An International Comparison of Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract

As globalization has increased, so have the increased pressures and expectations for companies to participate in corporate social responsibility (CSR). Using a new database, SustainalyticsGlobal Platform (SGP), we examined how a globalized economy affects CSR rankings,including the categories of environmental, social, and governance for 4,643 companies in thesix international regions of Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America, North America andSouth America.  We found that the regions of Africa, Europe and South America hadconsistently higher CSR scores for Total CSR and all categories, followed by North America,while the regions of Latin America and Asia-Pacific had the lowest CSR scores.  Additionally,we found that the CSR category of governance had the highest CSR scores while theenvironmental category has the lowest.