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One Vision, Different Paths: An Investigation of Corporate Social Responsibility Initiatives in Europe

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“But you know what the funniest thing about Europe is?…It’s the little differences.”—Vincent Vega (John Travolta), Pulp Fiction.

Abstract

This comparative study explores 499 corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives implemented by 178 corporations in five distinct, institutionally consistent European clusters. This study provides an empirically grounded response to calls to develop comprehensive, nuanced pictures of CSR in the composite European business environment. In so doing, the article stresses three distinct, non-exclusive approaches that characterize the embedding of CSR considerations in corporations’ strategies across Europe and the CSR challenges for corporations operating in different socio-political contexts. Furthermore, the study reaffirms the CSR notion as a contextualized concept, shaped by socio-political drivers, and contributes by bridging macro-level, socio-political facets of CSR with its meso-level, organizational implications.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. IESEG School of Management (LEM-CNRS - UMR 9221), 3 rue de la Digue, 59000, Lille, France

    François Maon & Valérie Swaen

  2. Université catholique de Louvain, 1 Place des Doyens, 1348, Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium

    Valérie Swaen

  3. Cardiff Business School, University of Cardiff, Aberconway Building, Colum Drive, Cardiff, CF10 3EU, UK

    Adam Lindgreen

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  1. François Maon
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  2. Valérie Swaen
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  3. Adam Lindgreen
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Correspondence to Adam Lindgreen.

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Alex Michalos served as editor for this article.

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Maon, F., Swaen, V. & Lindgreen, A. One Vision, Different Paths: An Investigation of Corporate Social Responsibility Initiatives in Europe. J Bus Ethics 143, 405–422 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-015-2810-2

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