Corporate Social Responsibility

In the wake of recent corporate scandals, Business Ethics magazine, which promotes the movement for corporate social responsibility, is facing up to some unpleasant realities. "It appears that much of the corporate social responsibility movement has dealt in peripheral matters, in language, in mechanical social screens.

"British American Tobacco (BAT) has vowed to plow on with its corporate social responsibility program (CSR) -- despite criticism that its first-ever CSR report is simply a PR exercise," PR Week writes. BAT's released its CSR report last week "after a series of face-to-face forums designed to establish dialogue with its critics." But according to PR Week, more than 130 organizations targeted by BAT refused to participate in the dialogue.

Radio stations won't let environmentalists at the Sierra Club run a radio ad urging the US car industry to build more fuel efficient cars. The ad spot specifically names Bill Ford Jr. of Ford Motor Company, an executive who excels at greenwashing his company with rhetoric, while failing to 'walk the walk.' Ford gives lip service to fuel efficiency, but staunchly opposes laws that would require it. Radio stations doing business with Ford and running its car ads are refusing to run the Sierra Club's radio spot.

Paul Hawken writes that McDonald's recent 'Report on Corporate Social Responsibility' is "a low- water mark for the concept of sustainability and the promise of corporate social responsibility. ... This is ... a report about how a corporation that's been severely stung by bad publicity, poor service and declining earnings now wants to plead its case to its critics. ...