Marketing's Corporate Responsibility

In this article, we examine the pressures on corporations to pursue more socially responsible actions, especially in their marketing activities. We review conceptual perspectives on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and how these perspectives apply in the marketing context, to corporate commitment to CSR, and to the relationship between CSR and firm performance. We then describe challenges and opportunities presented by CSR in practice, including recent cases in which companies have been pressured to improve their CSR performance, and initiatives pursued by companies - individually or collectively - to leverage their CSR commitment to advantage. We conclude with some observations about the future of CSR and marketing, arguing that CSR is likely to remain a critical elements of corporoate strategy and marketing.