Editorial

Citation

Aras, G. and Crowther, D. (2012), "Editorial", Social Responsibility Journal, Vol. 8 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/srj.2012.36808aaa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Social Responsibility Journal, Volume 8, Issue 1

As we follow recent issues in the business environment, we will notice that corporate social responsibility (CSR) is getting to be one of the most leading corporate interests and becoming a necessity. After the recent financial crisis corporate managers seem to have realised that one key element of a long lived and sustainable company must be a focus on stakeholders. Stakeholders are carrying company away from any financial distress and crisis. It is for this reason that CSR is not any more optional and extra for companies – it is an essential component of success. Socially responsible activities and socially responsible management is inevitable for companies to protect from themselves unexpected result and conditions. Moreover the business environment is getting more fragmented and fragile than before and market competition is increasing rapidly. Companies are needing to find ways to survive and to be durable in these competitive market conditions. Now we all believe that financial performance and company growth are not the only performance indicators any more. Business managers have learned that social performance is also important to keep long-term relationships healthy between stakeholders and the company.

It is fortunate that business managers also understand economic reality and therefore understand that the way to survive and prosper during the recession is not to abandon CSR but to do the opposite. So during the recession we have witnessed businesses focusing upon CSR as a way to manage through the recession; and we have seen businesses which do this prosper while others have fallen by the wayside. So rather than seeing a reduction in concern for CSR we are actually seeing the opposite – an increasing concern.

Social responsibility has of course always been also a global concern. However again the latest financial crisis has raised, to an even greater extent, a concern with socially responsible behaviour – not just for corporations but also for governments and other organisations and for citizens as individuals. This has always been the concern of this journal – reflected in this issue just as much as in all the preceding issues. Nevertheless we welcome the raising of the profile of socially responsible activity and confidently expect that it will be a crucial part of the recovery from the economic crisis.

Social Responsibility Journal is of course interdisciplinary in its focus and international in its outlook – and this is always reflected in the papers published in this volume, and others. In this issue of the Social Responsibility Journal, you will find rich international diversity as well as equally diverse subjects tackled in the papers. So the papers here point out such issues as management behaviour and human resource aspects of social responsibility, and some related labour issues. They also cover such things as environment performance in Malaysia and Australia, small business in South Africa; labour issues in Indonesia, employee volunteering in Israel, human resource disclosure in Spain, and leadership and ethics in Vietnam. All papers have however the commonality that they investigate an aspect of social responsibility.

Social Responsibility Journal is of course the official journal of the Social Responsibility Research Network (SRRNet) – www.socialresponsibility.biz. Producing it is one of the main activities which the network undertakes. Our aim in the production of this journal therefore is to further the discourse of social responsibility. In doing so however it is also one of changing this global village into a global community. And in a community everyone has a voice, even those dissenting – again one of the aims of this journal. There is nothing further to say at this point, from an editorial perspective, except to read the content and more particularly contribute to the debate. With that we leave you to read the papers, hoping that this will inspire you to contribute to a future edition.

Güler Aras, David Crowther