Corporate social responsibility : individual, institutional, and systemic perspectives

In this article, we will develop our argument in three steps: In the following section, we will focus on economic theory and the way it deals with aspects regarding the life-world of citizens. We argue that concepts of sustainability need to be linked closely to the life-world of economic actors in order to be practically relevant. The term life-world refers to the values and sense-making processes of individuals, and it is specific to social, cultural, and institutional contexts. We will show that economics as an academic discipline still has a hard time dealing with these issues, which is why we suggest moving on from the classical ‘homo oeconomicus' model towards the concept of a ‘homo culturalis'.

The third step of our argument focuses on the level of regulatory policy and its influence on corporate action. Beyond national regulation, modern regulatory policy also includes a wide range of new international modes of regulation, such as voluntary environmental and social standards. In times of intensifying global competition, such standards offer normative orientation when it comes to corporate responsibility. Therefore, they should be considered to be important stepping stones on our way towards a civilized market economy.