Damien Krichewsky

This book provides a timely contribution to the study of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and state-business relations in India. The development of CSR as a new component of business-society interplays has triggered intense debates and controversies. Corporate actors, governments, and other CSR advocates describe CSR as a promising opportunity to transform companies from societal problem-makers into societal problem-solvers. Conversely, critical commentators denounce CSR either as ‘window-dressing’, which hides corporate greed behind shallow commitments to social justice and environmental sustainability, or as a pernicious means used by companies to sideline regulatory constraints and manage business-relevant public affairs in their own terms. Departing from these controversies, this book mobilizes an original theoretical framework to examine empirically how CSR emerges from and retroacts on growing structural tensions between profit-making and competing collective values and interests in contemporary India. It shows at a macro-sociological level and with detailed case studies (cement industry; CSR public policies) that, paradoxically, CSR enhances the autonomy of the economy by making profit-driven economic processes more responsive to non-economic concerns raised in politics, law, morality, and other spheres of modern society.

India’s current ‘pro-business’ development regime has been both challenged by depictions of malevolent corporations oppressing helpless village communities and legitimised by depictions of socially responsible corporations ‘developing’ grateful backward communities. To overcome these contradictory narratives, which fail to account for the intricate relationships between villagers and corporate actors, the article analyses how these narratives are constructed in interaction with local conflicts surrounding industrial activity. Guided by a framework based on social systems theory, a detailed study of two cement plants located in Chhattisgarh shows how this interaction operates through multiple discursive layers, which vary in terms of their degree of specification/generalisation and concreteness/abstraction.

The rise of public policies in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) suggests a reassertion of state power over a phenomenon initially designed to weaken public authorities. But depending on policy objectives and underlying state-business relationships, CSR public policies seem to oscillate between the steering of corporate conduct towards political goals and the provision of political support to business interests. The present paper offers new perspectives on this ambiguity. Using social systems theory to guide a comparative study of two major Indian CSR policies, the analysis distinguishes two levels. At a functional level, the introduction of CSR in Indian regulatory politics produced more or less constraining expectations that open up opportunities for companies to participate in the performance of political functions. At an operational level, however, even a “mandatory” policy designed primarily according to political calculations let companies decide how they perform these functions. This persistence of voluntarism, which is supported by the semantic properties of “CSR,” consolidates the role of profit-driven calculations in the regulation of corporate conduct and, in the Indian case, in the redistribution of resources for social welfare. Research perspectives on the implications of CSR public policies for democracy are outlined in concluding remarks.

The emergence of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) as a global component of business-society relationships has triggered many controversial debates, in which CSR is either advocated as a source of virtuous business or disregarded as mere “window dressing.” This paper proposes an alternative perspective on the CSR phenomenon based on N. Luhmann’s social systems theory, which guides a study of CSR in India combining macroscopic observations and the case of the cement manufacturer Lafarge India. The study shows that CSR is not primarily constituted of corporate attempts to “do well by doing good,” as the CSR doxa suggests. However, the phenomenon generates significant transformations of business-society relationships. While increasing financial expectations tend to blunt large companies’ sensitivity toward competing societal expectations, other social systems react with protest movements and political interventions. Companies respond to the perceived threat of these uncertainties by introducing new CSR-related organizational structures, which improve their ability to observe the uncertainties as parameters of economic risks. Companies subsequently mobilize calculated CSR-related practices to shield business opportunities from the possible negative consequences of sociopolitical constraints. The analytical framework outlined in the present paper introduces new angles for studying how the CSR phenomenon proceeds from and transforms the way social systems observe and regulate the role of companies in society.

Le compromis social autour du capitalisme, longtemps tributaire du conflit entre capital et travail, se joue aujourd’hui autour d’une opposition plus large entre accumulation du capital d’un côté, préservation de l’environnement et justice sociale de l’autre. À partir d’une analyse du cas indien en deux volets, l’un macrosociologique et l’autre portant sur une entreprise, l’article explore les ressorts de la crise du compromis social autour du « nouveau » capitalisme corporatif indien et les modalités d’émergence d’un possible renouvellement du compromis social. Adoptant une approche stratégique-relationnelle, nous montrons comment les réformes économiques initiées courant des années 1980 se traduisent dans les entreprises par un recentrage sur leurs performances économiques et financières. Difficilement compatible avec les termes préexistant du compromis social, ce recentrage est source de conflits locaux, qui se multiplient à l’échelle de l’Inde. En réaction, un nombre croissant d’organisations de la société civile se sont mobilisées et, traduisant les conflits locaux en problèmes de sociétés, elles parviennent progressivement à infléchir le cadre politique et institutionnel de régulation du capitalisme. Bien que les résultats de ces mobilisations soient récents, on peut y voir l’ébauche d’un nouveau compromis social, qui pourrait aboutir à une plus grande prise en compte des objectifs de préservation de l’environnement et de justice sociale.

Parliaments are formalised assemblies where collectively-binding decisions are discussed, prepared and made. Ranked among the oldest institutions in the political organisation of human communities, parliaments are an important object of research. Some modern parliaments, such as the British House of Commons or the French Assemblée Nationale, have historical roots that date back to the feudal structures of late Middle-Age Europe, and their key role in the birth of liberal democracy is widely recognised (Kluxen 1983). Parliaments are also among the most common political institutions. They can be found in almost all countries, even in non-democratic ones, and at all levels of government, from municipal to international (Marschall 2005; Mulder van der Vegt and Cohen de Lara 2016). While they are generally ascribed functions like political representation, lawmaking, control of government and the political articulation of competing preferences, their role in the development and stabilisation of modern society extends considerably beyond this usual functional catalogue (cf. von Beyme 1999). Despite this success, parliamentary assemblies face considerable challenges. While they are supposed to represent the voice of the people in the policy process and to ensure that government remains accountable to the people, parliamentarians experience widespread distrust from a significant share of the electorate (Norris 1999; Dogan 2003). Over the past decades, parliaments in most liberal democracies have also been confronted with unfavourable political trends, including a growing significance of the executive and the judiciary in the national law-making process, as well as transfers of political functions to technocratic agencies, to sub-national units and to “collaborative” governance structures involving public and private “stakeholders” in transnational settings (Costa et al. 2004). Further developments could be added to the list of factors that may weaken parliaments in contemporary society, such as the rise of populist movements with a preference for direct democracy and/or the centralisation of power in the hands of a charismatic leader (Mudde and Kaltwasser 2017), the acceleration of society’s temporal structures, which undercuts the slower-paced parliamentary process (Rosa 2013) or the rise of global risks such as climate change, which seem to outgrow the problem-solving capacities of national political institutions (Beck 2016).

The post-interventionist development strategy adopted by the Indian government from mid-1980s onwards has led to an increased contribution of private companies to the country’s
economic growth. However, the benefits of the growth momentum are very unequally shared, at a time when social and environmental externalities weigh heavily on Indian society. In
reaction to the state’s policies that seek to loosen social and environmental regulatory constraints, which presumably act as impediments to private investments, numerous civil society organizations are multiplying their efforts to improve the social behaviour of companies. They also advocate more balanced public policies, so as to protect affected social groups and
preserve the environment in a more effective fashion. In this context, private companies operating in India are revising their strategies and practices in the field of CSR (corporate social
responsibility), in order to promote their social legitimacy and preserve the investor-friendly attitude of public authorities. Based on a vast array of primary and secondary data, including
qualitative interviews both at the national and local levels, this paper offers a detailed analysis of the stakes and dynamics at play in the public, civil and self-regulation of companies in India.
With the rapid growth and modernization of the country as the backdrop, this paper points towards a reconfiguration of relationships and the balance of power among market players, the state and civil society organizations.

Research on political parties is a rich field, its origins dating back more than a century. Sociology played a crucial role in the foundation of party research. However, while party research has narrowed its scope and agenda, thus overlooking significant contributions from sociology, sociology has neglected the significance of political parties in the study of related social phenomena. To address this mismatch, the article explores how a sociological outlook on political parties can open up new research questions by conceptualizing political parties as embedded in societal processes, by accounting for various informal processes in party organizations, and by investigating the political profession with a comprehensive practice-based lens.

The rise of public policies in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) suggests a reassertion of state power over a phenomenon initially designed to weaken public authorities. But depending on policy objectives and underlying state-business relationships, CSR public policies seem to oscillate between the steering of corporate conduct towards political goals and the provision of political support to business interests. The present paper offers new perspectives on this ambiguity. Using social systems theory to guide a comparative study of two major Indian CSR policies, the analysis distinguishes two levels. At a functional level, the introduction of CSR in Indian regulatory politics produced more or less constraining expectations that open up opportunities for companies to participate in the performance of political functions. At an operational level, however, even a “mandatory” policy designed primarily according to political calculations let companies decide how they perf...

A detailed analysis of the stakes and dynamics at play in the public, civil and self-regulation of companies in India is offered. With the rapid growth and modernization of the country as the backdrop, this paper points towards a reconfiguration of relationships and the balance of ...