Os valores pessoais e o comprometimento social dos gestores: Um estudo sobre a Responsabilidade Social das Empresas no Brasil

• Main Author: Filipe Almeida
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Centro de Estudos Sociais da Universidade de Coimbra 2009-09-01
• Series: Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais
• Subjects: human values; social commitment; social responsibility in companies
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/rccs/259
• ISSN: 0254-1106; 2182-7435

This article addresses the influence of managers’ personal value systems on their attitudes towards a corporate social responsibility (CSR), assuming it to be a predictor of management practice. The research hypotheses were tested in a study involving 252 Brazilian managers. The results show that a predisposition towards socially responsible management practices is favoured by a conservative value system which upholds stability and order, security and compliance with collective norms, as opposed to the negative influence of personal values centred on individual wellbeing and self-promotion. However, this relationship between value systems and managers’ attitudes towards CSR is only found in managers under the age of 30, suggesting that, as professional experience is acquired, the adoption of socially responsible business practices becomes independent of the value systems of the decision-makers, and that strategic and contextual factors are superimposed onto personal belief systems.