While public and political perceptions of business ethics and sustainability had been evolving, recent events have turned attention back to corporate philanthropy
While public and political perceptions of business ethics and sustainability had been evolving, recent events have turned attention back to corporate philanthropy
China’s economy is opening up, and has been for three decades now, but its political system remains rigid. Many of the initiatives citizens use in other countries – protests, leaflet distribution, setting up ad hoc organisations – are all virtually impossible in China or at least involve major personal risk.
As the recent arguments over Google’s threat to pull out of China show, censorship remains firmly in place across the media.
On the other hand the Chinese business community, as Alexandra Harney – the Financial Times southern China correspondent – notes, should be more receptive to corporate responsibility initiatives now than at any other time previously. This is due in part to the global recession, making export orders harder to find and so shifting power further towards buyers and away from manufacturers.
A new generation
Foreign buyers have found that demands for more health and safety training, better living conditions and other basic aims are being listened to more seriously now as the other side is more desperate to sign the contract. Harney also points out that China’s factory owners and managers are increasingly a new generation – younger, better educated, more aware of international best practice and keen to build their companies up from cheap assembly shops into world class factories.
In contrast to the previous generation that followed Deng Xiaoping’s advice and “jumped into the sea” starting businesses, the new generation of factory owners understand that social capital is as important as financial capital. As this generation gradually takes over more and more of China’s economy, many believe the future of corporate responsibility will be brighter. But at present this is not the case.
However, it is the environment that overshadows so much in China now. The government is being forced to deal with environmental issues through its heightened international role as a world power.. And it also has to act in response to the growing environmental awareness of Chinese citizens.
Combating growing environmental degradation and carbon emissions in China will be hard but many believe it can be done. Jonathan Watts is the Guardian newspaper’s East Asia environment correspondent and a Beijing resident. He highlights China’s fast adoption and roll out of alternative energy technologies such as wind and solar power as well as the rising environmental consciousness among China’s rapidly expanding middle class.
Chinese citizens, organised in Chinese-style NGOs, on the blogosphere, in a university green club or perusing the shelves in their local supermarket, are now increasingly conscious of corporate responsibility issues. They have used the internet and informal networks to punish many companies and brands they believe to be endangering their health, mistreating them or disrespecting them – boycotts and online attacks are just two methods they have developed to bring the recalcitrant to heal.
The thrust of the drive behind corporate responsibility in China is the Chinese watching themselves and those who operate in their country. In this sense, corporate responsibility in China has the potential to become a more internal and important issue.
Events, events
There had been moves towards establishing a focus on improving worker conditions, dealing with environmental impact and the other well-trodden stakeholder engagement issues. Since the Sichuan earthquake and the international recession, however, corporate responsibility in China has shifted towards the more traditional charity and community involvement.
Alex Harney sees a “danger of regression back to philanthropy and well-timed donations to politically salient causes” rather than any attempts to promote fundamental and structural change. This, she adds, “is neither sustainability nor CSR”.
Workers were promised change, not least in the form of new labour laws introduced in 2008. Analysts argue that workers will remember those promises. At the same time the rising environmental consciousness of many ordinary Chinese could lead to a more rounded embracing of concepts of sustainability.
History has led many companies in China to feel unsupportive towards corporate responsibility initiatives. One company corporate responsibility manager, who like many requires anonymity, comments that at the moment he is not able to persuade Chinese partners that corporate responsibility is not just PR and that there has to be more than just a press release of stated intentions that are never followed through.
There has not been enough embedding of corporate responsibility in Chinese business culture. Until that happens then larger concepts of sustainability and business ethics are likely to remain on hold. Perhaps the younger generation holds the key to China getting back on track.