Paper Title
Corporate Social Responsibility Practice in Developing Countries, The Case of the Kingdom of Bahrain
Abstract
Ethical Considerations and Governance issues are now the main concern for various national and international organizations. This comes along with the rise of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and sustainability programs undertaken by various institutions. CSR is a business approach contributing to sustainable development by delivering economic, social and environmental benefits for stakeholders. CSR has many definitions and practices; however the majority refer o companies’ practices to be sustainable or responsible, to be economically viable, with a positive impact on society, to respect and conserve the environment. The subject of Corporate Social responsibility, especially with the spread of unethical practices and organizations fallouts and wrongdoings is yet under-researched. Moreover, it is further mandated from developing countries to meet international sustainability and governance standards. The problem with current CSR models is that they are focused on the financial responsibility of an organization being less attentive to employees who are the most important stakeholder. In this study, the main objective is to understand the CSR practice in the Kingdom of Bahrain, a complementary objective is to measure the perception of employees about the code of ethics implemented and the CSR initiatives undertaken by organizations in Bahrain data has been collected through 3 Interviews with Experts in three organizations and from a survey collected from 106 respondents with a response rate of 40 percent as the rest were not considered for no respons and/or invalid and incomplete responses. Key findings reflected employees’ perception that there is a strong presence of organizational values, and most of the respondents perceive CSR as an important component in organizations, yet some of the employees were not engaged in such activities.
Keywords - Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR in Bahrain, Employee Perception of CSR.