Management & Marketing no. 2/2014

Corporate social responsibility versus corporate social iresponsibility

Mirela Popa,
Babeş‐Bolyai University, Cluj‐Napoca, Romania

Irina Salanță,
Babeş‐Bolyai University, Cluj‐Napoca, Romania

Abstract. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been an intensively researched topic in the last decades. More and more scientists manifested interest in this concept and elaborated various definitions. Gradually, CSR evolved from a theoretical concept to a complex managerial tool used to build a company’s reputation and enlarge its competitive advantage. It was soon a must have for more and more companies. Although only large corporations used it at first, today CSR is part of the business strategy of many small and medium size companies also. The more popular it became, the more it grew in complexity and the idea of corporate social irresponsibility arose. Corporate social irresponsibility (CSI) refers to the dark side, as it investigates the wrongful and damaging business decisions that managers might take. In this article we provide a viewpoint on the conceptualization of the two topics and the distinction between them. Through an evaluation of the academic literature, we provide an explanatory view of corporate social responsibility and corporate social irresponsibility emphasizing their most popular definitions, historical development and relevance for companies. The opinions expressed in the article can be useful for both academia and managers as we give suggestions on finding ways to reduce CSI and enhance CSR.

Keyword: corporate social responsibility, corporate social irresponsibility, organizational social responsibility.

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