The
EC is seeking views on whether it should become more involved in CSR.
Proponents should resist the siren call, says Martin Le Jeune
At the end of its comprehensive, if unexciting, green paper on
corporate social responsibility, the European Commission asks what more
could it do to promote socially responsible business in Europe. The
answer, dear eurocrats, is to go and … well I leave you to supply the
rest.
You might think that to be a harsh reaction to a
worthy attempt to summarize where we have got to on CSR. But I would
extend the same advice to any government that moves its tanks into this
territory. CSR and governments are like alternating whisky and wine –
they don’t mix well and leave you with a nasty headache in the morning.
CSR is proverbially difficult to define, but one of the accepted truths
about the term is that the activity goes beyond what is required by
state regulation. Laws set the minima which companies must observe: CSR
represents a voluntary extension of corporate activity in society.
Businesses have to realize that as far as the European Union is
concerned, CSR is a one-way street with the Commission driving the car.
Politicians all – reluctantly or not – have signed up to the
proposition that small government and market forces deliver greater
long-term prosperity. CSR bobs along like a raft for a drowning man,
offering the opportunity for social objectives to be fulfilled – at no
direct cost to the taxpayer, and with no need for unpopular legislation.
If you think this is too cynical, take another look at the green paper.
Apart from its inability to make a convincing business case for
anything it talks about, what strikes the UK reader is the
extraordinary emphasis placed on employee issues compared with any
other aspect of CSR – sustainability, environment, community
involvement, you name it. That this emphasis coincides with the
Commission’s long-held wish to extend employee rights to a degree
hitherto resisted by some member countries is surely not a coincidence.
Likewise, anyone who heard the last UK CSR minister, Kim Howells,
speaking on the subject would have spotted the obsession with involving
companies in education – at a time when the government’s expenditure
record in schools was under hostile scrutiny. Taking this view of CSR
and governments does not mean you are against more spending on
education. But these policy decisions should be part of the democratic
process, not surreptitiously imposed on companies under the banner of
CSR. For business to encourage further EC involvement in CSR would be
to accept the vampire’s kiss. Seductive at first, the result would be a
living death for the innovative and voluntary aspects of the CSR
success story.
