Mapping Corporate Social Responsibility Research: A Bibliometric analysis

Abstract

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a multidisciplinary concept which has gained attention with numerous exploratory, descriptive and empirical research conducted worldwide across various academic fields. This paper quantitatively analyses the existing research in order to provide scientific mapping on this subject area. The objective of the study is to summarise the existing research and identify future scope of research on the topic corporate social responsibility. For this Scopus database is selected to extract research documents, since it is a wide database that provides quality research articles on the topic. Total 1301 research documents published across 315 journals as well as 7946 sources referred by these articles were extracted following the scientific search on the Scopus database in order to conduct Bibliometric analysis over biblioshiny. Biblioshiny is a web-based software using R studio through which descriptive analysis, citation analysis, co-citation analysis, Thematic analysis, network analysis and data visualization is conducted. Thematic analysis in the study suggests various new themes have evolved across the topic making the topic interdisciplinary. Citation and co-citation analysis indicate existence of influential authors and documents with limited author collaboration in research expertise on this topic. The study identifies the emerging themes as well as prospective and new themes like environment, carbon credit, innovation, and decision making for future studies on this subject area. The results of the study provide insights for policy makers for promoting sustainable and conclusive development.