CSR in Management Sciences: Is It “a Road to Nowhere”?

Abstract

Over the years, the idea of corporate social responsibility has attracted the interest both of practitioners and researchers. While a discourse has occurred in the context of the meaning of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), there is no extensive analysis of the latest contributions. To address this gap, three objectives have been formulated for the purpose of this paper: to analyse development trends in CSR definitions, to assess the applicability of scientific efforts in the above-mentioned area and to demonstrate future research opportunities and threats based on the state-of-the-art in CSR. An organized literature review and bibliometric methods have been proposed based on 55 articles published in the “Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management Journal”, the top ranked periodical with the highest Impact Factor, from its beginnings to January 2021. This research provides a clear overview of the recent CSR trends that are present in the literature, by pinpointing those works that refer to significant characteristics and indicate future trajectories of CSR in a managerial practical context, particularly important for the effectiveness of future CSR-oriented organizational activities. This paper summarises the existing CSR-related knowledge and constitutes the first attempt to investigate the process of the creation and development of the corporate social responsibility concept from its origins to its contemporary multidimensionality.