Corporate Social Responsibility And Business Ethics Essay With Case Study Example.

Upon completion of the subject, students will be able to:

a. Understand “business ethics” and “corporate social responsibility” from a global perspective
b. Identify and resolve ethical dilemmas and responsibility issues in business and management
c. Analyse ethical and responsibility issues in individual business and management domains by applying the Babson framework and the stakeholder perspective

A shipping company had been brought to New York by a man named W.R. Grace. After completing fifteen years successfully he had been elected as the Mayor of the New York City. He was also promoting the welfare of others as massive food donation was being provided to those people of Ireland who are extremely scarcity of food. And at the same time, he was also running a nonprofit institute at his home to the poor immigrant women (Ball, 2013). To honor of the Grace Institute, October 28 was designated as a “Grace Day” by the New York City. It can understand that the W.R. Grace Company was dedicated to its social responsibilities. The grandson of Grace J. Peter Grace took the responsibility of the shipping company. By the 1980s, the company also started producing chemical and the plants were pouring toxins into the water and soil underneath the small town Woburn. This caused leukemia disease in newborns. Here W.R. Grace seems irresponsible towards its environmental responsibilities.

The ethical responsibilities make the corporation to do business by following a right and the fairway even when they are not bound by any law. The company should operate its business ethically. It can be expected from the companies to follow the norms and values which are appropriate at the specific time and a specific place (Bhattacharya, 2007). An organization should also understand its social and environmental impact and should invest in decreasing the negative impact of its business activities. Stakeholders also need to be entitled to view the direction of the firm and should have also given the opportunity to guide the company accordingly.  

It provides the ability to carry a defined level of economic production for an unlimited time. W. R. Grace Company is based in the United States, New York. The company was growing rapidly. The company had started providing shipping services all over the world.  In 1945 J. Peter Grace, grandson of W. R. Grace took over the control of the business and a decade later it became a publicly traded corporation of the New York Stock Exchange (Das Gupta, 2010). There was an achievement come for W. R. Grace in 1980 when it also started production of chemical and materials.

It is the potential of a social system, such as a nation, which works to a defined level for social welfare for an unspecific period of time. Grace was greatly involved in charity and donations as he was promoting the welfare of others as massive food donation was being provided to those people of Ireland who are extremely scarcity of food (Eweje and Perry, 2012). And at the same time, the company was also running a nonprofit institute at his home to the poor immigrant women. A tuition-free school and the classes were offering basic typewriting, stenography and bookkeeping. Above one hundred thousand young women have passed from the institute which helps them to survive.  

According to this, the rates of renewable resource harvest must be maintained by the organization, creation of pollution and the resources which cannot be renewed must be reduced for an unspecific period of time. In 1980s Grace has started producing chemical and materials and its plants were pouring toxin into the water which was reaching into the water supply of the Woburn a small town of Massachusetts (Robinson, 2012). This caused leukemia disease in newborn.

Economic sustainability

The theory of stakeholders can be considered as a mirror image of corporate social responsibilities. It does represent to those individuals and the group of people can be affected by the action of the firm. To be more specific the people whose lives are getting affected by a firm hold a right and commitment to engage in managing it (De George, 2014). The waste materials which are coming from the chemical factory of W. R. Grace is getting mixed into the water and the soil which is leading to water and soil pollution. As per the CSR perspective, the owner of W. R. Grace was responsible to dispose of the waste materials safely. This toxic water makes its way into the Woburn water supply which was being used by the people of the town. The people who were living there found their environment poisoned as it brought a disease called leukemia which was affecting the newborn babies. As per the business ethics, they have a right to get fresh air and clean water.

The best method is marketplace responsibility as it is a Corporate Social Responsibility framework which defines that what companies should look for to achieve in regards to the customer, governments and supplier. Also to measure the impacts are being made on the third parties through the products. The list of management behaviors can be considered as part of its principles which tend to be available in corporations that can help their market in having control of business practice protected by the principles (Griffin et al., 2014).

A predictable environment effect of any project is allowed by the Environmental Impact Assessment so that it can be identified and avoided or minimized at the early stage itself. People always feel concern about the probabilities of any unseen or unknown environmental effects of specific development.  ES provides accompany to a planning application, the arability of ES will be advertised by the Planning Service and will take the description of predictable effects on the environment into inspection to make its decision (Hawthorne, 2014). Getting available the information about the predictable effects, EIA can help in reducing fears gathered by the lack of information. One it’s getting approved by environmental clearance for industries they make them able to apply for Consent to establish and Consent to Operate. There are certain problems with environmental impact assessment and one of these is in maximum cases, once the elements have been inspected, there is small pressure on the actors to change their conclusion. When the action has been completed by the EIA, can go ahead nevertheless of any negative result related to the environment (Human, 2007).  Another problem with the formation of Environmental Impact Assessment may come from insufficient understanding about the scientific reason for the issues or form the type of knowledge required. This issue might be considered as extremely complicated and must be dealt with timescales that generate possible difficulties in understanding the issue.  

There are many important entities in society and business is one of them. The action is being taken by them making an impact on society, whether it is good or bad or both. All the businesses are bound by business ethics. And according to this corporations must realize the commitments given, responsibilities of the agreement, should not be any compromising in relates to the quality and protect accuracy. The corporations must include the environmental protection in their investment strategy. The green investment has emerged and according to that, the corporations are responsible for investments that combine environmental, governance and social aspects. It does not matter whether the corporation is polluting or not, environment protection must be the concern to every corporation (Ravi Raman and Lipschutz, 2010). All organization must use sustainable resources and should create a safe and healthy working environment. An ecological balance needs to be balanced and proactive steps are needed to be taken in order to minimize the generation of waste materials and to protect the environment. It was the responsibility of W.R. Grace Corporation to be aware of the consequences of the actions which were being taken by them and also to protect the resource of the environment.  They required purchasing good quality of raw materials and should have used scientific techniques to dispose of the waste materials. They should not have produced the chemical which can affect the environment or can increase the risk of soil, air and water pollution. The owner of W.R. Grace Corporation was required to review the corporation so that they could have improved the protection of the community and relations (Scha?fer, 2010). The implementation of the CSR program was required so that the pollution control partners can understand the CSR goals and they could have worked with the firm to meet those goals.

The cost-benefit analysis explains that the social policies need to be arranged in such a manner that it maximizes the benefits to costs ratio. When the relevant costs and benefits can be estimated in economic terms then cost-benefit analysis uses utilitarianism. The utilitarian foundation is considered to be the base for cost-benefit analysis because benefits and costs are based on whether the impacts are positive or negative on the people of the society. In the given case, W.R. Grace Company cost is associated with the environmental pollution created imposing a negative impact on the society. The benefit can obtain by the organization if the corporate social responsibility is being followed in an appropriate manner.         

The creation of “Grace Day” is ethical as the Grace Institute was a tuition-free school and was helping poor immigrant women. It was providing them with the basic knowledge of stenography, typewriting and bookkeeping which was helping those poor women to get a job and earn bread and butter for themselves. There were thousands of women had passed from the school and surviving to these days. It was not been created to earn money instead, it was a nonprofit organization to help poor people. The main goal of the Grace Institute was to help people in improving their quality of life by giving them free education (Weiss, 2014).

Conclusion

The W.R. Grace Corporation was failed to fulfill its responsibilities towards the environment and its stakeholders as the waste materials which were coming from its chemical factory were getting mixed into the water and the soil which is leading to water and soil pollution and caused leukemia disease in newborns. .It was the responsibility of W.R. Grace Corporation to be aware of the consequences of the actions which were being taken by them and also to protect the resource of the environment. But at the same time, Grace Institute was providing tuition-free school to poor immigrant women who help them to get a job and earn bread and butter for themselves, which has been awarded as “Grace Day” by New York City. 

References

Ball, D. (2013). International business. 6th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Bhattacharya, J. (2007). Corporate social responsibility. 4th ed. Delhi: Asian Books.

Das Gupta, A. (2010). Ethics, business and society. 8th ed. Los Angeles: Response Books.

De George, R. (2014). Business Ethics. 6th ed. Harlow, England: Pearson Education.

Eweje, G. and Perry, M. (2012). Business & sustainability. 5th ed. Bingley: Emerald.

Griffin, R., Ebert, R., Starke, F., Dracopoulos, G. and Lang, M. (2014). Business. 13th ed. Toronto: Pearson Canada.

Hawthorne, J. (2014). Ethics. 3rd ed. Malden, MA: Wiley.

Human, J. (2007). Business studies. 5th ed. Cape Town: Nasou via Africa.

Ravi Raman, K. and Lipschutz, R. (2010). Corporate social responsibility. 10th ed. Basingstoke [England]: Palgrave Macmillan.

Robinson, Z. (2012). Sustainability. 9th ed. Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Editions.

Scha?fer, R. (2010). Sustainability. 7th ed. Mu?nchen: Callwey.

Weiss, J. (2014). Business ethics. 10th ed. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.