中欧社会论坛 - China Europa ForumStates and corporate social responsibility in a time of crisis
Date: 4 juin 2010
Extract from ” Address of Michel Doucin, French Ambassador for CSR and Bioethics, to the Multi-Stakeholder Forum on the State of Sustainability: CSR, SRI and ESG, held in Nicosia, on 4th June 2010“
Michel Doucin advocates for a strong role of the state, together with a dynamics between the different stakeholders involved in CSR.
Therefore, he reviews the history of CSR and thus aims at demonstrating that the three following common opinions on CSR are wrong and misleading:
CSR, as a concept, is supposed to be the sole spontaneous creation of the business world - Michel Doucin argues that CSR was framed on the contrary as a response to a series of international crises;
The development of CSR is hindered by public policies designed to provide a framework for corporate governance - Michel Doucin on the opposite thinks that these policies are useful;
States are not supposed to be empowered to intervene in corporate management - Michel Doucin also objects to this third belief.
In conclusion, he recalls that the French government is supportive of “international rules for building a universal framework of standards for corporate social initiatives”. The framework should achieve the right balance between “private collective self-regulation and public incentives and, when necessary, sanction of public standards.”
France intends to push this agenda during its Presidency of the G20 in 2011. Michel Doucin would welcome a stronger involvement of the European Commission.