Corporate Social Responsibility

Corporate Social Responsibility and Ethics

Stephen M Russell

University of Phoenix

International Marketing

MK 571

Mr. Danny Rubick

June 13, 2011

Abstract

Ethics is sometimes described as a body of standards or human conduct that governs the behavior of individuals and groups. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the way a company manage the business processes to produce and overall positive impact on society. The three levels of this CSR are economic, legal and ethical. A company needs to be more than economically and legally responsible, it must include ethics and these ethics must be above the bare minimum legal requirements. (Gehrke, 2008) You hear of labor issues, environmental issues and the one this paper will discuss is government corruption. Many companies allow governments to be corrupt and they are allowed to steal from their own people. Such is the case in Nigeria, so PUR Packets will need to be aware of this dilemma and work closely with the government to make sure all business is legal, economical and ethical.

Corporate Social Responsibility and Ethics

Corporate Social Responsibility is a form of self regulation, conscious attempts and self efforts undertaken by an organization for enhancement of operations. CSR is usually part of a business model and should be part of the marketing strategy. CSR in its best element promotes public interest encouraging community growth and development, and it eliminates practices that harm that same public interest. It is sometimes referred to as the 3 P’s, people, planet and profit. The last of the three can sometimes cause a company to overlook some ethics. This is also true of some governments and Nigeria is no exception. (Yosuf, 2007)

Nigerian Government Corruption. According to the African Union the government of Nigeria steals around $150 million per year from the people. Forbes magazine lists the 16 most corrupt countries and Africa has 9 and Nigeria is number 3 on the...