An American Perspective on International Corporate Social Responsibility
AN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE ON
INTERNATIONAL CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
This researcher's role will be to provide an (not automatically the) American perspective for the symposium on "International Comparative Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility: Democratising Corporate Governance in the Global Economy." (The researcher can give his view as an American, informed by a reading of the relevant American literature.) The symposium subtitle strongly suggests ""democratisation" of corporate governance in a globalizing economy as a thematic approach to corporate social responsibility. The topic problem lies at the interface of stakeholder theory, corporate social responsibility theory, corporate governance theory, and public policy. The theme proposes that in a globalizing economy there should be increasing democratisation of corporate governance as a means for defining and implementing corporate social responsibility principles, processes, and practices to effectuate better responsibility outcomes. The logical scheme is illustrated as follows:
global democratic corporate social
economy corporate governance responsibility outcomes
democratisation corporate social
approaches principles, processes,
and practices
"Democratisation" presumably involves broader and greater stakeholder influence on corporate management decisions, if not broader and greater stakeholder ownership of the firm. (Technically, the term "democratisation" can also refer narrowly to increased investor rights vis-à-vis management as agents.) There are efforts underway for broader stakeholder participation layered on top of increased shareowner democracy. These efforts have occurred in several forms or venues. (1) Earlier there was a corporate constituency movement, whereby some 29 U.S. states effectively increased managerial discretion to consider non-investor interests-especially in acquisition battles. (2) More recently a number of key stock exchanges in Canada and Europe have issued corporate governance reform reports that simultaneously sought to increase managerial accountability to investors and maintain a broader stakeholder orientation. (3) Both Blair and Drucker argued a case for knowledge workers' ownership shares (not necessarily voting rights) on mixed incentive and moral rationales. (4) Most recently an economic democracy movement has developed. (This movement has old roots; see Dahl.) Turnbull (in Australia) has published work advocating that multinational enterprise ownership be transferred over a period of time (via tax incentives) to local citizens. This economic democracy movement may be considered to relationship to Scherer and Smid's recent argument that multinational enterprises should address social and environmental problems of developing countries, because governments are incapable of doing so. Their argument positions multinational enterprises closer to citizens' needs than their own governments in such countries. The relationship between economic democracy and corporate social responsibility for social and environmental problems then involves the following development profile for individual citizens:
INTERNATIONAL CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
This researcher's role will be to provide an (not automatically the) American perspective for the symposium on "International Comparative Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility: Democratising Corporate Governance in the Global Economy." (The researcher can give his view as an American, informed by a reading of the relevant American literature.) The symposium subtitle strongly suggests ""democratisation" of corporate governance in a globalizing economy as a thematic approach to corporate social responsibility. The topic problem lies at the interface of stakeholder theory, corporate social responsibility theory, corporate governance theory, and public policy. The theme proposes that in a globalizing economy there should be increasing democratisation of corporate governance as a means for defining and implementing corporate social responsibility principles, processes, and practices to effectuate better responsibility outcomes. The logical scheme is illustrated as follows:
global democratic corporate social
economy corporate governance responsibility outcomes
democratisation corporate social
approaches principles, processes,
and practices
"Democratisation" presumably involves broader and greater stakeholder influence on corporate management decisions, if not broader and greater stakeholder ownership of the firm. (Technically, the term "democratisation" can also refer narrowly to increased investor rights vis-à-vis management as agents.) There are efforts underway for broader stakeholder participation layered on top of increased shareowner democracy. These efforts have occurred in several forms or venues. (1) Earlier there was a corporate constituency movement, whereby some 29 U.S. states effectively increased managerial discretion to consider non-investor interests-especially in acquisition battles. (2) More recently a number of key stock exchanges in Canada and Europe have issued corporate governance reform reports that simultaneously sought to increase managerial accountability to investors and maintain a broader stakeholder orientation. (3) Both Blair and Drucker argued a case for knowledge workers' ownership shares (not necessarily voting rights) on mixed incentive and moral rationales. (4) Most recently an economic democracy movement has developed. (This movement has old roots; see Dahl.) Turnbull (in Australia) has published work advocating that multinational enterprise ownership be transferred over a period of time (via tax incentives) to local citizens. This economic democracy movement may be considered to relationship to Scherer and Smid's recent argument that multinational enterprises should address social and environmental problems of developing countries, because governments are incapable of doing so. Their argument positions multinational enterprises closer to citizens' needs than their own governments in such countries. The relationship between economic democracy and corporate social responsibility for social and environmental problems then involves the following development profile for individual citizens:
![Corporate Social Responsibility [CSR].](https://mbt-essays-prod-public.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/87818/listing/87818_1.jpg)