THE PERCEPTION AND ROLE OF CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE

The article is focused on the analyses of the issues that the global society faces – hunger, unemployment, ethnic minority inclusion, improvement of labor conditions, the need for highly skilled labor force, illiteracy, drugs and alcohol abuse, crime or poverty, etc. – and which require considerable attention, responsible actions and more concern and involvement from the main economic players on international, regional and national levels. That means the business sector might be the missing link in this challenging puzzle. A series of concepts such as: corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, corporate citizenship, corporate community involvement, promotes and stimulates the contribution of the business sector at the community level in order to solve problems and improve the life of the community. Corporate social responsibility is to be seen as an important feature of the new economy and needs a special attention in order to be efficiently developed and applied in Central and Eastern Europe by private companies, often multinationals that are expanding their operations in order to be consistent with their own best strategic interests.corporate social responsibility, Central and Eastern Europe, social issues