Organizational Identity Orientation and the Adoption of Corporate Social Responsibility: Symbolic, Selective, or Substantial?

Abstract

We develop a model that explains variation in adoption patterns of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)-related business practices in cases after multinational corporations (MNCs) have acquired social enterprises. Existing approaches that seek to explain these differences remain theoretically underdeveloped due to lacking emphasis on intra-organizational dynamics happening after an acquisition. We address this gap by arguing that different organizational identity orientations of the acquiring and acquired organization are critical factors that explain how MNCs interpret and build different preferences about organizational practices they decide to either adopt to varying degrees, that is, substantially, selectively, or symbolically. We develop a conceptual model that explains differences in organizational implementation of CSR.

Keywords: Adoption, corporate social responsibility (CSR), decoupling, organizational identity orientation, social enterprise

JEL Classification: M14