module specification

The module is a Level 6 15 credit option module running in the Spring semester. The module takes issues surrounding social responsibility from national to international platform. CSR has continued to reorient and repair our world in different dimensions. Corporate and individual citizens are therefore demonstrably expected to be socially responsible and contribute to reducing the adverse impacts of companies on the environment and planet Earth in general. 

Module aims to:

1.  provide an understanding of general issues surrounding corporate social responsibility from national to international perspectives.
2.   provide students with a broad understanding of the roles of company directors, investors, the media and consumers – stakeholders in general to allow socially responsible companies to flourish in modern societies.
3. provide students with a sound understanding of the roles international organisations such as the United Nations, the World Bank, World Trade Organisations etc are playing in propagating and developing corporate social responsibility.

The origins of corporate social responsibility and why modern businesses must be socially responsible. LO1
The differences and similarities between multi-national companies and small and medium sized enterprises for corporate social responsibility issues. LO2
Exploring the Brundtland Report 1987 on Sustainable Development and the parts it continues to play in global development goals
An examination of corporate social responsibility reports of companies in different sectors and what part the sector a company operates in determines the level of its social reporting. LO3

Scheduled teaching activity is a weekly one hour and thirty minutes lecture and a one hour and thirty minutes seminar. Independent study is supported by seminar questions, case studies, journal articles and video clips from online sources and occasional guest speaker sessions.

On completing the module students will be able to :

1. Explore the roles of directors, investors and other stakeholders to the transparency and growth of company financial and non-financial reporting practices.
2. Analyse, interpret and compare corporate social reports issued by modern businesses in order to make relevant decisions about corporate social performance.

Group report based on cases of companies of, 2,000 words. 
An individual essay on companies non-financial reports of 3,000 words.

Textbooks:

Core Text:  
Blowfield, M and Murray, A Corporate Responsibility, 4th Edition, OUP, Oxford

Others

Idowu, S O (Ed.) (2017) Key Initiatives in Corporate Social Responsibility, Springer International, Switzerland.
Aluchna, M and Idowu, S O (Eds.), (2017) The Dynamics of Corporate Social Responsibility Springer International, Switzerland.
Idowu, S O and Leal Filho, W (Eds.) (2009), Global Practices of Corporate Social Responsibility, Springer, Berlin and Heidelberg.
Idowu, S O, Schmidpeter, R and Fifka, M S (2015) (Eds.); Corporate Social Responsibility in Europe: United in Sustainable Diversity, Springer International, Switzerland.

Websites: 
CSR Europe www.csreurope.org
Business in the Community www.bitc.org.uk
European Business Ethics Network www.eben-net.org
European Corporate Governance Institute www.ecgi.org
Sustainable Investment and Finance Association www.uksif.org
FTSE4Good www.ftse.com/Indices/FTSE4Good_Index_Series/index.jsp
World Business Council for Sustainable Development www.wbcsd.org

Academic Journals
Journal of Business Ethics
Corporate Governance: an International Review
Corporate Governance: International Journal of Business in Society
Business Ethics: A European Review
European Management Journal
Society and Business Review
International Journal Corporate Social Responsibility
International Journal of Responsible Management in Emerging Economies