planet v.s. farmers?

Renowned Management theorist Michael Porter and Mark Kramer introduced the idea of Creating Shared Value, CSV, as a integrative strategic alternative to the established practice of corporate social responsibility. Porter and Kramer argue that traditional corporate responsibility programs pursue social benefits at the expanse of profit which is undesirable and unsustainable for profit-driven organizations. They argue that creating shared value with the community will allow companies to incorporate social responsibilities into a company’s core business, eliminating the conflict between the two. On an abstract level, CSV seems like a good idea, however, as David Aaker, suggest in his blog post, the broad scope of CSV approach makes it hard to evaluate the impact that each business decisions has. Furthermore, in addition to the difficulty of evaluation, CSV is also hard to implement as different aspects of social agendas often contradict. This is shown in 2009 Bodyshop incident in which they are criticized for sourcing palm oil from Daabon, which has been accused of force eviction of peasants off their farmland. Bodyshop’s pursue of eco-friendly products creates a conflict with their need for social responsibility towards farmers. This demonstrates that CSV is problematic in its implementation.

Reference:

1) http://blogs.hbr.org/2011/06/creating-shared-value-vs-lever/

 2) http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/13/body-shop-colombia-evictions

Photo Reference:

1) http://www.beautybulletin.com/images/stories/whats_news/green_peace.jpg