Corporate social responsibility and countries’ reputation: A study from a global strategic management perspective

Abstract

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The research contributes to empirical studies and justifies the country-level sustainability performance indexes and company-level environmental, social, and governance (ESG) risk rankings which allow the creation of analytical tools for integrating country-specific corporate social responsibility (CSR) context into the global strategic planning process. The findings reflect that appropriate ESG and CSR rankings and indexes can be seen as the axes of the global strategic CSR matrix that allows multinational corporations (MNCs) to explore strategic options of embedding sustainable behavior in the host countries according to their mission, goals, and resources. Based on the institutional theory perspective, global strategic CSR matrix, and the international firm’s home country context, the study also presents a strategic options typology of sustainable practices transfer to host countries, depending on their corresponding institutional context. The chapter adds to existing research by providing empirical-based findings on the global strategic planning process enabling sustainable practices transfer to emerging and developing economies. This work is a generalized look at cross-country gaps in CSR practices..