The strategic integration of corporate social responsibility - conceptualisation and scale development

Abstract

In recent years, the importance of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has increased significantly for companies, society, as well as scientific research. Although the need of embedding CSR into firm strategy is widely recognised, both a holistic concept and measurement scale for the strategic integration of CSR and its influencing dimensions are still missing. This paper aims at filling this gap by deducting contributing aspects from management literature and deriving a conceptional framework for integrating CSR into strategy. The influencing dimensions - as they are: embedding in corporate history, culture and values; formalisation of CSR; organisational responsibility for CSR; link to core business and competencies; link to other supply chain activities; use of resources for CSR, and involvement in CSR-related collaboration - are then operationalised. The scale development starts with item pool generation and results after a three-stage pretest in a valid and reliable scale that enables new ways of assessing CSR.