Corporate Social Responsibility in Emerging Economies

Abstract

India, a developing and the second largest populated country in the world after China, is characterized by many burning issues like unemployment, low literacy, lack of modern medical facilities mainly in rural areas, lack of connectivity of the rural areas with the mainland cities, and the like. Although government has been working on all these issues and has been very much successful, it is not possible for the government alone to solve all the issues in such a vast populated country in a desired period of time. Amidst such situation, it is the corporate sector that can play a bigger role in the development of the society through its CSR initiatives. This chapter attempts to study corporate social responsibility, its role and issues in a developing country with special reference to India. The findings show that lack of understanding, inadequately trained personnel, lack of proper policy making, lack of participation of the local people, and so on affects the reach and effectiveness of CSR programs in India.