This thesis examines corporate social responsibility initially
in Britain, where there has recently been a conspicuous growth
of interest in business social involvement, and Italy. Corporate
social responsibility is defined here as business engagement in
the wider community in order to contribute towards the general
well-being of society. Our analysis employs a hybrid methodology:
we employ a variety of sources, namely, historical texts,
secondary studies and detailed case studies of corporate social
programmes based on in-depth interviews of relevant personnel and
the study of company documents.
Our aim in this study is to provide a general explanation
of why companies go beyond their commercial remit to become
engaged in communitarian and philanthropic action. A socially and
politically informed analysis is furnished: we place this area
in its historical and political context, without losing sight of
the role played by economic forces. Any explanation of
contemporary advances in corporate social responsibility needs
to stress the role of the modern state in society, and, more
specifically, the development of relations between the state and
the business community. It is argued that, in Britain, as a
response to the political and economic crisis of the 1970s, the
links between the business and state sectors became ever closer.
This, as we shall demonstrate, created the institutional
opportunities for active business involvement in society in areas
such as environmental protection, small firm development and
urban regeneration. Italy has seen less political impetus given
to active corporate involvement in society. The most significant
achievements, though, have come from within the state sector.
A final consideration of our social analysis is that we
attempt to analyse the contribution of the private sector to
wider society. This is especially pertinent because, in Britain,
corporate responsibility has come to be seen as a private
solution to public problems. We show, using original case study
material, that there are limits to what companies can achieve on
a social front. We conclude that corporate social responsibility
must emphasise the need for companies to observe social and legal
restrictions in their pursuit of commercial goals, rather than
necessarily engaging actively in social action
