Corporate Social Responsibility and Reformed Global Governance - Solutions to the Financial Crisis?

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) witnessed one of the most striking evolutions that any concept of global political economy has had over the last decades. Although over 70 years of academic debate were unable to offer a universally accepted definition of the term, calls for multinational companies (MNCs) to demonstrate greater responsibility, transparency and accountability are leading to a variety of roles and standards that constrain the MNCs' behavior. Therefore, the rise of CSR in international relations is obvious. At the same time, global governance (GG) is another concept with a similar development that became, from unknown, central theme in the study of international relations and international political economy. Due to new evolutions and global influences, MNCs and subsequently CSR grew into a new source of global governance. In the context of the financial crisis, academic debate seems to focus a lot on the origins of the financial turmoil. The aim of this paper is to analyze if the crisis is a result of gaps in GG or of a perverted managerial behavior which indicates that the best practices characteristic to CSR are not followed, leading to corporate social irresponsibility (CSiR). The question is if at a global level the crisis is about an unsuitable growth pattern imposed by the actual GG or about the financial institutions' management flaws that were ignored over the years and turned into CSiR. The crisis proves itself to be a result of both. In conclusion, the inclusion of business in GG should be done by introducing a new paradigm of GG: government networks. This leads to a better relationship between GG and CSR as they can actively collaborate to prevent future crises.