CSR Paradigms, Consumer Behaviour, and Business Performance: A Literature-Based Analysis

Abstract

The study sought to contribute to the general body of knowledge and research work in corporate social responsibility. The research work also aimed to establish the most prevalent forms of CSR from the literature and ascertain how CSR influences customer behavior and businesses. Corporate social responsibility is a contentious subject for managers of businesses and their stakeholders. However, this paper’s purpose is to bridge the various pieces of CSR knowledge in literature by systematically reviewing a collection of articles on the subject and drawing valuable conclusions relating to the various paradigms or schools of thought. The researcher, for this study, identified and critically reviewed twenty (20) recent articles on CSR that were gathered from highly recognized and profiled research databases, including Google Scholar, Research Gate, Emerald (database), Elsevier (database), Pro-quest, Scopus, and Springer. Persistent themes on the prevalent forms of CSR; and the influence of CSR on consumer behavior and business performance were observed. It became clear that defining CSR is an arduous task because of the different perspectives of researchers and managers of organizations. Nevertheless, CSR is simply an organization getting back to the people it serves or produces for and offering any form of help that revolves around the environmental, the social, the economic, the stakeholder, and the voluntariness themes: In conclusion, CSR, no matter the angle it is looked at, there is enough evidential proof from the literature that when implemented well, yields enormous benefits to the community and respective businesses. Keywords: Benefits, Business Performance, Consumer Behaviour, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).