Corporate Social Responsibility: Issues and Controversies

Abstract

In recent times, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become an ever-increasing debatable topic of discussion among researchers and practitioners. But lack of a unified definition of CSR creates controversies at the conceptual levels of different of its stakeholders. It creates a big problem for the researchers to make a cohesive empirical view of CSR and its impact is difficult to measure. Wide gap also exists between stakeholders‟ perception of CSR and corporate practices. CSR means different things to different stakeholders. Stakeholder concept of CSR, though is seemingly holistic, nevertheless, generate a lot of issues and controversies at the conceptual levels of various stakeholders. This paper, while investigating CSR literature, will make an attempt to identify various issues and controversies.