisting of more than 60 leading multinational
corporations as direct members and of further 1,400 companies through 18 National
Partner Organisations. Since its launch (under the name of “European Business Network
for Social Cohesion”) in 1995 the network aims to help companies to achieve
profitability, sustainable growth and human progress by placing corporate social
responsibility in the mainstream of business practice. 22
• The European Environment and Sustainable Development Advisory Councils
(EEAC) are a unique collaboration between the advisory councils for environmental
policy and sustainable development. It was set up by European governments in 1993
aiming to provide independent, scientifically based consultancy regarding the
environmental and sustainable development. In 2006, more than 30 councils from
16 European countries participated in that network. 23
16 See http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/csr/campaign/index_en.htm
17 Source: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/csr/sme.htm
18
E.g. Union of Industrial and Employers’ Confederations of Europe (UNICE), the European Centre for Public
Enterprises and Services of General Economic Interest (CEEP), the European Association of Craft, Small and
Medium-sized Enterprises (UEAPME) or Eurocommerce
19
E.g CSR Europe, the European Round Table of Industrialists, the European Confederation of Workers’ Cooperatives,
Social Co-operatives and Participative Enterprises or EUROCHAMBRES
20 E.g. European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) or the Comité Liaison CEC, Eurocadres
21 Source: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/csr/policy.htm
22 Source: http://www.csreurope.org/
23 Source: http://www.eeac-net.org/