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By last year’s end, I watched a TV program from Argentina where a panel of national enterpreneurs were discussing the subject of Corporate Social Responsibility and what impact global economic crisis would make on these activities. A director of a company from Rosario –one involved with CSR- declared bluntly: “In my opinion, to be responsible in hard times is to keep employment positions”. In Spain, the Barcelona football team –a real Enterprise- uses UNICEF logo on its team T-shirts to show its commitment to that NGO. Similarly, in Rosario, the firm NASA Jeans launched a graphic campaign “with both sides of drugs” as its principal slogan, making reference to its concern about the complex subject of drug use.

There isn’t just one definition of the term CSR. Experts on the subject state that the term is constantly varying in meaning because it is precisely something relatively new and is in permanent development. However, we can speak about concepts, about the essence and, last but not least, about the intentions that lie behind the actions of CSR. Isolating and identifing the different visions and interpretations of companies on CSR is not an easy task, but it is one worth-trying. In this way, consumers might have a clear idea of how responsible a certain brand is. The NGO might detect partners from enterpreneur’s world with shared interests and the companies themselves could achieve better results by collaborating to fullfill shared goals. This would also unveil those companies that see CSR only as an advantage in an extremely competitive market. In an attempt to simplify, we can say that an interpretation of CSR is concerned with the way the firm intends to reach its objectives. Are production processes contaminating? Is environment damaged? Do all those involved in the production and distribution chain get fair earnings? Are employees well paid? Do they have good working conditions? Are there any underage employees? All these questions and some others are focused on how the firm performes its activities. This interpretation might be that of the director from Rosario when he talked about keeping the payroll unaltered.

Another view would be to start action when the goals of the firm have already been reached and it is agreed to “share” -a way to put it- parts of the benefit with the community. It is here that the firms decide to invest on community development programs, job opportunities, environment, education or any other field, or maybe they decide to support an NGO’s cause, as in the case of the Barcelona football team.

Finally, it is also believed that being social responsible improves the image of the firm and of the trademark, and therefore, this can be used as a competive edge in the market. Though it is true that the image can be possitively affected, this result should be a natural consequence of the firm’s behaviour. It should never be the cause, since should market once decide that being responsible is not an decisive factor, then the companies would give up those activities. This criteria seems to be the one that led NASA to carry on a campaign without any support at all, pledging its commitment to CSR. Not only did the firm fail to ground its stand on such a complex issue as drug addition, but it evinced its absolute lack of interest, research and involvement with the subject, when stating that drugs have two sides, a good one and a bad one, a real instance of Corporate Social Irresponsibility.