The changing role of government in corporate responsibility: A report for practitioners

An analysis of the literature on the subject highlights the following areas as the key drivers for governments to promote corporate responsibility; globalisation and challenges faced by the new economy, new models of governance and the welfare state crisis, national competitiveness and innovation, sustainable development and the partnership approach. In this context, governments are now operating in a new relational state, where societal governance is based on a set of increasingly complex and interdependent relationships. The different expectations and perceptions of each exchange relationship need to be addressed to develop public policy for CR and a consideration of these relationships allows a more complete view of government CR policy. At the international level there is a common discourse on CR, shared by the European Commission, various international organisations and the international CR network. However, the application of this discourse into specific polices and programmes varies across countries, as shown in this report of the approaches by the Italian, Norwegian and UK governments.