Strong and unrelenting pressure from governments, activists, and the media have forced business leaders to devote serious attention to corporate social responsibility (CSR). When that attention turns into action it is often ineffective or counterproductive, argue Porter and Kramer. That’s because CSR efforts set business and society at odds when the truth is that they are interdependent, and because companies think of corporate social responsibility generically instead of in the way most fitting to their individual strategies. The authors suggest that companies, NGOs, and governments stop thinking in terms of “corporate social responsibility” and start thinking in terms of “corporate social integration,” according to which both business decisions and social policies must follow the principle of shared value.
In this article, Porter and Kramer introduce a framework to help put the principle of shared value into action. The framework helps companies to identify the social consequences of their actions; to discover opportunities to benefit society and themselves by strengthening the competitive context in which they operate; to determine which CSR initiatives they should address; and to find the most effective ways of doing so.
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