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Home page> Corporate social responsibility > Key documents > "European SMEs and Social and Environmental Responsibility"

"European SMEs and Social and Environmental Responsibility"

Date:Report, European Commission, April 2002

A number of large companies are promoting social and environmental responsibility because they expect this will help their image to consumers and, hence, their competitiveness. As the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) seems to be more tailored to large enterprises, SMEs tend to abstain from this process. The report analyses how SMEs see their role in relation to CSR and the means they can use to adopt CSR strategies and practices in their business. This report has benefited from the European Network on Social Responsibility Survey, which is one of the main sources of information on this issue.

Document's Table of Contents
Section Page
Preface 5
Summary 7
Chapter 1: Introduction 9
Chapter 2: Approaching the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility 11
2.1. Definition of Corporate Social Responsibility 11
2.2. Current development in CSR 12
2.3. Definition of the "Stakeholder" concept 13
2.1.3. Adaptation to change 9
2.4. The social and environmental responsibility issue from a European perspective: the activities of the European Institutions 14
2.5. CSR from an SME perspective: Some preliminary considerations 16
Chapter 3: The social responsibility of SMEs to their external community 17
3.1. Introduction 17
3.2. Degree of involvement of SMEs in socially responsible activities 18
3.3. Description of socially responsible activities developed by SMEs. 21
3.4. Characterisation of SMEs' socially responsible activities 23
3.5. Rationale/reasons for the involvement in external socially responsible activities 27
Benefits identified by SMEs from their involvement in socially responsible activities 29
3.7. Existing barriers to the involvement in socially responsible activities 31
3.8. Future expectations on socially responsible activities amongst SMEs 32
Chapter 4: Environmental responsibility of SMEs 35
4.1. Introduction 35
4.2. SMEs� involvement in environmentally responsible activities 36
4.3. Rationale/reasons for the involvement in environmentally responsible activities 38
4.4. Business benefits for SMEs derived from the involvement in environmentally responsible activities. 40
4.5. Existing barriers to the involvement in environmentally responsible activities 41
Chapter 5: National support initiatives to encourage social and environmental responsibility within SMEs 45
Chapter 6: Conclusions 51
Annexes  
I The set-up and analysis of the ENSR enterprise survey 53
II Glossary of terms 59
III External social and environmental standards 61
IV Names and addresses of the consortium partners 65

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