CSR management, Public Policy

Comment: Europe: CSR campaign update

December 01 2002

by David Grayson

CSR has risen up the European agenda over the last two or three years. Jan Noterdaeme outlines progress so far with CSR Europe's latest pan-European campaign, which he hopes will frame the agenda over the next two or three years.

The Danish EU Presidency conference on CSR this November was far better than the equivalent Belgian event a year ago. The employment and social affairs commissioner, Anna Diamantopoulou, the new Danish employment minister and the Italian employment minister all made the right noises about CSR being a voluntary activity which should not be standardised or bureaucratised.

Nevertheless, I remain 'on guard' about the approach to CSR of the Commission's department for employment and social affairs. Summing up the conference, their spokesman talked about:

CSR becoming stakeholder-led, not business led;

the need for transparency in CSR tools;

the Commission's desire for convergence (whatever that may mean!). Now, stakeholder engagement is fundamental to CSR and being a responsible business - but should CSR itself be stakeholder-led or, as Gordon Brown told BitC's AGM, business-led? I wonder what impact getting the senior EC employment and social affairs officials into companies to get some first-hand exposure to CSR in practice might have on policy development in this area? David Grayson, director, BitC

David Grayson, director, BitC

Email Story >>

Printer Friendly View >>

This article is subject to copyright and may not under any circumstances be reproduced, either partially on in full, without prior consent from the publisher. If you would like to license Corporate Citizenship Briefing content for your company or your clients please contact the Managing Editor Oliver Wagg on editor@corporate-citizenship.co.uk. Corporate Citizenship Briefing is published by The Corporate Citizenship Company, a specialist consultancy helping companies succeed as good citizens worldwide.