Most theorizing on the relationship between corporate social/environmental performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP) assumes that the current evidence is too fractured or too variable to draw any generalizable conclusions. With this integrative, quantitative study, we intend to show that the mainstream claim that we have little generalizable knowledge about CSP and CFP is built on shaky grounds. Providing a methodologically more rigorous review than previous efforts, we conduct a meta-analysis of 52 studies (which represent the population of prior quantitative inquiry) yielding a total sample size of 33,878 observations. The meta-analytic findings suggest that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility is likely to pay off, although the operationalizations of CSP and CFP also moderate the positive association. For example, CSP appears to be more highly correlated with accounting-based measures of CFP than with market-based ...

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Corporate Social and Financial Performance: A Meta-Analysis

Companies are increasingly asked to provide innovative solutions to deep-seated problems of human misery, even as economic theory instructs managers to focus on maximizing their shareholders' wealt

Misery Loves Companies: Rethinking Social Initiatives by Business:

I offer an institutional theory of corporate social responsibility consisting of a series of propositions specifying the conditions under which corporations are likely to behave in socially responsible ways. I argue that the relationship between basic economic conditions and corporate behavior is mediated by several institutional conditions: public and private regulation, the presence of nongovernmental and other independent organizations that monitor corporate behavior, institutionalized norms regarding appropriate corporate behavior, associative behavior among corporations themselves, and organized dialogues among corporations and their stakeholders. Concerns about corporate social responsibility have grown significantly during the last two decades. Not only has the issue become commonplace in the business press and among business and political leaders (Buhr & Graf

http://laisumedu.org/DESIN_Ibarra/desin/imagenescampbell/tres-c.pdf

Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? an institutional theory of corporate social responsibility

Men and Women of the Corporation

In this review, the primary subject is the ‘business case’ for corporate social responsibility (CSR). The business case refers to the underlying arguments or rationales supporting or documenting why the business community should accept and advance the CSR ‘cause’. The business case is concerned with the primary question: What do the business community and organizations get out of CSR? That is, how do they benefit tangibly from engaging in CSR policies, activities and practices? The business case refers to the bottom-line financial and other reasons for businesses pursuing CSR strategies and policies. In developing this business case, the paper first provides some historical background and perspective. In addition, it provides a brief discussion of the evolving understandings of CSR and some of the long-established, traditional arguments that have been made both for and against the idea of business assuming any responsibility to society beyond profit-seeking and maximizing its own financial well-being. Finally, the paper addresses the business case in more detail. The goal is to describe and summarize what the business case means and to review some of the concepts, research and practice that have come to characterize this developing idea.

/pdf/the-business-case-for-corporate-social-responsibility-a-1qhpc3nysa.pdf

The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Review of Concepts, Research and Practice

In an era of rising concern about financial performance and social ills, companies’ economic achievements and negative externalities prompt a common question: Does it pay to be good? For thirty-five years, researchers have been investigating the empirical link between corporate social performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP). In the most comprehensive review of this research to date, we conduct a meta-analysis of 251 studies presented in 214 manuscripts. The overall effect is positive but small (mean r = .13, median r = .09, weighted r = .11), and results for the 106 studies from the past decade are even smaller. We also conduct sensitivity analyses to determine whether or not the relationship is stronger under certain conditions. Except for the effect of revealed misdeeds on financial performance, none of the many contingencies examined in the literature markedly affects the results. Therefore, we conclude by considering whether, aside from striving to do no harm, companies have grounds for doing good - and whether researchers have grounds for continuing to look for an empirical link between CSP and CFP.

Does it Pay to Be Good...And Does it Matter? A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship between Corporate Social and Financial Performance

Contents: A.P. Brief, J.P. Walsh, Series Editors' Foreword. Part I:Introduction. Part II:A Brief Orientation to the Question. Constructing the Business Case for Corporate Social Performance. Academic Debate. Purpose of This Compendium. Part III:An Integrated Portrait of the Empirical Literature. Method. Corporate Samples. Measuring Financial Performance. Measuring Social Performance. Summary of Results. Mechanisms and Control Variables. Conclusions.

People and profits? : the search for a link between a company's social and financial performance

https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/~/media/Files/Faculty/Research/ArticlesBookChaptersWorkingPapers/walsh%20weber%20margolis%20jom%202003.ashx

Social Issues and Management: Our Lost Cause Found

Does power corrupt a moral identity, or does it enable a moral identity to emerge? Drawing from the power literature, we propose that the psychological experience of power, although often associated with promoting self-interest, is associated with greater self-interest only in the presence of a weak moral identity. Furthermore, we propose that the psychological experience of power is associated with less self-interest in the presence of a strong moral identity. Across a field survey of working adults and in a lab experiment, individuals with a strong moral identity were less likely to act in self-interest, yet individuals with a weak moral identity were more likely to act in self-interest, when subjectively experiencing power. Finally, we predict and demonstrate an explanatory mechanism behind this effect: The psychological experience of power enhances moral awareness among those with a strong moral identity, yet decreases the moral awareness among those with a weak moral identity. In turn, individuals' moral awareness affects how they behave in relation to their self-interest.

Joshua D. Margolis

Papers

Misery Loves Companies: Rethinking Social Initiatives by Business:

Does it Pay to Be Good...And Does it Matter? A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship between Corporate Social and Financial Performance

People and profits? : the search for a link between a company's social and financial performance

Social Issues and Management: Our Lost Cause Found

Does power corrupt or enable? When and why power facilitates self-interested behavior