Contested Discursive Framing of a Bank’s Cooptative Joint CSR Model

Riki Galia

doi:10.18778/1733-8077.19.1.03

Authors

Riki Galia Kinneret Academic College, Israel https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5776-2765

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.19.1.03

Keywords:

BUS-NPO Partnerships, Joint CSR Initiatives Model, Cooptation and CSR, Contested Discursive Framing, Symbolic Interactionist-Semiotic Analysis, Banking and CSR, Ethnographic Method

Abstract

There is a dearth of critical ethnographic research that focuses on the semiotic-discursive features of corporate social responsibility (CSR) framing in business and nonprofit (BUS-NPO) partnerships. This article contributes to CSR scholarship by combining ethnographic methods (participant observation, in-depth interviews, and textual materials) and semiotic analysis to demonstrate how a bank-NPO partnership is discursively framed in the context of agonistic interactions and its implications in terms of cooptation.

This article crystallizes two arguments. First, the bank’s joint CSR initiatives represent a discursively framed and validated model of CSR as a commodity aiming at advancing bank interests at the cost of avoiding substantive and sustained social responsibility. Second, the joint CSR model, discursively framed as a cooptative partnership discourse, is effectively realized through the practices of the cooptative relationship between the bank and the NPOs.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Riki Galia, Kinneret Academic College, Israel

Riki Galia (Ph.D., Bar-Ilan University, 2010) is a Senior Lecturer of Sociology and Organization Studies at Kinneret Academic College in Israel. She studies corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate philanthropy from a critical and historical perspective.

References

AL-Tabbaa, Omar, Desmond Leach, and John March. 2014. “Collaboration between Nonprofit and Business Sectors: A Framework to Guide Strategy Development for Nonprofit Organizations.” Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations 25(3):657-678. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11266-013-9357-6
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11266-013-9357-6

Alvesson, Mats and Dan Kärreman. 2000. “Varieties of Discourse: On the Study of Organizations through Discourse Analysis.” Human Relations 53(9):1125-1150.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726700539002

Austin, James E. 2000. “Strategic Collaboration between Nonprofits and Business.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 29(1):69-97.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764000291S004

Austin, James E. and Maria M. Seitanidi. 2012a. “Collaborative Value Creation: A Review of Partnering between Nonprofits and Businesses: Part I. Value Creation Spectrum and Collaboration Stages.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 41(5):726- 758. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764012450777
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764012450777

Austin, James E. and Maria M. Seitanidi. 2012b. “Collaborative Value Creation: A Review of Partnering between Nonprofits and Businesses. Part 2: Partnership Processes and Outcomes.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 41(5):929-968. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764012454685
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764012454685

Barkay, Tamar. 2008. “Neoliberalism and Zionism: Corporate Social Responsibility and the Social Struggle on Israeliness.” Theory and Criticism 33:45-71. [In Hebrew].
Google Scholar

Barkay, Tamar. 2011. “When Business and Community Meet: A Case Study of Coca-Cola.” Critical Sociology 39(2):277-293. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0896920511423112
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0896920511423112

Barnett, Michael L. 2019. “The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Critique and an Indirect Path Forward.” Business & Society 58(1):167-190. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650316660044
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650316660044

Bass, Erin A. and Ivana Milosevic. 2018. “The Ethnographic Method in CSR Research: The Role and Importance of Methodological Fit.” Business & Society 57(1):174-215. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0007650316648666
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650316648666

Baur, Dorothea and Hans P. Schmitz. 2012. “Corporations and NGOs: When Accountability Leads to Cooptation.” Journal of Business Ethics 106(1):9-21. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1057-9.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1057-9

Bosscher, Judith L. 2009. “Commercialization in Nonprofits: Tainted Value?” SPNA Review 5(1):1-9.
Google Scholar

Brand, Teunis, Vincent Blok, and Marcel Verweij. 2020. “Stakeholder Dialogue as Agonistic Deliberation: Exploring the Role of Conflict and Self-Interest in Business-NGO Interaction.” Business Ethics Quarterly 30(1):3-30. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/beq.2019.21
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/beq.2019.21

Burchell, Jon and Joanne Cook. 2013. “CSR, Cooptation and Resistance: The Emergence of New Agonistic Relations between Business and Civil Society.” Journal of Business Ethics 115(4):741- 754. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-013-1830-z
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-013-1830-z

Carroll, Archie B. and Kareem M. Shabana. 2010. “The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Review of Concepts, Research and Practice.” International Journal of Management Reviews 12(1):85-105.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2370.2009.00275.x

Cook, Joanne and Jon Burchell. 2018. “Bridging the Gaps in Employee Volunteering: Why the Third Sector Doesn’t Always Win?” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 47(1):165-184. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0899764017734649
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764017734649

Cornelissen, Joep P. and Mirjam D. Werner. 2014. “Putting Framing in Perspective: A Review of Framing and Frame Analysis across the Management and Organizational Literature.” Academy of Management Annals 8(1):181-235. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/19416520.2014.875669
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.5465/19416520.2014.875669

Costas, Jana and Dan Kärreman. 2013. “Conscience as Control—Managing Employees through CSR.” Organization 20:394- 415. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1350508413478584
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1350508413478584

Dawkins, Cedric. 2015. “Agonistic Pluralism and Stakeholder Engagement.” Business Ethics Quarterly 25(1):1-28. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/beq.2015.2
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/beq.2015.2

Demuijnck, Geert. 2009. “From an Implicit Christian Corporate Culture to a Structured Conception of Corporate Ethical Responsibility in a Retail Company: A Case-Study in Hermeneutic Ethics.” Journal of Business Ethics 84:387-404. doi: http:// dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-009-0207-9
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-009-0207-9

Galia, Riki. 2016. “A Case Study in Self-Construction of Volunteering Employees as a Mechanism of Managerial Control.” International Journal of Work Organization and Emotion 7(4):316-335. doi: https://doi.org/10.1504/IJWOE.2016.081840
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1504/IJWOE.2016.081840

Galia, Riki. 2017. “Banking and Philanthropy: Particular ‘Sephardic’ Giving in the Guise of Zionist Giving for the Common Good.” Israel Affairs 23(2):342-360. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13537121.2016.1274509
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13537121.2016.1274509

Galia, Riki. 2021. “Culture, Ethnicity, Philanthropy and Sephardic Jewish Identity in Mandatory Palestine.” Jewish Culture and History 22(1):34-51. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/1462169X.2021.1862506
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/1462169X.2021.1862506

Hamann, Ralph and Nicola Acutt. 2003. “How Should Civil Society (and the Government) Respond to ‘Corporate Social Responsibility?’ A Critique of Business Motivations and the Potential for Partnerships.” Development Southern Africa 20(2):255-270.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03768350302956

Herlin, Heidi. 2015. “Better Safe Than Sorry: Nonprofit Organizational Legitimacy and Cross-Sector Partnerships.” Business and Society 54(6):822-858. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650312472609
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650312472609

Kaplan, Sarah. 2008. “Framing Contests: Strategy Making Under Uncertainty.” Organization Science 19(5):729-752.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1070.0340

Keller, Reiner. 2012. “Entering Discourses: A New Agenda for Qualitative Research and Sociology of Knowledge.” Qualitative Sociology Review 8(2):46-55.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.8.2.04

Kourula, Arno and Minna Halme. 2008. “Types of Corporate Responsibility and Engagement with NGOs: An Exploration of Business and Societal Outcomes.” Corporate Governance 8(4):557-570. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/14720700810899275
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/14720700810899275

Kurucz, Elizabeth C., Barry A. Colbert, and David Wheeler. 2008. “The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility.” Pp. 83- 112 in The Oxford Handbook of Corporate Social Responsibility, edited by A. Crane et al. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199211593.003.0004

Laasonen, Salla, Martin Fougère, and Arno Kourula. 2012. “Dominant Articulations in Academic Business and Society Discourse on NGO-Business Relations: A Critical Assessment.” Journal of Business Ethics 109(4):521-545. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1143-z
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1143-z

Moratis, Lars. 2014. “The Perversity of Business Case Approaches to CSR.” International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 34(9/10):654-669.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-06-2013-0063

Moriceau, Jean-Luc and Geraldine Guerillot. 2012. “Gifted: The Monolingualism of Corporate Social Responsibility.” Revista de Administração de Empresas 52:153-164.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1590/S0034-75902012000200003

Nijhof, André H. J. and Ronald J. M. Jeurissen. 2010. “The Glass Ceiling of Corporate Social Responsibility: Consequences of a Business Case Approach towards CSR.” International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 30(11/12):618-631. doi: https://doi.org/10.1108/01443331011085222
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/01443331011085222

Porter, Michael E. and Mark R. Kramer. 2006. “Strategy & Society: The Link between Competitive Advantage and Corporate Social Responsibility.” Harvard Business Review 84(12):78-92.
Google Scholar

Porter, Michael E. and Mark R. Kramer. 2011. “Creating Shared Value.” Harvard Business Review 89(1/2):62-77.
Google Scholar

Saiia, David H., Archie B. Carroll, and Ann K. Buchholtz. 2003. “Philanthropy as Strategy When Corporate Charity ‘Begins at Home.’” Business and Society 42(2):169-201.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650303042002002

Sanzo, María J. et al. 2015. “Business–Nonprofit Partnerships: Do Their Effects Extend Beyond the Charitable Donor-Recipient Model?” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 44(2):379- 400. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0899764013517770
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764013517770

Seitanidi, Maria M. and Andrew Crane. 2009. “Implementing CSR through Partnerships: Understanding the Selection, Design and Institutionalisation of Nonprofit-Business Partnerships.” Journal of Business Ethics 85:413-429. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-008-9743-y
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-008-9743-y

Seitanidi, Maria M., Dimitrios N. Koufopoulos, and Paul Palmer. 2011. “Partnership Formation for Change: Indicators for Transformative Potential in Cross Sector Social Partnerships.” Journal of Business Ethics 94(1):139-161. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-0784-2
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-0784-2

Shamir, Ronen. 2004. “The De-Radicalization of Corporate Social Responsibility.” Critical Sociology 30(3):669-689.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/1569163042119831

Shamir, Ronen. 2005. “Mind the Gap: The Commodification of Corporate Social Responsibility.” Symbolic Interaction 28(2):229-253.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/si.2005.28.2.229

Shamir, Ronen. 2008. “The Age of Responsibilization: On Market-Embedded Morality.” Economy and Society 37(1):1-19. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03085140701760833
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03085140701760833

Shamir, Ronen. 2010. “Capitalism, Governance, and Authority: The Case of Corporate Social Responsibility.” Annual Review of Law and Social Science 6:531-553. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-lawsocsci-102209-153000
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-lawsocsci-102209-153000

Skouloudis, Antonis, Konstantinos Evangelinos, and Chrisovaladis Malesios. 2015. “Priorities and Perceptions for Corporate Social Responsibility: An NGO Perspective.” Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management 22(2):95-112.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/csr.1332

Steinberg, Marc. 1999. “The Talk and Back Talk of Collective Action: A Dialogic Analysis of Repertoires of Discourse among Nineteenth Century English Cotton Spinners.” American Journal of Sociology 105:736-780.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1086/210359

Veleva, Vesela. 2010. “Toward Developing a Framework for Measuring the Business Value of Corporate Community Involvement.” Applied Research in Quality of Life 5(4):309-324.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11482-010-9112-8