Praxeological and Ethical Limits for Incorporation of Ethics and CSR into a Corporate Strategy and Operational Activities

Abstract

One can observe in the whole Europe a general trend to include ethics and corporate social responsibility into corporate strategy and operational activities. Institutional, public, corporate and competitors’ pressure reinforce the increasing popularity of the corporate social responsibility concept. It sometimes even happens that it is done without any preoccupation with risks and threats it may have to the business bottom line and to the interests of those stakeholders the company should first attend. We describe the praxeological limits, submitted to the criteria of efficiency and effectiveness, of including ethics and corporate social responsibility into a corporate strategy and operational activities by reviewing the literature on these issues. We also discuss the other side of the problem, namely its ethical limits, in general terms though, focusing on axiological aspects of these matters. The analysis concludes by emphasizing the practical sense of the golden mean.