University of Vaasa - Vaasan yliopisto

What is CSR?
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This paper starts the discussion with some arguments as to what CSR is. CSR is
originally based on the Anglo-Saxon corporate culture which centred philanthropy
and donation in CSR, but it has gathered a political attention globally since the
beginning of the 21 st century. Reasons are that government cannot well regulate
companies across border as long as the policy is anchored on a national level, and
that companies are strongly motivated to maximise their profit as often neo-classic
economists presume. Environmental NGOs always criticise company’s behaviour
unsustainable. In sum, the current CSR means the go-beyond-compliance concept
“whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business
operations and in their interaction with their stakeholders on a voluntary basis”
(COM(2001)366 2001). One more to add, Maxwell and Lyon’s definition of CSR for
the environment explains the extent of this that “environmental friendly actions not
required by law, also referred to as going beyond compliance, the private provision
of public goods, or voluntary internalising externalities” (Lyon and Maxwell 2007).
Also important is that interpretation of the concept of CSR is not identical in all
countries, because national institutions which construct actor’s allocation and social
expectation are different (Matten and Moon 2004). We have to be careful in
distinction between CSR and nearly CSR activities. For example, there are different
opinions as to whether Corporate Citizenship should be discussed as the complete
fulfilment of CSR 3 .
Who are Important CSR drivers?
On a practical level, CSR is not a completely unilateral approach of a company. In
fact, CSR started in 1950s as a social responsibility of managers (Carroll 1999)
however through the extent that companies more actively take care of the society in
which they are located (Pleon Gmbh and IFOK Gmbh 2008). Morimoto (2004)
argued that the essence of CSR is dependent on the expectations of stakeholders
which depend on cultural and institutional contexts. In sum CSR is a tool to respond
to the expectations of stakeholders which cannot be handled in markets. Therefore a
core is how to involve such invisible requirements of stakeholders in company’s
management. In this case, the core of CSR is communication. An important question
was what constructs a society a company takes care of, namely who stakeholders are 4 .
It is true that as many actors as possible should be involved in a comparative study.
There are many important stakeholders who actually should not be ignored in Japan
and Germany. Local communities, citizen initiatives, public organisations,
economical organisations, competitors, consumers, labour unions are examples of
this. But the mention of all actors makes a discussion complicating. Alberini and
Segerson (2002) extracted drivers promoting environmental voluntary programs
which is a part of the the environmental CSR. They result a regulator (government),
3 See also Debate about social responsibility in both countries
4 The stakeholder theory defines stakeholders as “any group or individual who is affected by or can affect the
achievement of an organisation’s objectives” (Freeman and McVea 2001).