Corporate Stakeholder Management and CSR

The traditional view of CSR, especially in a capitalistic context, focuses mainly on “the conduct of a business so that it is economically profitable, law abiding, ethical and socially supportive” (Carroll, 1983, p. 608). Among these four pillars, profitability and obedience to the law were recognized by Carroll as the “foremost conditions” to be fulfilled (Carroll, 1983, p. 608). Similarly, Freeman (1984) attested that it is important for corporations to make profits while safeguarding the best interest of the primary stakeholders, shareholders in particular, without causing societal harm. Essentially, the early CSR approaches were mostly instrumental, oriented to profits and shareholders, and lacked an integrative, affirmative approach in examining the tension between business and society, and the statutory public responsibility of corporations to society at large (Bowie, 1991; Donaldson & Preston, 1995; Porter & Kramer, 2006).

Subsequently, CSR expanded to encompass a more dynamic and interactive view of advancing various stakeholders’ interests by incorporating the concept of the social contract as the driving force in CSR strategies (Bowie, 1991; Donaldson & Preston, 1995). This socially progressive view has placed much emphasis on fundamental CSR values, including moral obligation and “individual rights and justice” (Bowie, 1991, p. 56) in stakeholder management of CSR. However, CSR strategies are still predominantly passive and reactive, focusing on the traditional economic model of promoting corporate citizenship to “generate profit, provide employment, follow the law, replenish the public coffers, and do no harm” (Vidaver‐Cohen & Altman, 2000, p. 147).

Eventually, a more proactive, community‐integrative mode of CSR emerged to highlight the importance of stakeholder management in CSR for driving corporate success. From the perspective of social issues management, Solomon (1992) suggested that corporate citizenship could only be realized through addressing stakeholder interests while advocating moral obligations to contribute to the local communities (Vidaver‐Cohen & Altman, 2000). Subsequently, Carroll (2004) has revisited his CSR model to highlight the notion of stakeholders, where he redefined “economic responsibility” as “do what is required by global capitalism,” “legal responsibility” as “do what is required by global stakeholders,” “ethical responsibility” as “do what is expected by global stakeholders,” and “philanthropic responsibility” as “do what is desired by global stakeholders” (p. 116). Stakeholder management was placed as the focal point of CSR development in the corporate sector by the European Commission (2012): enterprises “should have in place a process to integrate social, environmental, ethical, human rights and consumer concerns into their business operations and core strategy in close collaboration with stakeholders.”

Public Relations in Strategizing CSR

The role of strategist is equivalent to the significant management role identified by S.‐Y. Kim and Reber (2008) after surveying 313 public relations professionals in the United States. Public relations professionals in this role “strongly advise clients or advocate to management on behalf of CSR issues” (p. 339). Typically, these people are members of the dominant coalition or the CSR team in organizations or are senior public relations consultants at agencies. They usually engage in the following activities to contribute to the strategic development of CSR initiatives: (1) persuade management to adopt CSR within organizations (S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008); (2) inform ethical CSR decision‐making that is situated in the local context by interjecting diverse stakeholder expectations, beliefs, and attitudes to the management discourse, foregrounding marginalized internal voices, and advising on the impact of possible CSR initiatives (Dhanesh, 2013; Reeves, 2016); (3) negotiate new meanings where there is dissensus between organizations and their stakeholders (Dhanesh, 2013); (4) identity and establish strategic partnerships with stakeholders (e.g. governments, nonprofit organizations, and opinion leaders) that facilitate effective CSR performance (Reeves, 2016); (5) conduct a systematic environmental scanning function to detect threats to and opportunities for CSR programs (Heath, 1998; Zurita, 2006); (6) lead the processes for developing a vision statement and code of ethics (S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008). This CSR strategist role was the most common among those who participated in S.‐Y. Kim and Reber’s (2008) study, accounting for 32.9% of the group.

Public Relations in Philanthropy

Philanthropy is a kind of CSR (Carroll, 1991). As S.‐Y. Kim and Reber’s (2008) empirical data have shown, public relations often serves as the decision‐maker in an organization’s community or social philanthropic programs such as giving, employee volunteering, and community relations. An emerging trend in CSR shows that employee volunteering has become one of the fundamental CSR activities worldwide owing to its benefits to both the employee (e.g. skill improvement and job enrichment) and the corporation (e.g. reputation) (Cycyota, Ferrante, & Schroeder, 2016). Meanwhile, an effective CSR practice should go beyond giving money because such philanthropy usually would be “an ad‐hoc project aimed at short‐term social impact” (Zollo, 2004, p. 19). In addition, such philanthropic programs do not create shared experience between the organization and its publics (e.g. employees or nongovernmental organizations) that can result in benefits to the parties.

Public Relations in Value Advocacy

Public relations usually serves as the organization’s conscience by safeguarding the organization’s ethical standards, advocating CSR as a core value or serving as a role model in the organization (Bowen, 2008; Holtzhausen, 2000; S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008). Practicing CSR does not necessarily make an organization ethical. Because the duty of public relations as a profession is to serve the organization and the society, its professionals should engage employees at all levels in the complex ethical and political issues inherent in CSR from the stakeholder’s perspective (L’Etang, 2003). This is because CSR should be a shared responsibility or activity conducted by the organization and its employees rather than those in public relations (Benn, Todd, & Pendleton, 2010). Public relations practitioners should also follow ethical guidelines when communicating CSR to avoid manipulative messages that harm the interest of the public or the beneficiary (L’Etang, 2003).

Another example of this role is the aggregator role of public relations identified by Reeves (2016) that focuses on cultivating CSR as an organizational culture and tradition by storytelling, such as publicizing volunteer work done by individual employees. This work would help cement CSR’s importance as a core value and allow those employees featured in the publicity pieces to serve as role models for others. Furthermore, when public relations enacts a role in cultivating CSR culture in organizations, practitioners become more involved in the planning and implementation of CSR initiatives because of the leadership support (Reeves, 2016). Such involvement leads to public relations leadership in CSR, which in turn facilitates the development of public relations as a profession (Benn et al., 2010).

Other scholars have provided examples of public relations efforts in advocating CSR at the industrial or national levels. Byrd (2009) found international public relations agencies based in the United States had applied the 10 stipulated principles developed by the United Nations Global Compact to consult their clients on human and environmental issues. Therefore, public relations contributed to CSR development by advancing business adoption of global citizenship initiatives. Having said that, Byrd (2009) also argued that more effort was needed to integrate the principles into the internal functions, especially when dealing with ethical and diversity issues. White, Vanc, and Coman (2011) reported how corporations based in the United States performed their corporate citizenship (i.e. a CSR initiative) in Romania to advocate certain social and political issues using transitional public relations, a public relations function that helps the process of transition in postsocialist economies by adapting to the special conditions of those types of economies (Lawniczak, 2007).

Public Relations in CSR Communication

Practitioners in the role of CSR communicators provide communication to effectively plan, implement, and promote CSR initiatives for maximum positive impact on the organization and its involved stakeholders. They can act as publicist, strategic communicator, or both. A publicist publicizes CSR activities using various (online and offline) communication platforms, tactics, and content without overpromotion of the communicator. A strategic communicator recommends CSR communication strategies that support CSR activities (Reeves, 2016). Whether a public relations professional serves more as a strategic communicator or a publicist for CSR activities depends on the professional’s understanding of the business management and the leadership of an organization (Benn el al., 2010).

In the early stage of CSR communication, public relations professionals were largely CSR communicators using external communication to gain positive publicity for CSR activities that address public demands (Bartlett, Tywoniak, & Hatcher, 2007; S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008). Later, public relations professionals became strategic communicators who supported CSR activities by shaping public opinion in favor of the organization’s community relations and CSR performance using participatory, open processes of two‐way communication (Bartlett et al., 2007; Dhanesh, 2013). At this stage, US public relations practitioners utilize “balanced reporting” as a CSR communication tactic to avoid overpromotion or greenwashing (Reeves, 2016). Balanced reporting refers to the use of stories and press releases surrounding a results‐focused report; in other words, it is to “humanize” the disseminated CSR information while simultaneously supporting the information with statistics. Most recently, CSR communication has also taken on a form of transparency and engagement that aims to develop CSR initiatives in a collective process involving both the organization and its publics (S. Kim, 2017).

It is worth noting that a comparison of the results of research on public relations roles in CSR in 2008 and 2016 suggests an increasing weight of public relations in CSR communication efforts: 11% of the surveyed participants in 2008 pinpointed the public relations role of CSR communicators (S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008), while almost all of the interviewed participants in the 2016 research identified communication as the valuable contribution of public relations to CSR (Reeves, 2016). There are three possible explanations for this trend. First, increasing CSR expectations from the public make CSR communication throughout the entire CSR process – planning, implementation, evaluation, and post‐CSR promotion – more significant to organizations in 2016 than it was in 2008. Second, as a result of the increasing CSR expectations, CSR reporting for transparency is now a common, if not required, practice of corporate communication. Lastly, the public relations professionals interviewed contended that with sustainability becoming rooted in every aspect of business, it also needs to be embedded in all internal and external corporate communications (Reeves, 2016).

Public Relations Playing No Role in CSR

Public relations scholars generally conceptualize significant contributions of public relations to CSR because both functions focus on cultivating mutually beneficial organization–public relationships by corporate performance that meets stakeholder expectations (Hung‐Baesecke, Chen, & Boyd, 2016). However, some empirical data show that this theoretical argument does not always hold in practice. For example, S.‐Y. Kim and Reber (2008) found that public relations played no role in CSR in some companies for several reasons, such as the companies’ minimal CSR efforts or public relations practitioners’ skepticism of the corporate motives of CSR initiatives. Even though most companies engage in CSR initiatives, Ruiz‐Mora, Lugo‐Ocando, and Castillo‐Esparcia (2016) found no role of public relations in the CSR efforts of Spanish companies. This result is consistent with the finding of Argandoña, Fontrodona, Ramón, and García (2008, cited in Ruiz‐Mora et al., 2016) that public relations was largely excluded from CSR in Spanish organizations. Ruiz‐Mora et al. (2016) claimed that public relations is necessary in planning and implementing CSR programs because the function excessively involves professional communication to define CSR issues and to engage stakeholders. However, public relations was not involved in CSR in practice for three reasons: (1) public relations practitioners had limited understanding of business, corporate strategies, and sustainability, (2) CSR managers believed they could perform strategic communication despite their lack of skills and knowledge, and (3) CSR programs were largely unidirectional (Ruiz‐Mora et al., 2016).

Stakeholder Theory

The stakeholder theory concerns the relationship between an organization and its stakeholders. This theory was first proposed by Ansoff (1965) and received wide attention in the mid‐1980s (Freeman, 1984). Freeman (1984) contended that a stakeholder is “any group or individual who can affect or is affected by the achievement of the firm’s objectives” (p. 49). Hasnas (1998) posited that organizations should manage the business for the benefit of all the stakeholders, regardless of whether any financial benefits can be generated. The stakeholder theory highlighted stakeholders’ right to know about certain corporation behaviors. As a result, corporate social reporting serves as a mechanism for corporations to disclose whether corporations’ business operations have met society’s expectations, and this disclosure should be responsibility driven, rather than only provided when stakeholders request it (Gray et al., 1996).

Legitimacy Theory

The legitimacy theory argues that a corporation obtains legitimacy by following the expectations and norms of the society in which it operates (Arvidsson, 2010). Hence, Deegan, Rankin, and Tobin (2002) suggested that, in order to gain legitimacy with stakeholders, corporations voluntarily disclose information that is expected by the stakeholders, such as prevention of environmental damage and “employee health and safety issues” (p. 326).

Maignan, Ferrell, and Hult (1999) posited that, according to the rationale of legitimacy theory, when a corporation wants to be perceived as socially responsible, it should make its CSR activities visible to its internal and external stakeholders. Branco and Rodrigues (2006) stated that bigger corporations face more pressure from government and more media scrutiny to be socially responsible than smaller ones. Therefore, having their CSR efforts seen by the society and media is crucial for larger corporations, and this effort can be achieved via corporate communication (Arvidsson, 2010).

Studies employing the stakeholder theory and legitimacy theory in public relations research can be seen through the works of Golob and Bartlett (2007), who investigated CSR communication in Australia and Slovenia, and O’Connor, Shumate, and Meister (2008), who researched the definition and important attributes of CSR perceived by Active Moms (a stakeholder group of mothers aged between 25 and 49 with two or more kids). Their research explained how corporations handled the relationship with stakeholders and how they met stakeholders’ expectations. In Golob and Bartlett’s article in 2007, the results indicated that organizations’ adoption of CSR reporting in both countries was facing market pressures, but due to the differences in foreign investments and social systems, the emergence of CSR reporting in Slovenia was much later than in Australia. Moreover, Australia was adopting a more international standard of CSR reporting, while in Slovenia there was no official standard. Unlike the discussion in Golob and Bartlett’s article, which had a global perspective, O’Connor et al. (2008) took a local community as a basis and found that Active Moms perceived CSR as a contested term blending economic, social, rational, and emotional contexts. Moreover, Active Moms assumed CSR was different from, and more than philanthropy, and pointed out the attributes of corporate ethos (honesty, integrity, and character) and community ethos (compatibility, longevity, and accountability).

Framing Theory

Framing theory has been used extensively in research on communication, economics, sociology, psychology, and political science (Borah, 2011). This theory states that by using framing, the media highlight certain aspects of a topic that they want the audience and the stakeholder to know about, or to reinforce certain perceptions of a topic. Research using framing theory with CSR communication includes Bortree et al.’s (2013) study on environmental CSR advertising in National Geographic magazine, and Steltenpool and Verhoeven (2012), whose study used framing theory to understand the effect of differently framed CSR messages from various sectors on consumers. In their research, Bortree et al. (2013) tracked the trend, content, and types of environmental CSR communication from 1979 to 2008 in National Geographic and identified that a combination of a gain frame (positive message) with a focus on the current generation was the most common strategy. To be more specific, the messages presented in the magazine were mainly about how the readers would be affected personally by the benefits the organizations contributed to the environment. However, Bortree et al.’s study did not find many practices of using the loss frame (negative message) on the current generation, which was most likely to enhance future intended behavior toward the environment (Davis, 1995). In Steltenpool and Verhoeven’s (2012) article, the research results indicated that sector/industry was a crucial factor for the effect of CSR communication. For an organization not socially stigmatized (such as an organization producing non‐alcoholic drinks, e.g. orange juice), CSR framed messages generated a more positive attitude, better reputation, higher buying intentions, and less skepticism compared to no CSR messages. However, for a socially stigmatized organization (for instance, an organization that produces alcoholic drinks, e.g. Italian martini), the results suggested that CSR messages had adverse effects on customers’ perceptions.

Trends in Topics in CSR Communication

There has been a significant increase of publications on the interaction of public relations and CSR since 2006, as noted by T. H. Lee (2017), who provided a systematic review of 133 peer‐reviewed CSR studies published in 11 journals relevant to public relations scholarship from 1980 to 2015. The 133 journal articles included in the analysis could be divided into six research topics: description of CSR practices (n = 27); description of CSR communication (n = 25); effects of CSR (n = 32); conceptual framework (n = 21); role of public relations (n = 16); and stakeholders’ perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs (n = 12). Roles of public relations in CSR initiatives and communication seem to be the second‐least popular among the six research topics. Among the four time periods (1980–2000, 2001–2005, 2006–2010, and 2011–2015) of T. H. Lee’s (2017) analysis, research into the role of public relations in CSR reached its climax in 2006–2010 (n = 10). However, the number of publications on this topic fell to five in 2011–2015. Despite that drop, the total number of CSR publications in public relations scholarship has increased from 50 in 2006–2010 to 73 in 2011–2015. In fact, public relations research in CSR and stakeholder perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs are the only topics that have received less attention in recent years.

Empirical research on the roles public relations assumes in CSR predominantly aims to answer two questions. The primary question asks about the contributions of public relations in planning, performing, and communicating CSR initiatives and comes from the perspective of public relations practitioners. The secondary question discusses the discrepancy between the importance of public relations in CSR theory and the marginalized role of public relations in CSR practice and its causes and implications (Benn et al., 2010; Dhanesh, 2013; S.‐Y. Kim & Reber, 2008; Ruiz‐Mora et al., 2016; Reeves, 2016).

In addition, we also analyzed CSR communication related topics published in two major public relations journals, Journal of Public Relations Research and Public Relations Review, for the trends of topics public relations scholars explored in the recent decade (2007–2017). From 2007 to 2011, the foci of CSR communication research were exploring the contents and channels of CSR communication, consumers’ awareness of corporate CSR communication, and investigating the context of CSR communication. Most of the studies examined took place in the United States.

From 2012 to 2014, besides seeing more research exploring CSR communication topics in different countries, the most common topics in this field included CSR communication of small and medium‐sized enterprises (M. Lee, Mak, & Pang, 2012; Coppa & Sriramesh, 2013; Pastrana & Sriramesh, 2014); CSR communication effects (Steltenpool & Verhoeven, 2012); and strategic CSR communication (Y. Kim, 2014). In the latter study, the topic of CSR skepticism was discussed in a public relations journal for the first time in the recent decade.

From 2015 to 2017, research on strategic CSR communication remained a popular topic (Ozdora‐Aksak, 2015; Dhanesh, 2015). In addition, new topics included CSR and organization reputation (Shim & Yang, 2016), CSR fit (Aksak et al., 2016; Lunenberg, Gosselt, & De Jong, 2016), CSR and social media (Fraustino & Connolly‐Ahern, 2015; Gaither & Austin, 2016; Uzunoglu, Turkel, & Akyar, 2017), CSR skepticism (Rim & Kim, 2016), and CSR disclosure (Bachmann & Ingenhoff, 2016; Devin, 2016).

Summarizing the trends of CSR communication topics in recent years, it is clear that researchers' focus has gone beyond exploring how corporations communicate their CSR initiatives. The development of the research topic has evolved from an explanation of why corporations should engage in CSR communication, to how to communicate, to the benefits of CSR communication, and to communicating CSR in the digital era. Moreover, due to the public expectations for corporate disclosure, CSR communication research also reflects the importance of CSR reporting. Another development worth discussing is the skepticism people have about the motives of CSR communication. This topic has been discussed extensively in the business literature and is becoming a significant factor for the discussion of CSR fit.

A New Development: Creating Shared Values

Criticism of CSR motivations has received much attention. For example, publics will be skeptical of corporate CSR intentions if corporations cannot provide an ethical alignment in their operations (Hollender & Breen, 2010). Scholars also have suggested that CSR initiatives fail to accomplish corporate missions because of corporations’ focus on short‐term profits without attending to stakeholders’ actual needs and concerns (Wójcik, 2016). Responding to the criticism of corporate motivations for performing CSR, Porter and Kramer (2011) proposed the new concept of creating shared values (CSV). CSV refers to “policies and operating practices which enhance the competitiveness of a company while simultaneously advancing the economic and social conditions in the communities in which it operates” (p. 66). Porter and Kramer (2011) also identified CSV as a new way of doing business by both gaining credibility from stakeholders and improving economic and social conditions of the market.

CSV differs from CSR in two ways. First, CSV is internally driven (Wójcik, 2016) inasmuch as CSV increases total economic and social values rather than redistributing “values already created by the firm” (D. Lee et al., 2014, p. 461). Furthermore, CSV integrates social issues with the firm’s core business innovation through operational changes and/or technical support, while CSR initiatives can be separate from the business practice. Hence, CSV is integral to the corporate core business and strategy framework (Wójcik, 2016).

While this concept has gained attention in business scholarship, little has been explored in public relations research. The advantage of CSV is that it can help corporations reach a win‐win business outcome because stakeholders’ issues and concerns can be integrated into business operations. For example, the first two authors of this chapter adopted the CSV concept and explored publics’ perceptions of this concept (Hung‐Baesecke et al., 2018). The in‐depth interviews conducted in the United States and China showed discrepancies in what people believe are the benefits of CSV. For example, Chinese publics interviewed tended to trust CSV‐performing corporations, while their US counterparts trusted such corporations less. However, both US and Chinese publics had positive perceptions of CSV‐performing corporations.

The CSV approach provides a direction for corporations to strategically integrate stakeholders’ values and societal issues into their policies and strategies. The outcomes can be win‐win because corporate behaviors, while directed at profit seeking, provide solutions toward resolving societal problems and at the same time enhance corporate competitive advantage in innovative ways. The context of CSV can be explained by the case of Starbucks in the next section.

In this chapter, we have discussed the importance of CSR, public relations roles in CSR, public relations theories used in CSR communication research, and trends of topics in CSR communication research, and offer a case study on a new trend of a corporation’s combined motives in serving society. Many studies have illustrated the positive aspects of rewards when corporations perform CSR. The topics in CSR research have expanded to integrate multiple disciplines for evaluating the benefits and outcomes of CSR. Even though there is a debate as to whether public relations should have a role in CSR, it is essential for public relations to take advantage of being a corporate boundary spanner and be a strong advocate to corporations to be morally and socially responsible. We consider that by doing so, public relations can fulfill its role in the society.

Suggested Readings

1. Chatterji, A., & Levine, D. (2006). Breaking down the wall of codes: Evaluating non‐financial performance measurement. California Management Review, 48(2), 29–51.
2. Lee, T. H. (2017). The status of corporate social responsibility research in public relations: A content analysis of published articles in eleven scholarly journals from 1980 to 2015. Public Relations Review, 43, 211–218.
3. Porter, M. E., & Kramer, M. R. (2011). Creating shared value. Harvard Business Review, 89(1/2), 62–77.
4. Reeves, H. (2016). Defining public relations’ role in corporate social responsibility programs. PR Journal, 10(2). Retrieved from https://prjournal.instituteforpr.org/wp‐content/uploads/reeves_nz3.pdf
5. White, C., Vanc, A., & Coman, I. (2011). Corporate social responsibility in transitional countries: Public relations as a component of public diplomacy in Romania. International Journal of Strategic Communication, 5, 281–292.

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