Purpose Inspired: by Wayne Visser

S2.E15: Corporate Social Responsibility: An Agenda for the Future

October 18, 2019 Wayne Visser Season 2 Episode 15
Purpose Inspired: by Wayne Visser
S2.E15: Corporate Social Responsibility: An Agenda for the Future
Show Notes

This episode deals with the crucial debate that is beginning to emerge about corporate social responsibility (CSR), which acknowledges that the sophistication of stakeholder challenges and corporate responses has gone up a gear, but questions whether CSR itself is too little too late, or even a red herring. Is CSR a distraction from the more fundamental transformation (perhaps revolution even) of the capitalist business model which is needed? And as CSR becomes an established professional practice, will it take as given that its purpose is to benefit those who employ its professionals, rather than a primary goal of transforming the world? If so, CSR will have contributed towards a global Crash and Burn scenario, with growing ecological and social degradation. We have to find the courage to be self-critical, and explore what we are thinking and doing. It is through this reflexivity that CSR might avoid being complicit in a global Crash and Burn and become a crucial part of a Rise and Shine scenario, where the world achieves a greater harmony between people and with the ecology. This scenario requires systemic change.