Despite the existing vast literature on corporate social responsibility (CSR), there is a lack of research on the determinants of CSR categoriesenvironment, employees, community, and governance. Why do some firms dedicate more effort to community, while others focus on environment or employees? We address these issues with special attention to the roles of market structure and firm size, controlling for industry, geography, regulatory and macroeconomic variables. Answers are relevant for firms' strategic decisions, taking into account what rivals likely choose, in a world where CSR is often a competition tool. Public authorities also benefit on choosing focus: lack of competition; small or large sized firms; which categories are more affected. We find that all CSR categories profit more from a competitive setup, particularly employees and environment, and from larger firms, mainly environment. Size and market concentration thus contribute in different directions to CSR, contradicting their usually presumed positive association.
If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of this paper is to examine how demographic characteristics contribute to consumers' decision on bank delivery channels' usage, namely the direct and indirect demographic influence on channel usage frequency via cognitive and affective mediators. Design/methodology/approach -The consumer usage frequency pattern concerning the main bank delivery channels and its determinants are modelled and analysed with a questionnaire sent to 24,000 bank customers. This stage was preceded by a series of in-depth interviews to bank managers and bank customers. Findings -Empirical evidence suggests that demographic variables' influence over consumers' usage frequency decision has both a direct and indirect component. These influences are identified by delivery channel.Research limitations/implications -The main limitation derives from the nature of empirical results and their generalization to other samples and contexts. Nevertheless, precautions recommended in the literature to overcome this limitation were followed. Practical implications -Bank managers will benefit from knowing, by channel, which demographic characteristics have the desired direct and indirect impact on usage frequency. This information will improve bank managers' efforts to encourage customers to favour a specific delivery channel. Originality/value -In the literature, only the direct influence of demographics is compared to the innovation attributes in order to explain the innovation adoption decision. By clarifying the impact of demographic variables, the paper provides a more robust perception on their role as determinants of the bank delivery channels' usage.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to address firms’ decisions on corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a function of the economic environment. The paper focuses on corporate giving, a CSR dimension that is especially important in an economic downturn such as the one experienced by many European economies since 2007-2008. Design/methodology/approach A theoretical framework comprising product differentiation and market competition is proposed. The paper investigates whether adverse economic conditions refrain corporate giving or, alternatively, stimulate it as a differentiation and demand enhancing instrument. Econometric empirical testing on the business cycle properties of giving at an aggregate level is also conducted. Findings According to theoretical results, firms seem to refrain giving under adverse economic conditions in the short run. Empirically, the paper concludes for a pro cyclical contemporaneous relation of corporate giving with real gross domestic product, supporting the theoretical finding. In a dynamic perspective, however, giving causes revenues and firms tend to donate more than a few years after the downturn. Originality/value The paper examines the behaviour of an under researched component of corporate social responsibility, which is especially important in economic downturns - giving. It considers continuous degrees of market competition and differentiation.
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