Prof. Scherer, why should companies pursue CSR?

Today, the assumption of social responsibility by companies is "taken for granted". The question is therefore no longer whether companies should take on social responsibility, but what exactly they should and can do about it. Due to their resources (i.e. knowledge, people, capital, relationships), companies have a key role to play in tackling social and ecological problems. In addition, compared to state actors, they can also act beyond national borders.

What problems do companies face?

In an environment of rapid social and technological change, new problem areas are constantly emerging in which companies and their responsible commitment are required without their behavior already being sufficiently pre-regulated by laws or regulations. Public discourse is constantly renegotiating how social problems should be addressed by state, private and civil society players and how they should be tackled based on a division of labor.

What issues do companies face with regard to CSR?

These could be questions like these, for example: What responsibility do companies have for the physical and mental health of their employees and that of their suppliers or customers during the corona pandemic? How can and should this responsibility be exercised? What responsibility do companies have in the wake of the war in Ukraine? Towards business partners, customers, employees in Ukraine and Russia? How can and should this be perceived? The examples show that there is no ex ante defined answer to each of these questions, but that they must be developed in social discourses involving the various stakeholders. Companies must create suitable structures and processes and develop the ability not only to react appropriately, but also to act proactively with regard to latent or emerging problem areas.

What role does globalization play in this?

Today, many companies operate in heterogeneous institutional contexts with different political, legal and moral frameworks. Large parts of global value creation are outsourced to states with authoritarian or fragile regimes, i.e. they take place beyond the reach of democracy and the rule of law. We can therefore no longer assume that the law and moral expectations will channel the behavior of profit-oriented companies in such a way that its effects are beneficial to society and future generations. Closing these regulatory gaps is the task of "global governance", in which companies participate and define and enforce rules for the global economy either in the course of self-regulation or in concert with state and non-state actors such as NGOs and civil society groups.

Which companies do you see as pioneers?

More than 10,000 companies are involved in the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC). They have assumed responsibility and voluntarily committed themselves to protecting human rights, enforcing social and environmental standards and fighting corruption within their sphere of influence, i.e. along the value chains that affect them and also outside their own company boundaries. The UN Global Compact sees itself as a learning platform on which companies can exchange experiences and contribute to institutional change, particularly in regions where state actors do not have the will or capacity to ensure compliance with minimum social and environmental standards. In this context, companies play an important steering role and (co-)develop solutions that must be tailored to the institutional and sector-specific contexts. The UNGC website provides a wealth of information on corporate best practices.

What is the Faculty of Business Administration and Economics doing in the area of CSR?

The WWF is well positioned in the area of CSR and business ethics research. In terms of citations of relevant publications in scientific journals, UZH is one of the world's leading universities and business schools. In addition, our young academics researching these topics have developed into an "export hit" over the last decade and now hold professorships at top universities in Switzerland and abroad.

And what about teaching?

In teaching, the WWF pursues a decentralized approach in which it is up to the lecturers and professors to integrate the topics of ethics and responsibility into the respective subject canon. This makes sense insofar as different ethical challenges arise depending on the subject area, e.g. in IT, marketing, accounting, banking, leadership or human resource management. Nevertheless, we are faced with the challenge of pooling existing capacities and expertise in order to achieve greater impact and even greater visibility. The Center for Responsible Finance, for example, is a step in this direction.

What do you want for the future?

Another overdue step would be the creation of professorships with a dedicated focus on ethics and responsibility. This would enable us to focus more strongly on basic principles and methods, to supplement the existing canon of subjects in teaching and to acquire young, successful talent for the WWF, especially as these areas are currently where the music is being played and an above-average number of publications have been published in top journals with a high impact in recent years.

(Prof. Dr. Andreas Georg Scherer holds the Chair of Fundamentals of Business Administration and Theories of Entrepreneurship at the Institute of Business Administration at the University of Zurich. In 2020, the University of Hamburg awarded him an honorary doctorate.)

Text: Jennifer Zimmermann

Source: Oec. Magazine #17

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