Cultural Theoretical Approaches And CSR

CULTURAL THEORETICAL APPROACHES AND CSR

Introduction: A number of research on CSR address the topic from two points of view, one being CSR as a complementary or alternative taxonomy of a business and the other being creating a relationship between CSR and performance aspects of a business e.g. market share, shareholder value and brand recognition and so on. There exist a number of attempts to both conceptualize and understand CSR as empirical evidence, primarily because managers in different countries have a wide range of attitude towards the whole idea of CSR. The disparity is also evident in the way different firms communicate the different CSR activities to implement alongside its impact on the foreign investors.

Most literature reviews address CSR with the managers as the only subject of interest or within one given country or a cultural group. Due to this, little effort is put to help in reconciling CSR issues that face a multinational organization, with a diversified workforce culturally and operating in several countries. Cultural dimensions can readily be generalized to a wider stakeholder set, this includes: the employees, consumers and shareholders. The consumers have the power to dictate the behavior of managers in a firms through their consumption behavior primarily why cultural theoretical approaches and CSR is an important relationship for any business. This paper will address the implementation of CSR and its principles within an organization as well as the external factors that defines the context of its policies.

CSR can be grouped into four groups namely: The private wealth creating and instrumental models, where the shareholder’s value is maximized, The political and social models, The integrating social demands models and the ethical models. The four form the basis of discussion for this paper. The negotiation dance: Time, culture, and behavioral sequences in negotiation: In their work, Adair, and Brett, (2005) addresses the effects of culture, behavior and time on negotiation. The two propose a normative model where transactional negotiation incorporating competitive and cooperative behavior both wanes and wax across four different stages. The stages are: a relational position, problem identification, solution generation and realizing an agreement.

Based on communication flexibility especially in the high-context cultures, Adair, and Brett, (2005) implemented a culture-specific dyadic movement across the four stages. The results of their work confirmed that there exists a varied sequence pattern across the four different stages with particular sequences varying with the sample’s culture. This thus shows that in an attempt to realize the four main goal of CSR, negotiation, which is highly dictated by cultures, is important. Adair, and Brett, (2005) suggested that this is an important model that managers need to use to manage the strategic and evolving focus of their negotiation. Using reciprocal –information sequence as well as influence-information sequence in the first two stages of negotiation is key in generating the groundwork for a joint gain.

The Hofstede model: Applications to global branding and advertising strategy and research: Most research pays more attention to the need of adapting to advertising and branding strategies over the impact of culture on consumer behavior. In an attempt to shed light to this neglected concept, De Mooij, and Hofstede, (2010) addressed the issues revolving around it using the Hofstede model which is the most used among several others. The Hofstede model is a cultural dimension theory used as a framework for any cross-cultural communication. The model as stated by De Mooij, and Hofstede, (2010) in their work, gives an insight of a society’s value and culture on its members as well as how they relate to their behaviors in this case, consumption behavior. Additionally, the two authors described elements of the model relevant to advertising and branding: Power Distance (PDI), Individualism versus Collectivism (IDV), Masculinity versus Femininity (MAS) and Uncertainty Avoidance (UAI) as well as sought more information from reviews that have used the model in the past for inter- advertising and national branding. De Mooij, and Hofstede, (2010) discovered that cross-cultural consumer has over the years changed and as a result dictate the best out of the four CSR groups to be implemented by a business. The Hofstede model as stated in their work is an important instrument in understanding consumer behavior across the different cultures making it important for branding and advertising a business.

Whichever of the four groups of CSR, the Hofstede model as stated by De Mooij, and Hofstede, (2010) is crucial for the success of a business. The structure of cultural identity in an ethnically diverse sample of emerging adults: Schwartz, Zamboanga, Rodriguez, and Wang, (2007) presented a study aimed at examining the structure of cultural identity in the USA across persons and variables. They used an ethnically diverse sample to measure the orientation towards the American cultural practices, familyism, ethnic identity, individual collectivism, acculturation strategies and independence-interdependence. The results as stated by the four yielded three categories of cultural identity namely: biculturalism, heritage-culture identity and American-culture identity. Ethnic differences came about as a result of emerging association of cultural identity factors identified as: perceived ethnic discrimination, acculturative stress and familial ethnic socialization. Across persons, Schwartz, Zamboanga, Rodriguez, and Wang, (2007) cluster-analytic procedures showed two groups of participants, those that American and heritage cultures and American-culture identity highly. The above indicates that culture identity is important when it comes to consumers. Thus to realize any of the four groups of CSR, it is important for a business to put this idea into consideration before settling for one that best suites its goals and objectives.

The Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness Research Program: Javidan, Dorfman, Sully de Luque, and House, (2006) state that global leadership is the key for realizing success for multinational corporations. A number of proposals have been given on how to trade globally but the three argue that there are no practical or theoretical viewpoints on how to succeed in international markets. Javidan, Dorfman, Sully de Luque, and House, (2006) use a case of an American Executive who is in charge of teams in China, France, Brazil and Egypt to discuss the cultural implications of such an environment. The three argue that its takes a specific advice and an in-depth action oriented, this includes effectively interacting with employees form different cultures as well as recognizing and embracing the consequences.

SMEs and CSR theory: Evidence and implications from an Italian perspective: Corporate social responsibility (CSR) over the years has acquired high degree of relevance in a number of factors. According to Perrini, (2006) practitioners and academics are coming up with best practices and knowledge to improve social responsible competences. He additionally tries to explain the relationship between CSR and small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs). Perrini, (2006) argues that all research conducted by large firms should be based on the stakeholder theory whereas the CSR researches should be based on social capital. This he additionally argues is because as showed based on the population sample used in Italy, social influence greatly determines whether the CSR initiative of an organization actually realizes it’s set goals and objectives. One of the factors that directly influence social capital and is common in all the sample data is that culture greatly influences consumption behavior thus the need to put cultural differences into consideration when coming up with a CSR initiative.

Value priorities as combining core factors between CSR and reputation a qualitative study.: Siltaoja, (2006) explores the nature of corporate reputation and social responsibility (CSR) qualitatively. With keen interest, the author addresses the two from the viewpoint of value theory. He addresses the various priorities around reputation and CSR actions with the aim of categorizing the values and help organizations make informed decisions. Siltaoja, (2006), discusses the theory of content and structure identifying the principal values in different cultures. From this research Siltaoja, (2006) states that value priority is an influence aspect in CSR actions, simply because it influences the essence of reputation in a corporate context. The aspect of good branding in the eyes of the consumers and a selling point for an organization is well brought out by Siltaoja, (2006), stating that any CSR initiative should not only be financial centered in terms of returning revenue to an organization but it should also act as a branding mechanism. He concluded by stating that CSR initiative that end up branding an organization are more important in realizing an organizational short and long-term goals.

“Implicit†and “explicit†CSR: A conceptual framework for a comparative understanding of corporate social responsibility: Matten, and Moon, (2008) address the issue why corporate social responsibility (CSR) differs from country to country and primarily addresses cultural differences as the main cause. The two addresses two school of thoughts namely the institutional theory to explain the differences between CSR in Europe and the United Stated and secondly the rise of CSR in Europe. One of the reasons for increased CSR in Europe as stated by the authors is as a result of increased investments in environmental and social funds that have increased over the years. This has seen a large number of organization in the country invest in CSR so as not to be left behind as other companies grow and follow suite to this trend. Differences between CSR in Europe and the United Stated are highly dictated by the difference in culture in the two countries as well as the consumer behavior. Just like in all the other reviews, cultural difference

Conclusion

All the above literature reviews indicate that difference in the consumer’s behavior is highly dictated by their culture. Additionally, differences in consumer behavior in different countries are primarily because different countries have different cultures. These differences however can be understood as stated in the standard interpretation of Hofstede framework. A good example is a case where consumers in a given country are individualists; they tend to punish firms often for any bad conduct. In such countries therefore collective attitudes of the consumers are more prevalent. A second case scenario is a situation where consumers considers time as a scares resource are less patient with bad conduct and often punish the concerned organization more often compared to the less time cautious consumers. In a case where an organization operates in cross-cultural environment, high and low distance power is key. High power distance organizations are less likely to be punished for bad conduct if they operate in low power distance countries the opposite also applies. Bad CSR greatly affect stakeholders in such case scenarios as they transpose management strategies implemented overseas. This thus implies that CSR strategies have to accommodate the cultures of overseas markets or hosts than they do in their home market. Organizations that enter a high long-term operation will have to be more tolerant either through internationalism of operations or sales. Consumers in host countries are always accommodating to bad conduct only if in the long term the reward overcomes the loss suffered. Therefore, the relationship between culture and CSR should be well research and strategized for any organization operating or planning to operate internationally as a new market survival and entry strategy respectively.

References

• Adair, W. L., & Brett, J. M. (2005). The negotiation dance: Time, culture, and behavioral sequences in negotiation. Organization Science, 16(1), 33–51.
• de Mooij, M., & Hofstede, G. (2010). The Hofstede model: Applications to global branding and advertising strategy and research. International Journal of Advertising, 29(1), 85–110.
• Javidan, M., Dorfman, P. W., Sully de Luque, M., & House, R. J. (2006). In the eye of the beholder: Cross-cultural lessons in leadership from project GLOBE. Academy of Management Perspectives, 20(1), 67–90.
• Matten, D., & Moon, J. (2008). “Implicit” and “explicit” CSR: A conceptual framework for a comparative understanding of corporate social responsibility. Academy of Management Review, 33(2), 404–424.
• Perrini, F. (2006). SMEs and CSR theory: Evidence and implications from an Italian perspective. Journal of Business Ethics, 67(3), 298–312.
• Schwartz, S. J., Zamboanga, B. L., Rodriguez, L., & Wang, S. C. (2007). The structure of cultural identity in an ethnically diverse sample of emerging adults. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 29(2), 159–173. doi:10.1080/01973530701326486
• Siltaoja, M. E. (2006). Value priorities as combining core factors between CSR and reputation – a qualitative study. Journal of Business Ethics, 68(1), 91–111.