Critical Studies on Corporate Responsibility, Governance and Sustainability

ISSN: 2043-9059

Editor: William Sun
Subject: Business Ethics and Law (view other series in this subject area)
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Information Page

Editorial Objectives
Topicality
Key Benefits
Coverage
Editorial Policy
About the Editor
Contact the Editorial Team
Editorial Advisory Board
Reviews

• Congratulations to Daniel Satchkov, whose paper "The New Paradigm in Risk Management" has been selected by series editor William Sun as the winner of the 2012 Outstanding Contribution Award for Critical Studies on Corporate Responsibility, Governance and Sustainability. Daniel's paper featured in Volume 2, Finance and Sustainability: Towards a New Paradigm? A Post-Crisis Agenda.

Editorial Objectives of the Series

The aim of the book series is to explore public concerns and practical issues deeply and rethink theoretical debates and institutional policies critically in the broad area of corporate responsibility, corporate governance and sustainability around the world. It examines the social, economic and environmental impacts of corporations, and the real effects of corporate governance, CSR and business sustainability on societies in different regions. It facilitates a better understanding of how value systems, cultures and traditions in different societies may affect the policies and practices of corporate responsibility, governance and sustainability. It identifies the future development trends of corporate responsibility, governance and sustainability in contexts when examining and exploring those key issues.

Topicality

The series facilitates idea exchanges and research collaborations between developed and developing countries, and between the West and the East. It promotes best ideas, values, practices and innovations in corporate governance, corporate responsibility and sustainability in the world and encourages holistic thinking, cross-disciplinary research, multiple perspectives and the use of various research approaches and methods.

Key Benefits

The series attempts to fill research gaps in the interrelated fields of corporate responsibility, governance and sustainability; contribute new thinking and fresh insights to the existing knowledge; and provide innovative ideas and approaches for corporate directors, managers, consultants, policy makers, regulators and academics alike. 

Coverage

The series covers the subject areas of corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, business ethics, sustainable business and sustainable development; across various disciplines such as business and management, economics, law, politics, sociology, and philosophy. Examples of topics are:

• Corporate Responsibility and Governance: Lessons from the Global Financial Crisis
• Finance and Sustainability
• Business and Sustainability
• Risk Governance and Management
• Shareholder activism and behavior of institutional shareholders
• Corporate Stakeholder Relationships
• Corporate Social Irresponsibility
• Social and Intellectual Capital
• Value Systems, Cultures and CSR Perceptions
• Comparative Studies of Corporate Responsibility, Governance and Sustainability
• The impacts of religions on corporate responsibility and governance

Editorial Policy

All volume proposals will be reviewed by members of the Editorial Advisory and Review Board, or specially assigned experts, as well as the series editor for acceptance. All volume chapters are subject to double-blind peer reviews plus editorial reviews, in accordance with high academic quality standards. The book series is edited under the advice of the Editorial Advisory and Review Board that is composed of highly experienced senior experts in the related subject areas across countries. For further information about the series, or if you would like to discuss possible contributions to the series, please contact the series editor Dr William Sun.

About the Editor

Dr William Sun is Reader in Management and Leader of Corporate Governance and Sustainability Research Group (CGSRG) at Faculty of Business and Law, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK, where he also serves as an Independent Chair for PhD Viva Voce Examinations and the Course Leader of MSc Corporate Governance. He was Visiting Professor of Management at Harbin Engineering University, 2008-2011, and Harbin University of Commerce, 2009-2011. He has been Co-Chair of the Finance and Sustainability Programme (an international programme initiated by research organizations in UK, France and Switzerland, and international academic associations) since 2009. He is member of the Management Committee of Corporate Governance Special Interest Group, British Academy of Management. He is a reviewer of book proposals and textbooks on corporate governance and corporate strategy for Cambridge University Press, Routledge, Pearson Education, and Emerald.  Dr Sun received his PhD in Corporate Governance from Leeds Metropolitan University in 2002. His areas of expertise and research interests include corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, sustainable business, business ethics, corporate strategy, process philosophy, and research methodology. He is author and co-author of more than 80 refereed journal and conference papers and 15 academic books in corporate governance, corporate law, and transition economics, and co-editor of two book series (20 books) in transition economics. He is the author of the research monograph How to Govern Corporations So They Serve the Public Good: A Theory of Corporate Governance Emergence (Edwin Mellen, 2009) and lead editor of Corporate Governance and the Global Financial Crisis: International Perspectives (Cambridge University Press, 2011).

Contact the Editorial Team

Series Editor
William Sun
Leeds Metropolitan University, UK
X.Sun@leedsmet.ac.uk

Executive Publisher
Kim Eggleton
keggleton@emeraldinsight.com

Editorial Advisory and Review Board

Fabienne Alvarez
Professor of Management, Department of Economics and Business, University of Antilles and Guyane Pointe-à-Pitre, France

Ralph Bathurst
Senior Lecturer, School of Management (Albany), Massey University, New Zealand  

Lawrence Bellamy
Principal Lecturer & Associate Dean, Chester Business School, Chester University, UK

Robert Chia
Professor of Management, Glasgow University, UK

Blanaid Clarke
Associate Professor, Law School, University College Dublin, Ireland

Thomas Clarke
Professor of Management & Director of the Center for Corporate Governance, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia

Barry A. Colbert
Reader & Director of CMA Center for Business & Sustainability, School of Business & Economics, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada

Alexandre Di Miceli da Silveira
Professor, School of Economics, Business and Accounting, University of Sao Paulo (FEA-USP), Brazil

Gabriel Eweje
Senior Lecturer & Director of Sustainability & CSR Research Group, Department of Management & International Business, Massey University, New Zealand

Hershey H. Friedman
Professor, Department of Economics, Brooklyn College of the City University of New York, USA

Lyn Glanz
Dean of Graduate Studies, Glion Institution of Higher Education and Les Roches-Gruyère University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland

Adrian Henriques
Visiting Professor, Department of Business and Management, Middlesex University, UK

Øyvind Ihlen
Professor, Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo, Norway

Lin Jiang
Professor of Management, Business School, Renmin University of China, China

Eamonn Judge
Professor & Research Director, Polish Open University, Poland

Elizabeth C. Kurucz
Assistant Professor, College of Management and Economics, University of Guelph, Canada

Richard W Leblanc
Associate Professor, School of Administrative Studies, York University, Canada

Céline Louche
Assistant Professor, Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School, Belgium

Guler Manisali-Darman
Principal of the Corporate Governance and Sustainability Center, Turkey

Malcolm McIntosh
Professor & Director of Asia Pacific Center for Sustainable Enterprise, Griffith Business School, Griffith University, Australia

James McRitchie
Publisher of CorpGov.net (Corporate Governance), USA

Abagail McWilliams
Professor, College of Business Administration, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA

Roland Perez
Professor Emeritus, Economics and Management, University Montpellier I, France

Yvon Pesqueux
Chair of the Development of Organization Science, CNAM (Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers), France; President-elect of International Federation of Scholarly Associations of Management (IFSAM)

David Pollard
Reader in Technology Transfer and Enterprise, Faculty of Business and Law, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK

Lars Rademacher
Professor, Department of Media Management, MHMK (Macromedia University of Applied Sciences), Germany

Simon Robinson
Professor of Global Ethics, Faculty of Business and Law, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK

David Russell
Head of Department of Accounting & Finance, Leicester Business School, De Montfort University, UK

Ian Sanderson
Professor Emeritus in Public Governance, Faculty of Business and Law, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK

Greg Shailer
Reader, School of Accounting and Business Information Systems, College of Business and Economics, the Australian National University, Australia

John Shields
Professor & Associate Dean, Faculty of Economics and Business, the University of Sydney, Australia

Jim Stewart
Professor of HRD & Leadership, Coventry University, UK

Peter Stokes
Professor of Sustainable Management, Marketing and Tourism, Deputy Dean, Faculty of Business, Enterprise & Lifelong Learning, University of Chester, UK

Ralph Tench
Professor of Public Relations, Director of Research, Faculty of Business and Law, Leeds Metropolitan University, UK

Christoph Van der Elst
Professor of Law, Law School, Tilburg University, The Netherlands

Wayne Visser
Senior Associate, University of Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership, UK; Adjunct Professor, La Trobe University, Australia

Suzanne Young
Associate Professor, La Trobe Business School, Faculty of Business, Economics and Law, La Trobe University, Australia

Reviews

Volume 1
Reframing Corporate Social Responsibility: Lessons from the Global Financial Crisis
Edited by William Sun, Jim Stewart and David Pollard
ISBN: 9780857244550
Publication date: December 2010

Review I

Sharply crafted and refreshingly forthright, this edited collection is easily the most incisive scholarly treatment of the rhetoric and reality of ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’ (CSR) produced since the depths of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in 2007-8. It is also the first in what promises to be (under William Sun’s expert editorial guidance) a steady flow of high-quality multi-author volumes addressing front-of-mind issues in corporate responsibility, governance and sustainability from a critical yet constructive perspective.

If is incontestable that GFC exposed with brutal clarity the depths of corporate irresponsibility and regulatory ineptitude in western market economies, it is also plausible to argue – as do the 13 chapter contributions in this book - that the crisis also laid bare the underlying contradictions and limitations of pre-crisis approaches to CSR. In 2008, CSR (as then conceptualised and practised) was tested and found to wanting – perhaps even exacerbating the crisis rather than ameliorating it.

This fine volume offers intelligent and lateral explains as to why this may have been so, as well as providing informed and thoughtful suggestions as to how CSR discourse and practice might be transformed for the greater good. As the volume’s editors assert, the overriding conceptual and policy challenge is to reframe CSR from being an optional extra to an ‘embedded’ ethical imperative, integral to and inseparable from business discourse and values.

Here is a book, then, that is designed both to unsettle and to assure; a book that should surely be mandatory reading for every business executive, every business student, and every business academic. 

Dr John Shields, Professor of Human Resource Management and Organisational Studies, The University of Sydney Business School

Review II

This work seems to be a book of the moment and indeed it is, however, to view it this way would be to miss the essential thrust of the text. While the authors are eager to show some of the structural and conceptual fissures and fractures that played a role in bringing about the financial crisis, they are even more earnest regarding the perennial and ongoing issues that permeate society. As such it becomes quickly apparent that the recent financial crisis, rather than being Armageddon, was more a symptom of a longer-term general malaise.

The edited chapters bring a fascinating and broad church of insights to the building of an understanding of the crisis. These lenses embrace, among many others, neo-liberalism, capitalism, ideology, consumption, the dark side of social capital and national politics. These conceptual foci are intertwined with contributions from a number of national and cultural perspectives and these serve to show how CSR played out, for example, in American, British, Dutch and Polish contexts.
A recurrent theme of the commentaries is an attempt to juxtapose and reconcile responsible with irresponsible behaviour and their conditions and consequences. This is driven forward through a potent analysis of the impact of the theory/practice nexus of the concepts introduced. In relation to this, while working through the sections, I also had a gradual growing feeling about one particular issue and I was compelled to see that on arrival at p231 Visser’s contribution rightly confirmed what was dawning on me too – the role of ‘greed’. He rightly invokes the infamous fictional character Gordon Gekko’s avaricious speech in the film Wall Street. Other contributions, to name one, Fisher’s, work this theme in alternative ways and it is through this general pattern of analysis that the book evolves its own intellectual wealth and value. Things that could be approached slightly differently in future editions might be the addition of a general conclusion as the work tends to end on the Polish context and there is a lingering sense that it would have been valuable to pull everything together one final time.

Overall, this is a timely, cogent and well-conceived book. It is well-written with genuine engagement, passion and concern. This is not a blasé wander through the issues – it is a heartfelt ‘call to arms’ for justice and action. As such it has an undercurrent of seeking what might be a moral solution to the predicament in which many western and developed economies and the organizations and the people operating within them currently find themselves.

Professor Peter Stokes, Chester Business School, Chester University

Review III

Reframing Corporate Social Responsibility: Lessons from the Global Financial Crisis, edited by William Sun, Jim Stewart, and David Pollard, is Volume 1 in an important new series: Critical Studies on Corporate Responsibility, Governance and Sustainability. Disclosure: I’m on the Editorial Advisory and Review Board of the series at the request of William Sun, who I’ve already identified as an important voice in corporate governance. See my review of his How to Govern Corporations So They Serve the Public Good: A Theory of Corporate Governance Emergence.

This new volume reflects on corporate responsibility (CSR), focusing on what role, if any, it played in the financial crisis and, perhaps more importantly, how such events might be avoided in the future by more fully integrating CSR into mainstream corporate practices. The editors argue that business discourse and values are currently viewed as independent from ethical norms and ethics, which have never been truly integrated into our model of business. Alienated CSR is added to business from the outside; these authors hope to reframe it as part of an evolving and dynamic process embedded in business… (more)

James McRitchie, Publisher of CorpGov.net

Review IV

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis (GFC), much commentary has been dedicated to the spectacular failures of neo-liberal economics, the ‘Anglo-Saxon’ capitalist system and corporate governance, to the exclusion of CSR. In its analysis of the causes and fallout of the greatest financial and economic disaster since the Great Depression from a CSR perspective, this book takes a novel and interesting approach.

…...(more on http://www.csrinternational.org/2012/07/12/reframing-corporate-social-responsibility-lessons-from-the-global-financial-crisis/)

Overall, the editors have succeeded in achieving their objective of igniting interest in this research direction and challenging conventional modes of thinking and inspiring further discussion. While the layout and division of themes in this book facilitated this, it is truly the multi-disciplinary approach that worked best, enabling readers from various disciplines and backgrounds to focus on the contributions that appeal the most.

Katie O’Dea Cadden, CSR International

Volume 2
Finance and Sustainability: Towards A New Paradigm? A Post-Crisis Agenda
Edited by William Sun, Céline Louche and Roland Pérez
ISBN: 9781780520926
Publication date: September 2011

Book review

The collective authors of this book believe the need to put economic analysis in a comprehensive approach that integrates the political, social and environmental elements. …The sixteen contributions that make up the book have therefore aimed to lay the foundations of a paradigm shift towards sustainable finance. 

The book is very rich, very dense, on a subject so vast in its issue on the horizon that it covers. It provides, on a subject in full boil, a pleasant synthesis and helpful clarifications on the concepts of ethical/responsible/sustainable investment, and of social/environmental governance. It is clear from reading this full of enthusiasm.

(Translated excerpts from the book review on Finance and Sustainability: Towards a New Paradigm? A Post-Crisis Agenda, published in French in the second issue of the ‘Business and Finance’ special issue series, Economies and Societies, Paris)

Henri Zimnovitch, Professor in Finance and Management, University of Paris-Sud 11

Volume 3
Business and Sustainability: Concepts, Strategies and Changes
Edited by Gabriel Eweje and Martin Perry
ISBN: 9781780524382
Publication date: November 2011

Book Review

This is a thought provoking book that provides a rich and diverse view of business sustainability, not least for the discourse concerning the conceptual matters with regard to addressing environmental sustainability. The book considers business engagement with regard to sustainability from a number of perspectives; political, environmental crisis, business opportunity and stakeholder. It also provides useful context in examining business activity with regard to sustainability and includes valuable case studies of organizations highlighting tensions and issues for sustainable business strategies.

...

Overall the book captures the essence of sustainability well and provides an engaging read, with good theoretical underpinning, supplemented with context and cases. As a set of readings, it may be studied in its entirety or may be used more selectively according to the reader’s interests.

Dr David Russell, Head of Department of Accounting & Finance, De Montfort University. Excerpts from the book review published in International Journal of Law and Management, forthcoming.

Volumes within this series

Online access:

This title is available as part of the Emerald Business, Management and Economics eBook Series Collection. If you are a subscriber, please follow the link below to access your subscribed content. For purchase/subscription options please contact ebookseries@emeraldinsight.com.

Online table of contents

Print copy & more information

For more information about any of the volumes listed below, or to purchase a print copy, please click on the relevant volume title:

• Institutional Investors and Corporate Responses, Volume 5
• Corporate Social Irresponsibility, Volume 4
• Business & Sustainability: Concepts, Strategies and Changes, Volume 3
• Finance and Sustainability: Towards a New Paradigm? A Post-crisis Agenda, Volume 2
• Reframing Corporate Social Responsibility: Lessons for the Global Financial Crisis, Volume 1

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