Corporate Responsibility in Various Cultural Settings:
An Empirical Study of the Pulp And Paper Industry

Mikkilä Mirja
Leppärinne 5 D 33
55800 IMATRA
FINLAND
Phone: +358 40 5779766
E-mail: mirja.mikkila@joensuu.fi

Abstract

Many business enterprises have recently integrated the concepts of social responsibility and performance into their policies, but this rapid adoption has meant that the content has remained relatively loose in practice. This paper analyses and structures the concept empirically by quantitative and qualitative methods, employing the acceptability of operations as an indicator. The data were gathered at four mills belonging to a Scandinavian-based pulp and paper company located in four countries: China, Finland, Germany and Portugal. Tentative technical-financial, social and environmental acceptability criteria are used in the quantitative analysis. The qualitative analysis produces an experimental acceptability model covering technical, financial, economic, natural resource, environmental, social, societal, cultural, organisational, institutional and ethical issues. The results are developed further as a proposal for a concept of empirical corporate responsibility having four major elements: economic, environmental, social and organisational responsibility. Comparison of the qualitative and quantitative results demonstrates that although it is difficult to formulate a set of criteria which are simultaneously general, flexible and detailed enough for the purposes of a globally operating company, it is extremely important to define the concept in order to guarantee efficient allocation of resources both in companies and in society at large.

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