Corporate Social Responsibility in Shaping Corporate Image: An Empirical Study of State-Owned Enterprises in China

Abstract

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is highly valued by firms for seeking to drive corporate image. State-owned enterprises as special economic and social organizations also look forward to improving its corporate image through engaging into CSR, which is attracting more and more attention in academic and demands theoretical and empirical investigation. This study aims to examine the effects of CSR on corporate image in the SOEs of China. Based on a survey study we test the effects of six dimensions of CSR on two dimensions of corporate image. The authors find different effects of economic responsibility, organizational responsibility, employee responsibility, environmental responsibility, community responsibility and product responsibility on corporate image respectively. Moreover the authors identify the varied moderator effects of consumer CSR support on the relationships between CSR and corporate image. This study not only contributes to understand the internal impact mechanism of CSR on corporate image but also facilitates the explorations about the social context on CSR practices.