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We would like to thank Associate Editor Heather Haveman and three anonymous reviewers for their insightful and developmental comments. We also thank the participants of the O&S Workshop at the University of Southern California and of an OTREG meeting held at the University of Cambridge for their valuable feedback on an earlier version of this paper, especially

Causal complexity has long been recognized as a ubiquitous feature underlying organizational phenomena, yet current theories and methodologies in management are for the most part not well-suited to its direct study. The introduction of the Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) configurational approach has led to a reinvigoration of configurational theory that embraces causal complexity explicitly. We argue that the burgeoning research using QCA represents more than a novel methodology; it constitutes the emergence of a neo-configurational perspective to the study of management and organizations that enables a fine-grained conceptualization and empirical investigation of causal complexity through the logic of set theory. In this article, we identify four foundational elements that characterize this emerging neo-configurational perspective: (a) conceptualizing cases as set theoretic configurations, (b) calibrating cases’ memberships into sets, (c) viewing causality in terms of necessity and sufficiency relations between sets, and (d) conducting counterfactual analysis of unobserved configurations. We then present a comprehensive review of the use of QCA in management studies that aims to capture the evolution of the neo-configurational perspective among management scholars. We close with a discussion of a research agenda that can further this neo-configurational approach and thereby shift the attention of management research away from a focus on net effects and towards examining causal complexity.

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Research summary: The efforts of multinational corporations to be socially responsible do not always engender positive evaluations from overseas stakeholders. Drawing on attribution theory, we argue that two heuristics guide stakeholders in evaluating firms' social performance: foreignness and the valence of firms' social responsibility. We provide evidence from a field study of secondary stakeholders and an experimental study involving 129 non‐governmental organizations. Consistent with attribution theory, the liability of foreignness is minimized when firms engage in “do‐good” social responsibility (focused on proactive engagement creating positive externalities) but is substantial when firms engage in “do‐no‐harm” social responsibility (focused on attenuating negative externalities). In online supporting information, Appendix S1, we demonstrate that these evaluations have consequences for whether stakeholders subsequently cooperate, or sow conflict, with firms. Managerial summary: There is no guarantee that efforts to be socially responsible will improve multinational corporations' relations with overseas stakeholders, such as customers, governments, and activists. In a field study and an experiment, we unpack when foreign firms suffer from harsh stakeholder evaluations. Foreign firms especially suffer from harsh evaluations when they conduct “do‐no‐harm” CSR rather than “do‐good” CSR. Stakeholders attribute the motive for foreign firms' do‐no‐harm CSR to managerial interests and shareholder pressures, perceiving a wedge between managers and owners (who may be unmotivated to reduce the negative impacts of their business activities) and local stakeholders (who bear the social costs). A practical implication is that foreign firms gain more from highlighting do‐good rather than do‐(no)‐harm CSR initiatives. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Why are some firms more effective than others at addressing stakeholder concerns? Conventional stakeholder theories focus on variables in the external environment and cannot adequately explain variance across firms operating in the same context. Our matched-pair study of eight global corporations goes inside the firm and investigates the role of managerial cognition on corporate attention to stakeholders. We find that top management's conceptualization of the firm's relationship with society-which we name enterprise logic-prompts distinct foci of attention and potentially constrains how well a single firm can simultaneously attend to multiple stakeholders. These findings highlight the value of an 'inside-out' perspective, centered on managerial cognition, in explaining why some firms address stakeholder concerns more effectively than their peers.1 Strategy researchers often distinguish the firm's task and general environment. The task environment refers to sectors closest to the organization where relationships are established through direct transactions, for example, with customers. The general environment refers to sectors that affect the organization indirectly (Nadkarni and Barr, 2008) and can include social and political actors, such as governments (Daft, Sormunen, and Parks, 1988).

To date, the discussion regarding corporate social responsibility (CSR) has primarily addressed organizational rationale and activities. Little has been said about the individual characteristics and behaviors that promote the development of CSR within organizations. In this paper, we propose and test a model to explain individual differences in the propensity to engage in socially responsible behavior (SRB). By linking values, affect and reasoning to managers' propensity to ‘do good’ and ‘do no harm,’ we provide a more complete picture of how SRB arises in organizations. A survey of 643 middle managers in five multinational corporations supports our contention that values, affect and reasoning matter for SRB. In particular, self‐transcendence values (universalism and benevolence) and positive affect increase the propensity to engage in SRB, as do moral and reputation‐based reasoning styles. Moreover, we find that values and affect shape more controlled processes such as moral reasoning. We develop implications for the interaction between the individual and the organization in promoting SRB.