Trade Union Motivations for Corporate Social Responsibility

Trade unions in Europe have showed a mixed response to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and have adopted a broad spectrum of positions on CSR. Prior research has identified five distinct positions of trade unions across Europe. The key argument is that the whole process is linked to neoliberalism and the outcome of neoliberal approach is deregulation. Withdrawal of state from regulation of businesses has created a vacuum of regulation and there are inadequate governance mechanisms available at all levels. Businesses have tried to fill this vacuum by engaging in CSR. Trade unions are apprehensive of CSR due to its voluntary nature and some see CSR as a threat because there is evidence that adoption of CSR as an alternative to binding regulations has hampered trade union power. Trade unions are trying to develop some supranational regulatory institutions and development of IFAs is an evidence of that. Trade unions are advised to broaden their agenda by adding non-traditional items such as climate change that might possibly provide further legitimacy to trade unions.