Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Homero Aridjis: You cannot effect a corporate social responsibility while there is complicity inside the gouvernement and the corporation to exploit a human being. The composed values of citizens for a corporation aren't the moral values when this doesn't correspond to the commercial values.

by Homero Aridjis

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Irina Yasina: Yes, of course. And we see a lot of examples in what kind of communities it happens. It happens in great corporations, sometimes on the government and on the local community level. It is a strange question because there are many examples of it. Thank you.

by Irina Yasina

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jerry Mander: Answertext will be available soon.

by Jerry Mander

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jesper Green: Yes, corporate social responsibility is possible but it depends on corporate willingness to cut some profit. To build hospitals, to sell software is okay, is fine. It’s fine with me. You could say it’s responsible. There’s no harm done. So yes, corporate social responsibility is possible. But sometimes corporate social responsibility is also bullshit, is some kind of make another brand, building another brand, reinforce a brand. But it can be done. It is possible.

by Jesper Green

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jodie Evans: I don't believe corporate social responsibility is possible. I believe personal social responsibility is possible and happens, but it's the people. And I don't think a corporation is made up of people. So it can do great harm and it can do great good, and it can be the way it's forced into behavior is through affecting the people. There's nothing to affect there. It's an inanimate object that's created to-- the success is tied to a bottom line. And even in socially responsible investing, what we see is that people think that if you give to a socially responsible company it'll grow, you can do well and do good. But maybe being socially responsible is not having as big a bottom line, is not feeling that you have to be in the culture of a 10% return every year. But we're not there, because the corporations that even call themselves socially responsible are bought up in a system about growth, growth, growth, growth, growth instead of people who are willing to invest their money non-profitly for something to grow. What about a corporation that's job was to find solutions to create sustainability and that meant not huge profits? But we're not there yet, because that will take some very courageous people. It won't take a socially responsible corporation. It will take individuals whose depth of understanding of what social responsibility means are willing to take the courageous step of not having something that has an enormous return on investment, that their return on investment value is the social value that that company, corporation has brought. So I don't think there's such a thing as a socially responsible corporation. I think there are socially responsible people and hopefully they become more and more socially responsible, hopefully that that culture of social responsibility, of people who are working within corporations that are still invested in capitalism loosen their identity with that and create more change.

by Jodie Evans

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

John Gage: In short, no. That is to say, the corporation and disembodied legal entity formed for certain specific functions, a functional thing that enables the law, enables flow of money and flow of responsibility if a disaster occurs, the disembodied corporate form is created by human beings for purposes of production. The simplest models of production depend at the end on the prices of what is an input and the prices of what is an output. In other words, the corporate forms are created for the purpose of providing goods and services at the cheapest possible prices to meet a certain specific set of demands by human beings, these are products. In the calculation, it’s abbreviated simplified form of cost and price. In that revenues and profits, in that simple calculus, there is no room today for the addition of happiness, welfare, richness of life of those that work with long-term implications of a particular product [that’s cost] in the environment, both in making it and using it, in the complete lifecycle costs of these objects that the corporate mechanism creates. Altering the form of accounting alters what today you would call corporate social responsibility. Altering the form in which the responsibility of a corporation, not simply to make a product, but to all those that work there to put their life effort, their knowledge, their capabilities into that corporate, adding that extra dimension is what makes the phrase corporate social responsibility meaningful. So, today, when I hear people say corporate social responsibility, it often means nothing more than a simple foundation, putting some money into small projects where the employees work. In reality, the much deeper responsibility of a corporation is to fully account for its weight upon the environment, its weight upon and inspiration for the lives of those that work in the corporation, its long-term responsibility to the families of those who work in the corporation, and its long-term advantage in recognizing the contribution of creative human beings to the process of fabrication, manufacture, creation, that in fact is the point of the corporation in the first place.

by John Gage

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jonathan Granoff: Corporate social responsibility is possible; in fact it's very easy to achieve, because corporations are [dejoury] institutions. They're created by law, by states. They're not natural institutions. So the values that are infused in a corporation are values that can be expressed very explicitly and positively. So, right now, the main value in the corporation is simply profit, and that's the bottom line in evaluating the success or failure of a corporation. But there are other values that could be included in that. Such as its environmental responsibility, such as - well, I mean we have laws relating to child labor, for example, if we have - in most of the industrialized world, and there's laws about safety in the workplace, and there's laws about how shareholders have rights of information, and corporations have to account to their shareholders. So, there are high levels of social responsibility that corporations have, but their responsibility is only to - is mainly to the shareholders. So if we took that principle of accountability and brought in other stakeholders, the corporation would be more socially responsible. If we put in values of protecting human rights and protecting the environment, the corporation would be more responsible. So, bringing the corporation into becoming socially responsible is not difficult at all. It’s redefining to whom, and for whom, and why, and for what, they’re going to be responsible. That it’s a matter of changing laws, since corporations are only creatures of law.

by Jonathan Granoff

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jonathan Meese: A company is a company, responsibility is responsibility, society is society. Longing for connections between these ultimately hermetic states is completely barbarous and irrelevant. If an affair is suitable for itself, the responsibility and the society are suitable as well, everything will be consistent with absolute anti-harmony. That means to be human. Ups and downs, mountains and valleys, storm and anti-storm. Life is a ship without rail and this is good. One is not able to cling to anything in a storm. The ship arrives at shores again and again where it could shatter. We are in the ship or we are flushed away or we shatter. It always is our fault, never the fault of others. The responsibility of society has a responsibility of society, but we do not know it. An affair is as Nautilus, as a submarine boat, as the realm of Captain Ahab. We go hunting, hunting is good; if we come into the mouth of Moby Dick, it is good and if we are eaten, it is good too - this all belongs to hunting. If you hunt, you can lose; if you hunt, the hunter can be killed - by the victim. Nobody knows who the hunter is, no one knows what the victim is. We do not know anything. This is humbleness and the relevance and responsibility of society. We are unknown to ourselves.

by Jonathan Meese

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jonathan Stack: Yes. I mean it's possible. Look this event is proof that it's possible, but I think that it's a catchphrase for everything. I mean corporations are made of individuals, the people who run the corporation care to be socially responsible, then they will be socially responsible. It's not inherent to the corporate goals, not necessarily it's human beings, it gets back to the whole idea. Corporations are made up of human beings. They can be powerful, obviously they are. They are a very powerful way to organize and consolidate energy, but there are also -- they can be very negative just by when they don't care. Look at Union Carbide in India and many, many others. I don't think that, I personally have not chosen to work within the corporate structure because I like the freedom of being able to choose how to spend my time everyday and I have to answer to anybody on that kind of consistent structural way, and I think that allows me to be more "socially responsible." But, on the other hand, I greatly admire and depend upon the good social responsibility spirit of corporations or people who have worked and lived within corporations and have benefited from who have accumulated wealth through it. So, let's just say this. If corporations are not socially responsible, or that's not possible, then we got a problem. How can we get, how can we, I kind of think it of more like, how can I help to "liberate" the resources of corporations to help them apply more of their economic resources towards socially responsible activities? And I thoroughly believe that's possible and think of it ultimately as one of my responsibilities. If I can get a corporate American broadcaster to play some work on television that opens minds instead of closing it in small and big ways, then it's a little bit like subversiveness. You are sort of liberating space piece by piece. I can't contemplate totally of changing the system. So, I am just contemplating liberating the little pieces of that that I have some influence or some bit participation in.

by Jonathan Stack

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

José Manuel Prieto: Corporate social responsibility is attainable. I think the degree to which a community establishes connections, establishes transparency, allows [...], and that the members of this community monitor and keep an eye on the main subjects or the main movements. The ones who exercise this responsibility, the ones who are conscious of these degrees and conscious of this and conscious of the usefulness this can have. There are examples in which collective activity hat not been reached and this usually leads to moments of major urgency or of great danger. [...]

by José Manuel Prieto

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Jwan M. Aziz:

by Jwan M. Aziz

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Kailash Satyarthi: Yes, corporate social responsibilities are very much possible. I am proud to say that I am amongst the one who have initiated the big debate of corporate social responsibility in the carpet production and carpet market. In this part of the world in Germany about 15 years ago when we launched a big campaign to educate the consumers and pressurize the entire corporate to ensure that the carpets produced in the developing world, in India, Pakistan, and Nepal are not produced by the slave children, that consumers' consciousness and consumers' pressures helped a lot. And, the first social initiative led to the formation of the first social labeling which is known as the RUGMARK. RUGMARK is one of the most successful social labeling which guarantees that those carpets are not made by children and child slave and that has helped in the new code of conducts formulated by the government agencies and the carpet industry. Similarly, we can see a good example in sporting goods industry. Then, we see examples in cloth industry where the Clean Cloth Campaign has led to the corporate social responsibility, not only the discourse, but also some concrete measures which were taken by the industry and by the governments in many parts of the world. The latest one is the corporate social responsibility in the chocolate industry. When it was exposed that thousands of slaves are engaged in production of cocoa beans in Ivory Coast and Ghana and some other countries, that has led to a big discourse and big criticism. And, the big carpet industries, the big manufacturers got together along with the civil society and the International Labor Organization and formulated and devised a way to find the solution that the children and the slaves are not engaged in production of cocoa beans in West Africa and other parts of the world. So, the corporate social responsibility is not only the possible, but it is necessary in this globalized economy. We cannot think of a situation that without ethics, without corporate social responsibility the market will flourish because that market will end-up in more exploitation to the people, especially the children and women in the developing countries.

by Kailash Satyarthi

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Kamal Boullata:

by Kamal Boullata

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Kigge Hvid: Hi, Adam. How are you? You are in California. You must have sun shining on you again. So, you are asking if corporate social responsibility is possible? Of course, you could put your answer in another way or I would do tha. What you are asking is really, is human social responsibility possible because basically a company or a corporation is humans. So, if you do not believe that a company can act responsible to the environments and all the communities surrounding them, then you basically do not believe that humans can act responsible. Yes, the answer is, yes. Corporate social responsibility is possible. We see a lot, a lot, a lot of questions around. This table is one question. As far as I know, a very, very big insurance company is the main sponsor of this whole project. They just simply paid for me being here, for the table being setup, for all the techniques around. Yes, corporate social responsibility is possible because basically corporations are just people.

by Kigge Hvid

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Kurt Weidemann: Social responsibility of businesses is something we should absolutely demand and there are enough businesses which exercise this responsibility in an ideal way and which are not unsuccessful with it. This means that it is not the case that if you take care of social regards, that you have no money to invest in the development of your business or the like. The correspondence of the business with the surroundings, with administration, with neighbours, with everything is ultimately essential if they want to work peacefully and be successful.

by Kurt Weidemann

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Lesego Rampolokeng: I suppose by corporate, we mean the celebration of the dollar, pound and euro. I suppose by corporate we mean, modern days leave camps disguised as something else. I believe by corporate here, we mean Coca-Cola structures and MacDonald hamburgers. By corporate you mean dropping bags of bins in Iraq. If the entire idea of the corporate, of the multinational is one that is based upon the degradation of human life, then we have to ask ourselves, if anything positive is possible within that. I just believe in the entire destruction of the corporate concept as one that governs human life. By corporate, I believe we mean the manufacturing and the sale and the movement to and from of armament, of weapons that seek the destruction of human life; and I don’t know how you can be responsible existing within an atom bomb. I believe that the only responsibility that exists within that is a responsibility that is geared towards the killing of the human, so that is what the corporate structure is about and so. Anyone might as well fart out into the air about all sorts of responsibilities. I do not think within a world where corporate structures are only in place for the benefit of the few at the expense of the destruction of human life, of the decimation of multitudes. I don’t believe that if that is indeed a valid definition of corporate that there is any responsibility of which one might speak, if by responsibility, we mean the positive in life. Is corporate responsibility possible? Anything and everything is, you might as well say.

by Lesego Rampolokeng

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Leung Ping-Kwan: I have problems with question number 17. I think the question being proposed that the woman in position of power and family manage magnify and there could be harmony and balance. I think that they are in mistake on this with the position because I think to have this human society in balance and in harmony, it is not just that one type of values in position of power but rather a kind of overall respect for different kinds of values and the likes are advantageous and I think the question in a way is frivolous. The problem is that the woman in position of power to be able to future succeed as the only solution and I think that this brightens the setting up of a question like that because I think even with the woman in position of power could [inaudible] and values and make it magnified in the society. It doesn’t solve all the questions. I think it’s not just one kind of people in power that will solve all kinds of questions, but rather how people make use of their power and how people recognize the others’ right in using power and that the power of others and recognize the attitude or the values of the others will be more important. I think that we need [to have tolerance] than what the person himself to ask. Again I think that we need to have tolerance of different kinds of power, different kinds of values, of different kinds of ethnic, races, agenda and it’s not that [inaudible + relation] one power or one gender that could solve the problem. I really have problems with this question.

by Leung Ping-Kwan

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Lijun Fang: Theoretically, it is possible, say it can be a common responsibility of all humanity pursuing a world at peace or making the world more beautiful. However, a Christian's visualization of a beautiful world is probably much different from a Muslim's, thereby we can hardly attain such a practical corporate social responsibility. In short, many people must give up their own dreams and rights in order to attain a practical corporate social responsibility.

by Lijun Fang

Sep 9, 2006 11:15:00 AM cite

Lillian Holt: Well I would hope so. And I think that there are pockets of it around. It's very interesting because this whole event I believe is sponsored by Allianz. I saw the message from the CEO in relation to this event and I think it's very responsible to have an event like this where people can share and participate all the hues of humanity around world. I think that perhaps that there's a consciousness creeping into corporations. I mean you can even talk about Bill Gates in relation to his philanthropic duties and I hope he sets an example, sets the sea, for others. Because corporations can be very isolated and profit driven and very alienating that they can only be about the arena of profit for other people. But I hold great hope that corporate responsibility will come to the fore, given the fact that it only needs a few people to set the example. So I think all things are possible. For me to say anything else would be to say that there is no hope. And I think ultimately it can be much more corporate responsibility, social responsibility. I think it's absolutely possible and hopefully it will become more prevalent.

by Lillian Holt