Strategic CSR - 2nd Edition!

This will be the last CSR Newsletter for the Fall semester.

Have a great holiday season and I will see you in January!

The purpose of the Newsletter today is to ask for your assistance in shaping the second edition of the textbook that this Newsletter is intended to support: Strategic CSR: Stakeholders in a Global Environment.

Sage has decided to publish a second edition and Bill and I thought it would be a good idea to ask for your thoughts in terms of what you like and do not like about the first edition.

In general, we intend to keep the overall structure of the current edition, but will:

• Add two new chapters to Part I
• Update the Issues in Part II (removing the less effective ones and adding some that are more relevant to the CSR debate today), and
• Add a selection of 50 past Newsletters as a new Part III.

None of the current material will be lost, however, as Sage plans to set-up an interactive website on which we can store:

• Information in the current edition, but not included in the second edition
• The Instructor’s CD, and, perhaps,
• Additional material posted by adopters.

We would appreciate it very much if you could make any suggestions you have with these proposed changes in mind (particularly those of you who are using the book in the classroom). Please, also, if you have any additional ideas that are not included in this brief outline, please let us know as we are open to your suggestions.

In the past I have solicited thoughts from some of you on the book, so, if you have already sent me your ideas and have nothing more to add, thank you and rest assured your comments will be taken into account.

Many thanks again for your input into this process and continuing support for the textbook. We are excited to try and improve the book for its second edition. We will keep you updated on the release date for the second edition when it is finalized and as it gets nearer.

Happy Holidays!
Dave

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
© Sage Publications, 2006

Strategic CSR - Teaching CSR

The article in the url below questions the ambitions of students from prestigious U.S. colleges (Harvard in particular) who automatically pursue high-paying careers in the financial or consulting industries:

“As Adam M. Guren, a new Harvard graduate who will be pursuing his doctorate in economics, put it, ''A lot of students have been asking the question: 'We came to Harvard as freshmen to change the world, and we're leaving to become investment bankers -- why is this?'”

The article outlines the pressures students feel to enter such careers, while talking to those who are trying to stimulate a debate about the true value of these sought-after educations (Issues: Ethics, p227):

“Is this what a Harvard education is for?'' … ''Are Ivy League schools simply becoming selecting mechanisms for Wall Street?”

The universities are also engaging in this debate, sponsoring “reflection seminars” at Harvard and reducing the financial cost of attending these universities as a way of removing the need/incentive to pursue a high salary on graduation:

“This year, Tufts announced that it would pay off college loans for graduates who chose public service jobs. And officials at Harvard, Penn, Amherst and a number of other colleges say one reason they have begun emphasizing grants instead of loans in financial aid is so students do not feel pressured by their debts to pursue lucrative careers.”

Take care
Dave

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
© Sage Publications, 2006

Strategic CSR - Carbon Offsets

The article in the first url below demonstrates the size of the market for carbon credits:

http://sg.wsj.net/public/resources/images/P1-AL151A_carbo_20080411191616.gif
  
It also demonstrates the market’s fragile nature and the potential for abuse:

“The United Nations is the main global policeman in an effort by wealthy nations to reduce the impact of their own pollution by paying for cleanups in the developing world. The program, known as the Clean Development Mechanism, is one of the most important coordinated efforts to attack global warming. In recent months, however, U.N. regulators who administer the program have objected to dozens of these developing-world projects, ranging from hydroelectric plants to wind farms, questioning whether the projects would produce a real environmental payoff.”

The article in the second url below profiles the fate of the largest of the agencies/auditors that identify and certify projects, EcoSecurities. Following certification, the projects are then submitted to the UN for final approval under the scheme. Following UN approval, then the agencies can begin trading the credits:

“EcoSecurities Ltd., helps companies in the industrialized world meet their obligations to pollute less by selling them "credits" that fund clean-air projects in poorer nations. Last year, some $9.4 billion in these credits were traded, up from almost none four years earlier.”

The articles report that during the early years of the scheme, set-up following the Kyoto Protocol, UN oversight was lax and agencies like EcoSecurities were allowed to submit projects that had not been properly vetted. Now, however, the UN is moving to improve its oversight and tighten the overall system of approval:

“EcoSecurities' rise coincided with a permissive U.N. board. In 2004 and 2005, the board automatically approved 95% of the projects proposed to it, according to U.N. statistics. … Last year, the U.N. board gave automatic approval to only 57% of proposed projects, down from 95% in 2004 and 2005. Overall, it rejected 9% of proposed projects last year, more than double its rejection rate in 2006.”

Take care
Dave

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
(c) Sage Publications, 2006

U.N. Effort To Curtail Emissions In Turmoil
By Jeffrey Ball
1463 words
12 April 2008
The Wall Street Journal
A1
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120796372237309757.html

Up In Smoke: Two Carbon-Market Millionaires Take a Hit as U.N. Clamps Down --- EcoSecurities Sees Shares Slide 70%; 'In the Gray Zone'
By Jeffrey Ball
2317 words
14 April 2008
The Wall Street Journal
A1
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120813542203111705.html