The antecedents and consequences of corporate social irresponsibility: evidence from large U.S. corporations, 1991-2009

• Main Author: Song, Danping
• Other Authors: Gao, Jijun (Business Administration)
• Published: 2014
• Subjects: Corporate social responsibility; corporate social irresponsibility
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1993/23277

Both academic and practical attention to corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been increasing over the past few decades. Past research on CSR largely focuses on the positive side of corporate social issues management, explaining why and how firms engage in CSR activities and how such engagement influences corporate financial performance. Paying little attention to the negative side of social issues management, this research has generated little understanding as to why firms, even those with a strong record of CSR investment, commit irresponsible activities. In this study, we focus on corporate social irresponsibility (CSiR) and explore the antecedents and consequences of CSiR. From a strategic management perspective, we propose four key antecedents of CSiR, including selective management of stakeholders, technical orientation, past history, and performance pressure. We also propose that CSR moderates the negative effect of CSiR on corporate financial performance. We used an unbalanced dataset of large U.S. corporations from 1991 – 2009 to test our theory, and most of the hypotheses were supported. We discuss the implications of our findings and the contributions of this study to research on organizational misconduct, stakeholder theory and strategic management.