Corporate social responsibility

Abstract

This chapter examines the ideas and ideology associated with the contemporary corporate social responsibility (CSR) movement, and discusses how new approaches to corporate social responsibility are changing the relationship between the corporate and third sectors. Changes in this relationship raise questions in turn about shifts in attitudes, behaviors, and practices within third sector organizations as well as in their external environment. The chapter concludes with an examination of the pressures these trends bring to bear on current conceptualizations of a unique third sector charged with specific roles and civil responsibilities as new systems of global governance emerge in which corporate authority merges, rivals, and even supplants that of the state. © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010.