Abstract:

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is known to produce benefits such as improved customer relationships, increased employee loyalty, and better financial performance. As a result, scholars interested in marketing and corporate communication, have sought to establish what corporations include within their CSR campaigns and how this is communicated to key stakeholders. This has resulted in a proliferation of research related to CSR, including such subject areas as the focus in CSR campaigns in the developed world and in emerging economies, the reporting practices used in CSR, the ways in which corporations communicate with their stakeholders, and the relationship between CSR activities and profitability. Despite this increased interest in CSR however, much still remains to be done to understand the relationship between the CSR initiatives pursued by corporations and the impact that these may have on their corporate image and their relationships with stakeholders, and the potential that CSR affords for competitive advantage.

In this presentation we will discuss an on-going trilateral research initiative focusing on the communication surrounding CSR, involving students and researchers at three different universities located in India, the Netherlands, and the United Arab Emirates. As a result of this initiative a series of empirical research projects have been carried out to investigate various aspects of CSR, including the focus in CSR campaigns across the three regions, the ways in which corporations communicate with their stakeholders and the response of stakeholders to these decisions. Students at the Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands, and at Zayed University in the UAE, for instance, have participated in the projects as part of their Bachelors programme in Business Communication and Business Sciences respectively, and students at the Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University in India, have been introduced to CSR as part of a collaborative effort between the oil and gas industry and the university to provide them with a appropriate learning experience. Over a period of five years, the project has generated a number empirical publications that have shed light on the similarities and differences between the developed world and emerging economies, it has contributed in a practical way to the teaching materials developed at each institution, and it has led to an demonstrable increase in motivation within the study body, e.g. several students have gone on to carry out their own research projects related to CSR both as capstone projects in the UAE (BA) and India (MBA), and as Masters projects in the Netherlands. In doing so, it has provided both global and local opportunities for the faculty and students involved.

The presentation will include details on the empirical findings that have resulted from the project that serve to shed light on CSR as it is used by corporations and viewed by stakeholders in different parts of the world. We will also discuss some of the challenges inherent in conducting an international research initiative across three different continents, together with the implications that a project of this nature can have for research in the context of higher education in the future.

Keywords:

Corporate Social Responsibility, International Cooperation.