(Voice over):  Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), also known as corporate conscience, is a commitment to integrate social and environmental concerns into a company’s business model. CSR incorporates public and environmental interests into corporate decision-making.

Proponents of CSR believe that a corporation should not only be responsible to shareholders but also to the environment and company stakeholders. These stakeholders may include employees, customers, communities, and related groups that support the organization. Approaches to implementing CSR include community-based development, creating better business practices to mitigate risk, and philanthropy.

These are the most common examples of corporate social responsibility:

• Reduce carbon footprints to mitigate climate change
• Improve labor policies and embrace fair trade
• Engage in charitable giving and volunteer within your community
• Change corporate policies to benefit the environment
• Make socially and environmentally conscious investments

CSR has gained increased importance in the last two decades due to a new phenomenon called ethical consumerism — the practice of educated customers purchasing only products they believe are made ethically. As a consequence, many companies are now being pressured to adopt CSR strategies regardless of whether they genuinely care about social responsibility or not.

Most corporations establish CSR programs to genuinely give back, and they use considerable resources to make a positive impact on the world. However, there are some that cultivate the image of a socially responsible organization simply for the marketing benefits.  This disingenuous form of “giving back” is known as greenwashing, and it’s an example of bad corporate social responsibility. Rather than actually engaging in social or environmental improvements, corporations may simply spin their advertising and reputation marketing to make it seem as if they’re doing a good thing.