Contents

• Introduction 2
• James Hardie - CSR Frameworks & Concepts 2
• CSR Reporting 3
• Rationale Triangle 3
• The Managerialist rationale: 4
• The Public Interest rationale 4
• Value Shift 4
• AAA1000 Framework for Ethics and Social Accountability 5
• TBL reporting 6
• Government compliance rules 6
• Government Measures Required 7
• Impact 7
• References 8

Description

Over the past two decade the world has witnessed increased globalization, deregulation, and privatization. Private enterprise today plays an important role in all sphere of life. The challenges facing society today such as environmental climate change, enforcement of labor standards and basic human rights cannot be solved without cooperation of private sector. Social welfare is seeing reduced funding by the government; private corporations are expected to contribute in the improvement of social welfare of citizens and to act in an ethical manner. They are expected to contribute more towards in protection of human rights, environment and maintain social cohesion. This concept is today being known as corporate social responsibility (CSR) and much attention has been paid into this (Carroll, 1979; Utting, 2005; Luo. X. & Bhattacharya C.B, 2006) CSR is an attempt by the company to attain balance between the interests of all its stakeholders and it should be aligned with its strategic objectives and operations.
Milton Friedman (1970) was staunch supporter of the belief in primacy of firm’s self-interest before engaging in CSR. Hence from utilitarian point of view, it is unrealistic to expect corporations to commit resources for social well being in CSR activities since there is no direct return. However, Carroll, 1979; Waddock, 2004; Matten and Crane, 2005 etc belonged to contrarian school of thought and demanded selfless corporate commitment for betterment of society. And they expect corporations to go beyond charity and donations etc.
The middle path towards this dilemma is for the corporations to engage in CSR activity in such ways that it is designed around the business. This is to bring sustainability in the CSR activities which demands that there are benefits from companies CSR activities. Key and Popkin, 1998 etc have mentioned that this can be achieved via interlinking CSR with business strategy and integrating it with the day-to-day operations in activities such as corporate image building.
With this background, we will look into the case at hand
James Hardie case study is analysed while answering the following 2 questions –
• Using CSR Framework, explore broadly the concepts of social responsibility evident in James Hardie case. In doing so, discuss responsibilities to shareholders and stakeholders such as consumers, employees, community and environment in both the domestic and international communities.
• Do you think the government ought to require the companies to report on issues of Corporate social responsibility. What implications would such regulation have on the James Hardie case.