Corporate Social Responsibility in India

Social responsibility is not a new concept or philosophy to Indian businessmen. It is a philosophy that looks at the social interest of business over the long run as compared with the short run self-interest. However, modern industrial civilization has created a new environment of challenge and struggle in which business has come to be viewed as business only. It was largely the initiative taken by late Sri Jayaprakash Narayan, Sarvodaya leader and also the active involvement of several other social activists and environmentalists which regenerated social interest among businessmen. Academic research in stimulating social responsibility in the business world is in its beginning in India. This book makes a significant contribution to this field by providing rich empirical data on the attitudes of managers at the top and middle levels of large scale public and private enterprises in India. It identifies their attitudes towards various aspects of social responsibility. It gives a detailed account of how managers perceive the concept of social responsibility, the social areas of importance, the implementation process and problems, and the need for and methods of social audit. Also, the study examines the impact of sectoral differences and management hierarchy differences on the attitudes of managers. Another interesting feature of the book is that it discusses at length the theoretical issues and provides an extensive survey of literature and indicates directions to future research in this subject. In fine, the book integrates rich theoretical base with invaluable empirical data and is likely to prove highly useful to management students, researchers and executives alike.