Critical Perspectives on CSR

CSR is often presented as progress: firms moving beyond narrow self-interest to consider their broader social and environmental responsibilities. Yet many scholars, activists, and practitioners argue that CSR, as currently practiced, too often functions as strategy rather than ethics. It helps firms protect their reputation and manage risk, but not necessarily to make structural change. This section explores four recurring concerns.

CSR as Risk and Reputation Management

One of the most consistent critiques is that CSR primarily serves strategic needs rather than ethical ones. Rather than addressing harm, it is often deployed as a form of reputational risk management in that it becomes a way to anticipate, contain, or deflect potential damage to the company’s image. Firms may launch CSR initiatives not because they reduce injustice, but because they help manage regulatory pressure or consumer backlash. This use of CSR is especially evident in high-impact industries, where public scrutiny is intense and reputational volatility can carry material consequences.

Companies may issue sustainability reports, partner with NGOs, or join global compacts not because these actions transform business practices, but because they help shape how stakeholders perceive the firm’s principles. These actions often function as buffers against criticism. For instance, some companies under pressure from unionization drives introduce employee wellness programs rather than improve wages or working conditions. Fossil fuel firms have promoted offset schemes even as they continue to expand extraction.

Reputation management is not inherently unethical. In some cases, it creates internal momentum for change. The concern arises when these efforts are used primarily to shield the company from accountability.

CSR as Image Laundering

While reputation management aims to contain fallout, image laundering attempts to rewrite the story entirely. The goal is not merely to deflect criticism but to recast the firm as an ethical actor even when core practices remain unchanged. Terms like greenwashing, whitewashing, and carewashing describe some common ways used to reframe things.

Greenwashing involves exaggerating or fabricating environmental commitments. A company might promote a carbon neutrality campaign based on offset programs while simultaneously expanding operations that increase emissions. Whitewashing refers to reputational recovery following a scandal. For example, a firm accused of labour violations might fund scholarships or sponsor community events instead of reforming workplace conditions. Finally, carewashing involves aligning with social causes to gain moral capital. Companies may release Pride-themed products while funding anti-LGBTQ+ politicians, or celebrate International Women’s Day while maintaining gender pay gaps.

Figure 5.9. “Rainbow washing” is when a company or organization uses LGBTQ+ symbols—especially the rainbow flag—in marketing or branding to appear supportive of LGBTQ+ rights, without taking meaningful action to support the community. It’s often criticized as a form of performative allyship, especially if the business doesn’t back up its messaging with inclusive policies, donations to LGBTQ+ causes, or year-round support. [Image Description]

These tactics have grown increasingly sophisticated. Early greenwashing relied on vague slogans and eco-labels, whereas today, some firms will publish ESG reports and bias audits just to counter harmful practices and stories. These efforts often create the illusion of alignment with public values while avoiding the cost or complexity of real transformation. These tactics are morally resonant and reputationally useful, but they are ethically hollow.

CSR as Ethical Branding Without Structural Change

A related critique focuses on the rise of ethical branding. As phrases like “purpose-driven business” and “ESG leadership” gain currency, companies increasingly adopt the language of responsibility, while at the same time, their business practices change very little.

This pattern is visible across industries. A tech company may highlight mental health days while maintaining work cultures of chronic overwork. A fast-fashion brand might advertise a sustainable collection while relying on supply chains that exploit workers and generate massive waste. These examples are not outliers; they are part of a broader strategy in which ethics becomes a brand asset. When firms sell responsibility as part of their image, the appearance of virtue may matter more than its substance.

Even where companies measure CSR performance, the metrics themselves can reinforce the problem. Organizations increasingly optimize for what can be easily reported (carbon savings, diversity quotas) while overlooking more complex forms of harm that are harder to quantify but no less significant. Workplace coercion, biodiversity loss, or community disempowerment, for example, often escape the dashboards. Consumers may continue to support companies whose practices they recognize as problematic because the firm’s messaging also offers a moral alibi. When CSR is driven by branding logic, it becomes less a framework for social repair than a form of market positioning. The ethical narrative gives the firm a competitive advantage (or a pass), and not what the firm does to actually promote the common good.

CSR as a Substitute for Public Accountability

Perhaps the most fundamental concern is that CSR displaces regulation. By promoting CSR as voluntary, flexible, and internally governed, companies often present it as a superior alternative to binding rules. This framing allows firms to position themselves as moral leaders while resisting external accountability. In doing so, firms are able to claim the authority to define, measure, and evaluate their own responsibilities. This is not true of all firms, but the pattern is widespread enough to raise concern.

Reclaiming CSR’s Ethical Core

These critiques do not suggest that no businesses have made genuine improvements, but critique performs a vital function. It helps distinguish between appearance and substance, identifies when CSR is being used to distract or delay, and refocuses attention on the underlying structures that enable harm. For CSR to fulfil its ethical potential, it must move beyond communication and toward accountability. This means stronger standards, greater transparency, and independent monitoring and not just better storytelling.

Image Descriptions

Figure 5.9. This image is a collage of 16 brand logos, each redesigned using rainbow colors associated with the LGBTQ+ Pride flag. Companies and organizations represented include LinkedIn, Facebook (thumbs-up icon), YouTube, Tumblr, Spotify, Twitter, Uber, BuzzFeed, MasterCard, GAP, American Airlines, Airbnb, the White House, (RED), and Lyft. Each logo is stylized in a way that prominently features rainbow stripes or gradients. The visual illustrates the concept of rainbow washing, which is when businesses display LGBTQ+ symbols or colors, particularly during Pride Month, as a form of marketing or branding without necessarily supporting LGBTQ+ rights through policies, advocacy, or sustained actions. The caption critiques this performative allyship, especially when not backed by meaningful, year-round support. [Return to Figure 5.9]