CSR As Imperialism: Towards a Phenomenological Approach to CSR In the Developing World

Abstract

The voices of local manufacturers have largely been overlooked in academic and policy debates on corporate social responsibility (CSR) in the developing world. This article makes a contribution towards filling this gap in the literature by explicitly taking a phenomenological approach that maps the interpretations given to Western-based CSR initiatives by local manufacturers. Data from two qualitative research projects on CSR initiatives in the soccer ball industry of Sialkot, Pakistan, are utilized to explore this issue in an inductive and exploratory manner. The article suggests that many soccer ball manufacturers in Sialkot perceive CSR as part of the wider historic project of Western imperialism in the developing world through which economic resources are extracted from local manufacturers while their perceptions of what constitutes socially responsible behaviour are delegitimized. This counter-discourse of CSR as Western imperialism paves the way for an alternative reading of CSR that challenges both more management-oriented mainstream conceptions of CSR and more critical contributions to the CSR and development literature. The article suggests that this alternative reading of CSR as Western imperialism may have significant implications for future change management research and practice.

Keywords:

• Corporate social responsibility
• postcolonialism
• imperialism
• developing countries
• soccer ball industry
• corporate codes of conduct

Notes

This is not to say that firms based in the developed world always comply with their legal obligations. Research from the field of criminology demonstrates how some corporations and managers routinely violate government laws and regulations pertaining to worker and public safety (Punch, 2000). For example, General Electric has routinely violated the law and has been prosecuted by U.S. state and federal authorities for a whole litany of offences from making defective products to over-invoicing the U.S. government on contracts (Grieder, 1996). The recent corporate scandals in the West (e.g. Enron) and the financial meltdown are indications that even making corporations fulfill the letter of the law may be a challenge in the West leave alone voluntarily going beyond it through CSR.

Other parts of these data subsets have already been reported elsewhere (Khan, 2004, 2007; Khan et al., 2007; Lund-Thomsen 2008; Boje and Khan, 2009).

For the history of the child labour controversy and efforts to remove child labour from the Sialkot soccer ball industry, refer to Khan et al. (2007) and Boje and Khan (2009).