Corporate Social Responsibility

The goal of this major essay is to promote the development of critical reflective skills in order to analyse specific global-related issues, considering diverse perspectives and heterogeneous stakeholders in cross-national contexts that are shaped by global forces.

The unit of analysis of the major research essay combines the main topics covered during the course with specific issues developed in particular industries, companies and/or organisations in which global forces have created controversies or contradictions.

In order to facilitate the selection of themes, student must combine any three themes; two from column one and one from column two (see Table below). Two groups must not focus on the same issue or company. The first group that informs the course convenor their chosen topic will be awarded the right to develop it. Alternatively, groups can propose topics that focus on specific issues covered in column one and two. In this case groups must obtain acceptance from the Course Convenor in writing.

In your analysis you must consider at least one of the two following questions:

1. How have particular globalisation forces affected/influenced the issue you are studying?
2. What are the ethical, CSR and/or sustainability implications of the issue you are studying?

In order to develop this assignment, you need to focus on one specific situation (issue or problem) that will facilitate the application of the selected topics in order to develop your essay. In order to find out ‘the problem’ I advise to look at Newspapers (e.g. The Australian) or Magazines (e.g. The Economist). You can also look at the Web but only to get ‘data’ about the issue you are researching. You must not use ready-made cases available either in textbooks or web sites. For example, if you are focusing on ‘low cost manufacturing’ (column 2), the role of the state (column 1) and CSR (column 1), you can use the example of Nike to illustrate and discuss situations regarding the exploration of manpower in developing countries, something that can be linked to the use (or not use) of CSR policies by TNCs as well as the role of the government. There is one restriction regarding this point: students cannot use McDonald’s, Nike or Coca Cola as ‘the problem’ to be investigated.

A minimum of 10 academic journal articles &/or scholarly monographs (books) are required in this item. Academic journal articles need to be directly related to the themes (from column 1) selected. Web information and data can be used but are not considered to be academic journal articles. I strongly recommend the use of academic articles from the list of readings of this course. Students who have difficulties in differentiating scholarly books from textbooks must contact course convenor for clarification.

Remarks about references

• Use of textbook need to be kept at minimum (20 % max).
• Avoid building your main arguments based on references from one or two Journals only.
• You can use other sources of data, but they will not count as one of the 7 references.
• Do not use Wikipedia, blogs or social media to build your main arguments.
• Do not Google to find your academic references. Use electronic resources from the library to search for your academic references.
• Be aware of statements posted on the Web by official company web sites. They are bias.

Groups who use an English editor or any other person to help to improve/edit written English, must inform in the cover page of their essay the full name of the person, email address & telephone number. Specifications and Format

• This is a 3000-word report (excluding references & cover page).
• Use Times New Times, font 12, single space.
• Pages must be numbered (top right).
• Use APA referencing format.
• In the cover page indicate: Full names; Students ID number; title of Report; total number of words (excluding references, & cover page) and the extent to which individual team members contributed to the final essay in the following format [surname1] [% of contribution]. Example: Obama 100%; G. Guzman 100%; K. Petroski 50%.
• Submission must be made via safeAssign only. A SafeAssign link will be available in the ‘Assessments’.

Additional information:

• There is a 10 % of flexibility in the word limit. A penalty of 8 marks will be applied for essays containing more than 3.300 words.
• While this assignment item constitutes a group report, marks might be allocated on the individual basis considering the extent to which individual students collaborated towards the development of the major report, at the discretion of the course convenor. Furthermore, after students have submitted their assignments, the course convenor, at his discretion, might ask for a face-to-face meeting with one or all team members in order to clarify both the content of the assignment and/or the level and quality of participation of team members. All group members must keep record of all their work-in-process (drafts of report, references, additional data 12 gathered but not used in the report, drafts of bibliographical searches etc., including both handwritten and electronic documents) in order to demonstrate the originality of your authorship. At the discretion of the course convenor, groups and/or individual team members may be asked to present this evidence. Failure to present evidence of your work-in-progress implies heavy penalties.

Also get help on Unit 2 – Principle of Health and Social Care Practice, Cross Cultural Leadership, Unit 3 – Human Resources Management and Unit 21 – Supporting Significant Life Events.