Corporate Social Responsibility

Introduction Corporate social responsibility is a concept that has been around for decades. It emerged as an issue when law makers, stakeholders, and the general public began focusing on ethical and responsible corporate behavior, also referred to as “corporate citizenship” (Carroll, A., 1998). According to Carroll (1998), there are four facets of corporate citizenship. These facets are: 1) corporates fulfilling their economic responsibilities and be profitable, 2) corporates obeying the law, 3) corporates being ethically responsible, and 4) corporates making charitable contributions, however, “defining socially responsible corporate behavior is not a straightforward exercise” (Campbell, J. L., 2007, p. 950).
According to Campbell (2007), socially responsible behavior may vary depending on one’s point of view. Therefore, care must be taken in how the concept is used and defined. In addition, Campbell (2007) discusses the behavioral threshold below which describes how some corporations no longer behave in socially responsible ways, as well as focusing on conditions of why firms are more likely to behave in socially responsible ways. Campbell explores relationships between the economic health of the company and the likelihood of its being socially responsible. Based on the information described above, we will analyze the corporate citizenship policy of our selected corporation, Starbucks. Starbucks was founded in 1971 in Seattle’s historic Pike Place Market. It started as a narrow storefront offering some of the world’s finest fresh-roasted whole bean coffees. The whole concept of good coffee and a place for conversation and community inspired Howard Shultz to purchase Starbucks in 1987. Since then, Starbucks has grown exponentially. Based on SEC Quarterly filings, Starbucks netted $10.4 million in earnings in its May 1996 10Q filing and just eight years later, $540.7 million in its January 2014 10Q filing. We will analyze its corporate social