Introduction
In the realm of management, companies are never alone, since they exist in environments and within communities. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a field of management that describes business ethics and business standards (Fifka 2009). In business and administrative practices, profit or commercial organizations must adhere to the practice of corporate social responsibility. In its broadest meaning, CSR describes a range of strategies and activities that the profit organizations undertake voluntarily as a way of adhering to the environmental, social, and ethical standards of business practice (Jamali 2007).
CSR helps private companies to enhance their corporate reputations among the local consumers and meet the legal requirements of operating businesses within their locations. However, justifying the appropriateness and objectiveness of this practice in individual organizations is often a subject of empirical verification (Popa & Salanta 2014). This report analyses two peer-reviewed journals to discuss CSR and the major issues identified in these documents.
The Main Topic in the Articles: CSR
Corporate Social Responsibility is the foundation and the umbrella that involves the incorporation of various voluntary practices and activities that help organizations to operate optimally while fulfilling the globally accepted business standards (Fifka 2009). Each business segment and each business location across the world contains the people, who are the employees, the communities, the consumers, and the laws, which form the guiding principles of the business activities.
Popa and Salanta (2014) state that maintaining CSR helps organizations to practice corporate conscience or responsible business practices within the environment they operate and to the people they serve around the societies. With a positive CSR, a profit organization is capable of demonstrating corporate citizenship through satisfying the interests of all the shareholders including the consumers, the investors, and the community people (Popa & Salanta 2014). Generally, CSR is an important business management concept because it makes firms responsible.
Corporate Social Responsibility and the health promotion debate
The article delved into investigating the issue of health promotion and the manner in which it interacts with the idea of CSR in the healthcare management paradigm. In examining this relationship within the healthcare management realm, Monachino and Moreira (2014), investigated the concepts of the corporate communication, healthcare management, health partnerships, and health promotion.
CSR is all about enhancing corporate citizenship regardless of the ideas or strategies involved, as long as they follow the business ethics (Fifka 2009). The above ideas in this study brought a continuum of strategies on how healthcare organizations, through the CSR umbrella, can create new health promotion partnerships and health promotion strategies that can help several healthcare stakeholders. In CSR, being responsible generally entails promoting the activities and actions that best serve the interests of the consumers and other stakeholders. Health promotion is the ultimate goal of all the healthcare organizations and boosting the practice means promoting CSR.
The journal was selected through an assessment of the available CSR articles on an online library. The rationale for selecting this document lies within the idea that formulating health partnerships to promote good health can be a good idea that will enhance CSR within the healthcare realm. The first idea in the article is the idea of the formation of health promotion strategies that aimed at enhancing health promotion among the healthcare receivers (Monachino & Moreira 2014).
The concept of CSR claims that offering services through the optimal strategies and initiating new ideas of serving the clients, promoting environmental safety, and enhancing good governance, are major facets of corporate citizenship. The second idea is the idea of the formation of new health promotion partnerships (Monachino & Moreira 2014). Forming corporate partnerships to promote good health, means having a commitment to provide optimal care services, which is often a positive idea that drives the whole meaning of CSR.
Public Health, Academic Medicine, and the Alcohol Industry’s CSR
The article analyzed the existing CSR issues in the alcohol industry, in the scholarly medicine, and in the public health community. The authors, Babor and Robaina (2013), assessed the above issues using the public health theory that deals with the concept of corporate social responsibility. The journal article wanted to exploit the quandary that exists between the medical research and the commercialized alcohol research, with respect to the practice of CSR (Babor & Robaina 2013).
The journal considered the relationship between the public health systems and the alcohol industry to be a complex one, where CSR is slowly losing its meaning. While the academic medicine and the scientific medical research consider alcoholism detrimental to the health of individuals, the alcohol industry skillfully uses its scientific and policy-related programs in its CSR platform to boost its commercial interests (Babor & Robaina 2013). Brewers and distillers are all using dubious scientific evidences to boost their alcohol distribution activities, while threatening the lives of the consumers.
This journal existed in an online library that contained documents that discussed CSR and the practice of medicine. The rationale for selecting this document lies on the idea that alcohol consumption tends to affect the field of medicine in its care practices and in its commitment to ensure optimal healthcare among the patients. According to Babor and Robaina (2013), the well-protected alcohol manufacturing industries promote the wrong CSR.
The first idea that matches the concept of CSR is the idea that the CSR of the alcohol processing industries uses dubious research and doubtful alcohol consumption policies that are solely for promoting the commercial interests of the firms and not the good health of the consumers (Babor & Robaina 2013). The second idea is that the CSR of medical research on alcohol consumption provides scientific evidence that recommends for the reduction of alcoholism via medically proven facts, but these facts do not influence the alcohol consumers.
Conclusion
Corporate Social Responsibility is a diverse management concept that stretches across several corporate organizations that operate for profit reasons. However, the global healthcare management community also feels the need to examine its CSR and the manner in which the CSR of other firms affects health promotion. The two journals present four unique ideas that are important to understand in the realm of healthcare management. CSR means providing sufficient services that meet the demands of the consumers and the ethical standards of business practices.
The first document presents the ideas that formulating health promotion partnerships and health promotion strategies are two essential aspects of ensuring that CSR is working in the healthcare sector. In the second document, the authors investigated two important ideas that create a dilemma in the CSR of the alcohol processing industry, the medical science, and the academic research. While medical CSR provides scientific medical proofs about alcohol consumption, the brewer’s CSR lures people into consuming alcohol.
References
Babor, T & Robaina, K 2013, ‘Public Health, Academic Medicine, and the Alcohol Industry’s Corporate Social Responsibility Activities’, American Journal of Public Health, vol. 13, no. 2, pp. 206-214.
Fifka, M 2009, ‘Towards a More Business-Oriented Definition of Corporate Social Responsibility: Discussing the Core Controversies of a Well-Established Concept’, J. Service Science & Management, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 312-321.
Jamali, D 2007, ‘The Case for Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility in Developing Countries’, Business and Society Review, vol. 112, no. 1, pp. 1-27.
Monachino, M & Moreira, P 2014, ‘Corporate Social Responsibility and the health promotion debate: An international review on the potential role of corporations’, International Journal of Healthcare Management, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 53-59.
Popa, M & Salanta, I 2014, ‘Corporate social responsibility versus corporate social irresponsibility’, Management & Marketing, vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 137‐146.