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Ever wondered who was the father of modern-day corporate social
responsibility? Step forward the 1950s American economist Howard Bowen,
who has just been given the title by the CSR historian Archie Carroll.
Carroll, who is emeritus professor of business ethics at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business in the US, makes the case for Bowen in an essay in a new book, The accountable corporation, in which he charts the history of CSR since the Second World War.
Carroll argues that Bowen ‘deserves the appellation of father of CSR’ for the ideas he put forward in his groundbreaking 1953 book Social responsibilities of the businessman, now out of print.
Bowen, who was born in 1908 and studied economics at the University of Cambridge and the London School of Economics in the 1930s, held various academic and government positions in the US before becoming president of Iowa University in 1964. He died in 1989, aged 81.
Carroll says Bowen’s landmark volume – which argued that company managers should ‘pursue those policies which are desirable in terms of the objectives and values of society’ – marked the beginning of ‘modern serious discussion’ of CSR.
Other contenders for the title, writes Carroll, include Joseph McGuire, author of the 1960s book Business and society, and Clarence Walton, who wrote Corporate social responsibilities in 1967. But they were both building on Bowen’s foundations.
Bowen’s book, commissioned by church groups as part of a six-volume study of Christian ethics and economic life, considered unethical business practices in the 1920s and maintained they were a significant factor contributing to the Great Depression. He reasoned that if businesses seek minimal regulation they must reciprocate by assuming social responsibilities even if they have no legal obligation to do so.
Sunghoon Kim, who wrote a study for Cornell University last year on ‘pivotal publications’ in CSR, said most scholars would point to Bowen’s book as the first modern attempt ‘to theorize the relationship between corporations and society’.
Carroll, who is emeritus professor of business ethics at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business in the US, makes the case for Bowen in an essay in a new book, The accountable corporation, in which he charts the history of CSR since the Second World War.
Carroll argues that Bowen ‘deserves the appellation of father of CSR’ for the ideas he put forward in his groundbreaking 1953 book Social responsibilities of the businessman, now out of print.
Bowen, who was born in 1908 and studied economics at the University of Cambridge and the London School of Economics in the 1930s, held various academic and government positions in the US before becoming president of Iowa University in 1964. He died in 1989, aged 81.
Carroll says Bowen’s landmark volume – which argued that company managers should ‘pursue those policies which are desirable in terms of the objectives and values of society’ – marked the beginning of ‘modern serious discussion’ of CSR.
Other contenders for the title, writes Carroll, include Joseph McGuire, author of the 1960s book Business and society, and Clarence Walton, who wrote Corporate social responsibilities in 1967. But they were both building on Bowen’s foundations.
Bowen’s book, commissioned by church groups as part of a six-volume study of Christian ethics and economic life, considered unethical business practices in the 1920s and maintained they were a significant factor contributing to the Great Depression. He reasoned that if businesses seek minimal regulation they must reciprocate by assuming social responsibilities even if they have no legal obligation to do so.
Sunghoon Kim, who wrote a study for Cornell University last year on ‘pivotal publications’ in CSR, said most scholars would point to Bowen’s book as the first modern attempt ‘to theorize the relationship between corporations and society’.
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