Corporate Social Responsibility: A Fake Already According to the Theory of the Firm?Date submitted: October 4, 2017Revised version accepted after double blind review: August 31, 2018

Abstract

This paper asks if we can support by argument the norm “we should hold firms responsible”. From a critical rationalist perspective, answering this question has an ethical and an empirical dimension. The ethical dimension discusses whether we should hold firms socially responsible for ethical reasons. However, since demanding that we should hold firms responsible requires that we can hold them responsible, this paper focuses on this empirical dimension. Thus, this paper asks whether we can hold firms responsible for theoretical reasons. Theoretical reasons means that this paper refers to theories of the firm and in particular to their hypotheses about the behaviour of firms and firm members. The paper finds that the nexus of contracts approach (which is the economic mainstream theory of the firm) ascribes behaviour to the firm that corresponds to the firm members’ behaviour. In consequence, we would not have reasons to ascribe responsibility to the firm from a social science perspective. Since the nexus of contracts approach is not adequate from a critical rationalist perspective, however, this paper develops an extended corporate actors approach. In contrast to the nexus of contacts approach, the extended corporate actors approach ascribes behaviour to the firm that differs from firm members’ actions. Thus, we do have reasons to ascribe responsibility to the firm from a social science perspective.