This review argues that the role of technology in business and society debates has predominantly been examined from the limited, narrow perspective of technology as instrumental, and that two additional but relatively neglected perspectives are important: technology as value-laden and technology as relationally agentic. Technology has always been part of the relationship between business and society, for better and worse. However, as technological development is frequently advanced as a solution to many pressing societal problems and grand challenges, it is imperative that technology is understood and analyzed in a more nuanced, critical, and comprehensive way. The two additional perspectives invite a broader research agenda, one that includes questions, such as “Which values and whose interests has technology come to emulate?”; “How do these values and interests play out in stabilizing the status quo?”; and, importantly, “How can it be contested, disrupted, and changed?” Any research that endorses green, sustainable, environmental, or climate mitigating technologies potentially contributes to maintaining the very thing that it seeks to change if questions such as these are not being addressed.
den Hond, F., & Moser, C. (2022). Useful servant or dangerous Master? Technology in Business and Society debates. Business & Society, 1–30.
In their recent essay, Gond and Moser (2019) have proposed that micro-CSR research has the potential to “matter” and transform business practices as it engages closely with how individuals in companies work with and experience corporate social responsibility (CSR). But can micro-CSR research in its current form realize this transformative potential and serve social justice? Adopting an intellectual activist position, we argue that the transformative potential of micro-CSR is severely limited by its predominant focus on CSR as defined, presented, and promoted by companies themselves, thereby serving to sustain the hegemony of the business case for CSR, promoting narrow interests and maintaining managerial control over corporate responsibilities. We propose that micro-CSR researchers broaden the scope of their research to cultivate the potential of alternative ideas, voices, and activities found in organizational life. In so doing we lay out a research agenda that embraces employee activism, listens to alternative voices, and unfolds confrontational, subversive, and covert activities. In the hope of inspiring other micro-CSR researchers to explore these unconventional paths, we also offer suggestions as to how we can pursue them through empirical research.
Girschik, V., Svystunova, L., Lysova, E. I. (2022). Transforming corporate social responsibilities: Toward an intellectual activist research agenda for micro-CSR research. Human relations, 75(1) 3 –32.
https://journals-sagepub-com.vu-nl.idm.oclc.org/doi/10.1177/0018726720970275
