Taming Wicked Problems: The Role of Framing in the Construction of Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract

While scholars have explained how business has increasingly taken on regulatory roles to address social and environmental challenges, less attention has been given to the process of how business is made responsible for wicked problems. Drawing on a study of 'conflict minerals' in the Democratic Republic of Congo, we examine the process through which companies became responsible for a humanitarian crisis. We contribute by: (1) bridging insights from contentious performance and deliberative approaches -to present a model of corporate political responsibilization for a wicked problem that explains how a 'field frame' of responsibility can emerge; (2) explaining shifting boundaries between public and private responsibilities and the changing role of the state as catalytic rather than coercive; and (3) showing how responsibility can be attributed to a target by framing an issue and its root cause in ways that allow such an attribution, and how the attribution can diffuse and solidify.

When Orders of Worth Clash: Negotiating Legitimacy in Situations of Moral Multiplexity

“…They also act as institutional entrepreneurs who mobilize alternative moral orders to devise, introduce and establish new practices (Helms, Oliver, & Webb, 2012;Levy & Scully, 2007;Maguire, Hardy, & Lawrence, 2004). For instance, social movements have championed new green industries and product markets (Lounsbury, Ventresca, & Hirsch, 2003;Weber, Heinze, & DeSoucey, 2008), created new lifestyles based on values of greenness and authenticity ( Van Bommel & Spicer, 2011) or re-shaped the normative domain for what counts as a responsible company (Helms et al, 2012;Reinecke & Ansari, 2016). Common to all these works is the notion that social movements mobilize alternative moral schemes to challenge the moral legitimacy of existing arrangements and infuse new, potentially conflicting values.…”

Signposts or Weathervanes? The Curious Case of Corporate Social Responsibility and Conflict Minerals

“…Or is it inevitably, and unwillingly perhaps, a citizen on the world stage that acknowledges its connectedness within global production networks? Rather than more narrow contract responsibility the latter calls for full responsibility for the human rights impacts that are linked to operations upstreaming the value chain (SchrempfStirling et al 2012;Reinecke and Ansari 2015). Here we join a conversation in the Journal of Business Ethics on the responsibilities of the corporate citizen in developing contexts (Agbiboa 2012;Janssen et al 2013;Rotter et al 2013), CSR ''rhetoric'' (Driver 2006;Kallio 2007;Sethi 2014) and public good (Carcello 2009;Morrell and Clark 2010;O'Brien 2009).…”

“…The militarized scramble for resources exploded after the overthrow of Mobutu in the 1990s (Trapido 2015), but the often violent integration of DRC's minerals into international capital circuits started with the colonial exploitation of the country. Therefore, as important as it is to analyse discursive shenanigans surrounding the 'conflict minerals' problem, placing conflict minerals at the root of the conflict should be recognized as a causal construction that aims at 'taming' the wicked problem (Reinecke and Ansari 2015), but it is only the tip of the iceberg as far as the DRC's governance problems are concerned.…”

“…The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was adopted by the United States in July 2010. Section 1502 of this act introduced a new reporting requirement which effectively constructed corporate responsibility for conflict minerals (Reinecke and Ansari 2015): all publicly traded companies in the US must disclose annually whether any minerals that are necessary to the functionality or production of a product of the company, originated in DRC or an adjoining country and, if so, to provide a report describing the measures taken to exercise due diligence on the source and chain of custody of those minerals, which must include an independent private sector audit of the report that is certified by the company submitting the report. Section 1502 added Section 13(p) to the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, which required the SEC to promulgate the related rules.…”

“…While long seen as a problem of state failure, the link between armed conflict and minerals sourcing has only recently gained attention as an issue of corporate social responsibility (CSR) (Reinecke and Ansari 2015). Natural deposits of precious metals such as gold ore, cassiterite (the source of tin), coltan (a key ingredient in mobile phone technology) and tungsten, fuel some of the world's most brutal conflict.…”