Research on social responsibility of small and medium enterprises: a bibliometric analysis

Abstract

Research on corporate social responsibility continues to advance in the context of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), although the results remain fairly contentious and fragmented. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability today are strong trends in the corporate world. This article discusses the literature on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) research in SMEs with the goal of understanding the history and research patterns over the last 20 years based on the review of 120 papers. We describe the contribution of literature in terms of epistemological orientation and identify the state-of-the-art of CSR research by linking it to a bibliometric analysis. In this paper, we contribute to the literature by finding a growing interest of CSR in Europe and North America and a relative increase in CSR empirical studies vis-a-vis a relative decrease in descriptive papers. According to our results, we rank CSR research in SMEs at a growing stage but with theoretical limitations when it comes to evolving into a mature stage and, eventually, provide a reference point for the theoretical and methodological positioning of future research.