Consuming Responsibility.pdf

Consuming Responsibility: The Search

for Value at Laskarina HolidaysPaul M. Gurney

M. Humphreys

ABSTRACT. This paper provides an alternative theo-

retical conceptualisation of corporate social responsibility

(CSR) in order to further our understanding of prosocial

organisational behaviour. We argue that consumption

provides a perspective that enables theorists to escape the

confines of existing CSR literature. In our view the

organisation is re-imagined as an arena of consumption

where employees are engaged in a quest for value,

constructing and confirming their identities as consum-

ers. Using the award-winning tour operator Laskarina

Holidays as an illustrative case, it is suggested that CSR

can provide combinations of functional, social, emo-

tional, epistemic and conditional value. This new per-

spective on CSR facilitates the coexistence of a plurality

of values that are relativistically constructed and nar-

rativised by organisational stakeholders. Our consump-

tion paradigm provides a thought provoking means of

reconciling divergent perspectives and encourages fur-

ther interdisciplinary research. We argue that future

research should begin, not by asking the question of

why organisations assume responsibility, but by con-

templating the notion of why organisations consume

responsibility.

KEY WORDS: corporate social responsibility, con-

sumption, theoretical reconciliation, multiple and coex-

istent values, qualitative research, interpretive case study

Introduction

‘‘There are times in life when the question of knowing

if one can think differently than one thinks, and per-

ceive differently than one sees, is absolutely necessary

if one is to go on looking and reflecting at all’’ (Mi-

chel Foucault, 1987, p. 8).

Despite the argument advanced by moral economists

and ethicists that businesses are inseparable from the

societal context in which they operate (Booth, 1994;

Etzioni, 1988; Freeman, 1984), the established

intellectual frameworks and the literary conventions

used by theorists rest on the conception of economic

performance as being separate from social perfor-

mance (Wicks, 1996). Freeman’s (1994) ‘separation

thesis’ captured the pervasive view of corporations as

one where the normative core of business and society

contrasts with the prevailing wisdom of corporate

business literature. Wicks (1996, p. 111) argues that

this thesis has had ‘‘far-reaching and debilitating ef-

fects’’ on the evolution of business and society,

resulting from the ‘‘insidiousness and pervasiveness of

the assumptions that support it’’. Whilst Freeman’s

(1994) thesis focuses on the relationship between

business and ethics, it has been argued that it

has ramifications for all of business and society re-

search as it shares a common grounding in value-

based sources (Wicks, 1996). The implications of this

thesis are that, business is essentially separate from,

and to a certain extent, in opposition to, society. This

dualistic notion of business and society has given rise

to a plethora of conceptual dichotomies and the

consequent bifurcation of theoretical and empirical

Paul M. Gurney is a visiting research fellow at the International

Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility (ICCSR) at

Nottingham University Business School. His interests focus

around ethnographic and interpretive approaches to organi-

zational behaviour and interdisciplinary research.

Michael Humphreys is a reader in organizational studies at the

Nottingham University Business School. His research inter-

ests include ethnographic and narrative approaches to organi-

zational identity in both public and private sector

organizations. He has published widely in a range of journals

including: The Journal of Management Studies, Orga-

nization Studies, Organization, British Journal of

Management, The Journal of Applied Behavioral

Science, The Journal of Organizational Change

Management and Qualitative Inquiry.

Journal of Business Ethics (2006) 64: 83–100 � Springer 2006DOI 10.1007/s10551-005-5498-x

research (Buchholz and Rosenthal, 1995; Frederick,

1994; Freeman, 1994, 1999; Swanson, 1999; Victor

and Stephens, 1994; Wicks, 1996).

Created, reinforced and perpetuated by aca-

demic language, such dichotomies are a ubiquitous

feature of the literature. Concepts such as ‘busi-

ness’ and ‘ethics’, ‘economy’ and ‘society’,

‘employee’ and ‘individual’ are commonly per-

ceived as conceptually distinct, such that ‘‘they are

seen, at least initially, as bounded off from – and

perhaps in tension with – each other’’ (Wicks,

1996, p. 92). Language as a means of codifying

and communicating ‘knowledge’, represents a

primary vehicle for the construction and perpetu-

ation of these dichotomies. Certain meanings are

illuminated, others are disguised thus fashioning

the categories and contexts used by researchers,

making particular forms of enquiry appear more

legitimate than others (Rorty, 1989; Wicks et al.,

1994). Swanson (1999) argues that this is a self-

perpetuating mechanism, giving rise to polar

dualities and the segregation of research. Even

though theorists try to reconnect these separations

and achieve ‘‘intellectual reconciliation’’ (Wood,

1996, p. 122), it becomes extremely difficult to

ally concepts that are conceived of as fundamen-

tally distinct and mutually exclusive: as Wicks

(1996, p. 92) argues, ‘‘it may be time to search for

alternate ways to construct out inquiry if we want

to continue to make progress in our efforts’’.

Based on Wood’s (1996, p. 120) assertion that

theorists need to ‘‘try and find ways to ‘‘break out

of the box’’ ’’ we have tried to ‘‘scale the barri-

cades of positivism’s epistemological roadblock’’

(Crane, 1999, p. 246) by providing a fundamen-

tally different perspective that enables us to escape

the confines of existing literature. Through what

we have referred to as the lens of consumption, we

argue that the values derived from CSR are plu-

ralistic and co-existent as opposed to binary and

oppositional. Our perspective is predicated on a

brief review of consumption as a pervasive con-

cept in contemporary society (e.g. Bauman, 1987;

du Gay, 1996), followed by a theoretical recon-

ceptualisation of the organisation, the employee

and CSR. Following this we provide an account

of our research design, data collection and analysis

from which we constructed our case study of the

award winning and putatively socially responsible

tour operator Laskarina Holidays. The subsequent

discussion highlights the theoretical benefits and

insights that we argue are a result of applying the

lens of consumption to CSR within an organisation.

Consumption and society

It has been suggested that consumption is at the

very centre of the social world and that Western

society has entered a new epoch, where con-

sumption is the ‘‘cement that links the social sys-

tem’’ (Warde, 1992, p. 58). The notion of

consumerism is so prevalent that it has been argued

that the language of the market has become the

only valid vocabulary of moral and social calcula-

tion, where ‘‘civic culture’’ is gradually giving away

to ‘‘consumer culture’’, as citizens are reconceptu-

alised as ‘‘enterprising consumers’’ (Bauman, 1987;

du Gay, 1996; Keat, 1990). Bauman (1987, p. 166)

argues that ‘‘every item of culture becomes a

commodity and becomes subordinated to the logic

of the market either through a direct, economic

mechanism, or an indirect psychological one’’. In-

deed, as de Certeau (1984, p. xii) notes on con-

sumption, ‘‘it insinuates itself everywhere, silently

and almost invisibly’’. So pervasive is the ‘‘hege-

mony of the consumer’’ (Gabriel, 2002) that ‘‘all

perceptions and expectations, as well as life-rhythm,

qualities of memory, attention, motivational and

topical relevances are moulded inside the new

‘‘foundational’’ institution – that of the market’’

(Bauman, 1987, p. 166). From this perspective, the

notion of ‘‘consumer sovereignty’’ (Davies and

Kirkpatrick, 1995; Hildebrand, 1951) becomes a

ubiquitous phenomenon in contemporary society,

where features of consumer culture ‘‘spill over all

other aspects of contemporary life’’ (Bauman, 1987,

p. 166). Based on this view of consumerism, du

Gay (1996, p. 78) argues that the organisation can

be ‘‘re-imagined through the language of consumer

culture’’. In the next section we use du Gay’s

mechanism of ‘re-imagination’ by applying con-

sumption as a lens through which to reconceptu-

alise the organisation, the employee and the very

nature of CSR.

84 Paul M. Gurney and M. Humphreys

Applying the lens of consumption

The organisation: from machine to mall

The bureaucratised mechanistic organisation is a

prominent metaphor for the contemporary corpo-

ration (Morgan, 1997; Scott, 1997; Weber, 1947).

Precision, regularity, reliability and efficiency are

seen to represent the ideals that organisations strive

to achieve through the process of mechanistic ra-

tionalisation. Concepts of ‘‘scientific management’’

(Taylor, 1911) served to reify the notions of cal-

culability, predictability, efficiency and control

which characterise contemporary ‘‘McDonaldized’’

organisations (Ritzer, 1993). The mechanistic

institution is often conceived of as a dehumanising

environment, where the sole objective of the

organisation is the untrammelled pursuit of surplus

value and the accumulation of capital (Marx, 1999).

In such an organisational context, CSR can be

viewed as an instrumental tool with which to

further the objectives of profit maximisation (e.g.

Friedman, 1962, 1970; Murray and Montanari,

1986). Although the machine metaphor is still

prevalent in contemporary literature (Morgan,

1997), other discourses have also emerged offering

alternative perspectives on the organisation.

Whilst the realms of consumption have typically

been seen as distinct from those of work and pro-

duction, du Gay (1996, p. 76) argues that ‘‘the

‘character’ of the consumer has become a crucial

element in the reinvention of organisational life’’.

This idea of reconstructing the commercial organi-

sation around the character of the ‘‘sovereign con-

sumer’’ (du Gay and Salaman, 1992, p. 627)

resonates with existing managerial notions such as

the ‘‘internal customer’’ (George, 1990). The con-

cept of consumerism is also apparent in the ‘‘human

relations’’ discourse which argues that working can

be empowering and a route to self-fulfilment

(Hollway, 1991; Rose, 1990). Du Gay (1996, p. 6)

has suggested that:

‘‘by re-imagining organizational life through the

language of consumer culture, these new

discourses of work reform brook no opposition

between the mode of self-presentation and self-

understanding required of people as consumers

and that required of people as employees’’

In this view, work becomes ‘‘an arena in which people

exhibit an ‘enterprising’ or ‘consuming’ relation to

self’’ (du Gay, 1996, p. 78). As du Gay and Salaman

(1992, p. 627) have argued, ‘‘paid work and con-

sumption are just different playing grounds for the

same activity; different terrains upon which the

enterprising self seeks to master, fulfil and better itself.’’

Unlike the mechanistic organisation where pan-

optic surveillance technologies prevail to ensure

efficient output (Foucault, 1979; Zuboff, 1988), the

notion of the organisation as a mall, or a ‘‘glass palace

of consumption’’ (Gabriel, 2003, p. 180), suggests

that ‘‘the individual is not to be policed and invig-

ilated by others because work is defined, not as a

constraint upon freedom, but as a realm in which

people represent, construct and confirm their iden-

tity as consumers’’ (du Gay, 1996, p. 80). ‘Work’ is

therefore considered to be both a site and an activity

forming an integral aspect of the individual’s style of

life as a consumer (Rose, 1990). From this per-

spective, the objectives of the organisation are no

longer solely determined by profit maximisation; as

Solomon (1992b, pp. 120–121) states ‘‘it can and has

been argued that profit making is not even a goal of

business, but rather a condition of ‘staying in the

game’, a necessity and not an aspiration’’. Applying

this rationale to CSR, socially responsible behaviour

can no longer be regarded solely as a venture to

achieve the maximisation of wealth, but also as an

instrumental medium through which employees can

achieve other personal and societal objectives.

Working within such a romanticised conceptual

mall, the employee becomes redefined, no longer as

a dehumanised cog in a machine that has an

‘‘obsession with profit maximisation’’ (Wicks, 1996,

p. 111), but as a fully fledged consumer in search of

meaning and self-fulfilment.

The employee: from cog to consumer

Conceived of as a consumer, rather than a ‘‘servant or

adjunct’’ of the organisational machine (Morgan,

1997, p. 24), the employee is ‘‘re-imagined as an

individual actor in search of meaning, responsibility, a

senseof personal achievement and a maximised quality

of life’’ (du Gay, 1996, p. 78). In the organisational

mall, ‘‘the employee, just as much as the sovereign

consumer, is represented as an individual in search of

Consuming Responsibility 85

meaning and fulfilment, looking to ‘add value’ in

every sphere of existence’’ (du Gay and Salaman

(1992, p. 627). Enterprising subjects are portrayed as

individuals in pursuit of meaning and self-identity

(Bauman, 1987), ‘‘work[ing] upon themselves in

order to better themselves’’ (du Gay, 1996, p. 145).

Evolving from ‘‘Homo economicus’’ to ‘‘Homo

consumericus’’ (Firat and Shultz, 1997), organisa-

tional actors are conceptualised as cultural experts or

bricoleurs, assembling their identity from a variety of

possible signifiers (Chambers 1986; Fiske, 1989).

Applying the idea of employees as consumers in

search of value allows us to question the hegemony

of the instrumental perspective of CSR. We argue

that economic rationality implies only one desirable

value and may neglect important consumption

phenomena (Olshavsky and Granbois, 1979; Sheth,

1979). The designation ‘‘consumer’’ suggests that

employees do more than simply process information

to make decisions and maximise organisational util-

ity, but that they also engage in imaginative, emo-

tional and appreciative consumption experiences

(Holbrook and Hirschman, 1982; Holbrook et al.,

1984; Woods, 1981).

Advocates like Carr (1968) conceive of individ-

uals in organisations as dualistic entities who, upon

entering the work place, take on the characteristics

of the rational organisational actor, ‘‘bluffing’’ ethical

behaviour to increase the profitability of the firm.

However, a consumerist perspective facilitates

recognition of the multiple self-concepts that cha-

racterise an individual’s identity and their identifi-

cation with the organisation (Elsbach, 1999). With a

plethora of possible selves (Banister and Hogg, 2001;

Onkvisit and Shaw, 1987; Sirgy, 1982), it can be

argued that individuals seek different values from

consumption experiences in different situations,

complicating the simplistic notion of a singular ‘work’

self. Having explored the notion of the employee as a

consumer in search of value, it is essential to recon-

ceptualise CSR as something no longer considered to

be a source of profit, but a source of value.

CSR: from venture to value

The reconceptualisation of CSR as a source of

value, rather than simply a source of profit,

implicitly recognises that value is a multifaceted and

socially constructed concept. The search for a

precise definition of ‘value’ has proved an enduring

endeavour for philosophers and consumer behavi-

ourists alike (Babin et al., 1994; Perry, 1926;

Sewall, 1901; Zeithaml, 1988). One of the most

comprehensive conceptualisations of value is pro-

vided by Holbrook (1994, p. 27) who defines value

as ‘‘a relativistic preference characterising a subjects’

experience of interacting with some object’’. This

‘‘object’’ can represent any possible ‘‘content of

consciousness’’ (Holbrook, 1994, p. 27), or as Juran

(1988, p. 8) puts it, ‘‘that which consciousness is

conscious of’’. Whilst studies of consumption have

typically focussed on material possessions (e.g

McCracken, 1986; Schwarz, 1979; Solomon,

1983), some studies have considered, amongst

others, the consumption of education (Fulton,

1994), health and welfare (Hugman, 1994), identity

(Combes et al., 2001; du Gay, 1996) and culture

(Firat, 1995). We argue that acts of social respon-

sibility can be consumed by individuals who engage

in prosocial behaviour, where in many cases the

production and consumption of responsibility is

simultaneous (Firat and Shultz, 1997). Stakeholder’s

relativistic consumption experiences of CSR can

therefore result in the construction of a plurality of

‘‘value types’’.

Despite the paucity of empirical research in this

area, typologies of the value derived from consump-

tion experiences have emerged in the literature and

are of importance in discussing the possible types of

value that may be constructed as a result of consuming

responsibility (Floch, 1988; Holbrook, 1994; Sheth

et al., 1991a, b). Whereas Floch (1988) identifies four

types of value associated with a hypermarket shopping

experience, Holbrook (1994) suggests that an indi-

vidual may experience eight different value types from

the consumption of an object. These typologies are

comparable with Sheth et al.’s (1991a, b) classifica-

tion, which identifies functional, social, emotional,

epistemic and conditional as possible values derived

from a consumption experience. All of these typolo-

gies suggest that each consumption experience results

in the construction of ‘‘multiple values’’ (Sheth et al.,

1991a, b), where many kinds of value tend to com-

mingle in any one consumption experience (Hillard,

1950; Holbrook, 1994; Lewis, 1946). As Holbrook

(1994, p. 56) argues ‘‘any one consumption experi-

ence is likely to involve more than one type of value


simultaneously’’, as the consumer can derive ‘‘values

of various types’’ at any one moment (Floch, 1988,

p. 244).1

In this paper we take a narratological approach to

the consumption of CSR in an attempt to address

Spradley and McCurdy’s (1972, p. 9) question

‘‘what do these people see themselves doing?’’.

Consonant with the linguistic ‘turn’ in the social

sciences, we regard ‘organisation’ as a discursive

space constituted through language, in particular the

telling and re-telling of stories (e.g. Boje, 1991;

Gabriel, 1999). Our approach attempts to under-

stand how the meanings attributed to CSR are

comprehended and constructed into narratives (Ar-

nould and Price, 1993; Thompson, 1997), examin-

ing how employees continually make sense of their

world ‘‘on the fly’’, as their ‘‘experience is literally

talked into meaningfulness’’ (Shore, 1996, p. 58).

We argue that organisational sensemaking (Weick,

1995) arises through the processes of narrative con-

structions and that organisations may be character-

ised by multiple narratives which variously compete,

overlap, intertwine, distance and often compete with

each other for prominence. In this paper we contend

that ethnographic interpretive research, focused on

processes of narrative construction, can be used to

illustrate how organisational stakeholders socially

construct their experiences of CSR.

Research design

Crane (1999, p. 244) argues that ‘‘given the

importance of discerning the motives underlying

ethical and unethical behaviour in organisations,

understanding organisation members’ own percep-

tions of organisational reality is critical’’. Given the

paucity of cultural and experiential perspectives

(Brigley, 1995), combined with the assertion that

extant empirical research is in many cases ‘‘relatively

poor and unconvincing’’ (Crane, 1999, p. 237), an

inductive research design was necessary whereby

‘‘research begun as close as possible to the ideal of no

theory under consideration and no hypotheses to

test’’ (Eisenhardt, 1989, p. 536). A single case study

was considered to represent the best means of

acquiring a deep and contextual insight in order to

generate and build theory (Dyer and Wilkins, 1991;

Yin, 1989). The nature of the research required an

ethnographic approach in order to provide the ‘‘in-

depth, intuitive, and empathetic understanding of

the other’’ (Humphreys et al., 2003, p. 10) and as a

means to acquire a ‘‘realistic account of culture’’

(Van Maanen, 1988, p. 45). This interpretive

and reflexive ‘‘inquiry from the inside’’ (Evered and

Louis, 1981) casts off ‘‘the bonds of realism

and positivism’’ (Bate, 1997, p. 1154) and recognises

the inherent complexity and multiculturality, the

paradox and contradiction, the competing values and

contests of meaning that characterise organisations

(Alvesson and Sandkull, 1988; Quinn and McGrath,

1985; Young, 1989).

The primary aim of this study was to author an

ethnographic account of the working lives of those

employed by the ‘boutique’ UK-based tour oper-

ator Laskarina Holidays, which specialises in vaca-

tions to the Greek islands. Our main sources of

data were 39 semi-structured interviews conducted

with employees between April and September

2003. Of these, 23 interviews were carried out in

the UK with 19 individuals, 4 key employees being

interviewed twice, and 16 interviews were con-

ducted with ‘reps’ and ‘area managers’ in the Greek

islands. Three people working on the Greek islands

could not be formally interviewed, and these

people were the only Laskarina employees from a

total workforce of 38 not to participate fully in this

project. While some of the interviews were con-

ducted in Laskarina’s offices and properties, others

took place in cafes, tavernas and Laskarina managed

properties. The duration of the interviews varied

from 40 to 80 minutes, with a median length of

60 minutes. All were recorded on to audio tapes

and fully transcribed before being subject to anal-

ysis. In addition, a substantial number of additional

informal interviews and observations were made in

the same time period, photographs of noteworthy

landmarks and buildings, and a range of docu-

mentation including internet pages, internal policy

reports, marketing brochures, and newspaper re-

ports also contributed to our ‘‘rich picture’’

(Geertz, 1973) of the organisation. Focussing on

how individuals and groups deployed narrative

structures to account for their activities, and those

of their organisation, we subjected our transcripts

to a form of grounded theory analysis (Glaser and

Strauss 1967), deriving coded categories in an

inductive process of integrating theory and empir-


ical data. The case study we present in the next

section represents our subjective interpretation of

the data as a set of five narratives of value.

Laskarina holidays

Background

Founded in 1975 by Ian and Kate Murdoch, Laskarina2

was a small specialist tour operator that sold approxi-

mately 10,000 holidays to the ‘unspoilt Greek islands’

each year (Laskarina brochure). The espoused aim of

the organisation was to provide ‘‘a better holiday’’ to

the ‘‘real Greece’’ (Ian Murdoch) for clients who pre-

ferred to be ‘‘treated as travellers rather than package

tourists’’ (Laskarina brochure). The company had a

turnover of approximately £7 million, and had won

multiple consecutive awards for the quality of its service

to customers as well as for its social and environmental

initiatives. Laskarina’s UK base was in the Derbyshire

town of Wirksworth where 19 staff dealt with reser-

vations, ticketing, finance and marketing and expressed

pride in the fact that 60% of the holidays sold each year

were purchased by repeat customers. A further 19

personnel were based on the 11 Greek islands where

Laskarina had established its apartments, and small hotel

accommodation. Of these, the 15 reps and 3 area

managers had responsibility for customer support,

while the property manager had varied responsibilities

associated with the villas used by the company. Overall,

21 employees had worked for Laskarina for more than

3 years, 11 were male and 27 were female. The 2

founder-owners, (Ian and Kate Murdoch, who styled

themselves ‘directors’), divided their time between the

UK and the Greek islands, and were involved in all

operational and strategic aspects of the business.

One of the main planks of Laskarina’s leading posi-

tion as an independent operator was its well-publicised

espousal of ‘responsible tourism’ which was described

in the brochure as ‘‘Laska-Greener’’; a policy that

involved a mix of programmes and ad hoc initiatives

aimed at ‘‘improving’’ the Greek islands. The com-

pany’s Marketing Manager referred to this policy as

‘‘genuine moves by the company to give something

back to the islands and work harmoniously with the

islands’’. Laskarina staff in general saw this as an example

of organisational altruism, expressing satisfaction and

even pride in their company’s efforts on the islands.The

initiatives included supplying canvas ‘survival bags’ to

all clients in an attempt to combat the use of plastic bags

on the islands, the restoration of original houses and

pathways, the provision of veterinary surgeons to the

islands to neuter the feral cat population and care for

local animals, and their investment in programmes of

flower planting and beach cleaning. Employees also

talked passionately about the restoration of the

churchyard in Halki, the purchase of a fire engine for

the island of Samos, and the funding of a music school

on the island of Symi. Much of this was attributed by

Laskarina staff to the vision and responsible attitude of

the two founders and directors.

‘‘They [the directors] love Greece, I think it’s as

simple as that, they just... it’s not just a country

that they want to use as a business tool... They

want to bring people to [the Greek islands] so

they can enjoy what they enjoy because these

people really, really love the country. So they

are taking something from it... getting a good

business from it, and they want to give some-

thing back’’ (Rep 8).

‘‘I do believe that Kate and Ian genuinely care

about the environment or contributing to the

community...’’ (Rep 4).

Narratives of value

Our case study takes a narratological approach to the

analysis of consumption experiences associated with

Laskarina’s prosocial endeavours. To facilitate this

we use Sheth et al.’s (1991a, b) five-fold typology,

namely; functional, social, emotional, epistemic and

conditional values, which are perceived as interre-

lated and as contributing incrementally to choice.

Whilst the concept of utility maximisation can be

applied to all of the values, Sheth et al. (1991a, p. 26)

argue that the ‘‘economically rational’’ behaviour

discussed by economists is ‘‘generally analogous to

behaviour motivated by functional value’’. Using

this model enables us to examine employee

discourses, highlighting the multiple values that

individuals may seek through engaging in socially

responsible behaviours.

Functional value

The perceived utility acquired from an alterna-

tive’s capacity for functional, utilitarian, or phys-


ical performance. An alternative acquires func-

tional value through the possession of salient

functional, utilitarian, or physical attributes.

The concept of functional value resonates with the

instrumental or economic perspective on CSR

where prosocial behaviour is enacted in order to

maximise utility (Marshall, 1890; Stigler, 1950).

Although some employees saw ‘‘Laska-Greener’’ as

‘‘more a concept than a financial reality’’ (Finance

Director), the functional value of Laskarina’s CSR

initiatives was often narrativised by employees. The

image of the company and the possible impact of the

responsible tourism programme on sales was one of

the most prominent examples.

‘‘It [‘Laska-Greener’] generates a lot of good

feeling with the clients...’’ (Kate Murdoch).

Whilst the various prosocial endeavours were per-

ceived to generate goodwill with the clients, earning

Laskarina ‘‘brownie points’’ (Reservation Consultant

4), employees also mentioned that ‘‘Laska-Greener’’

served to improve the relationship between the

company and the islanders.

‘‘... it is a very good diplomatic move as

well’’ (Rep 4).

‘‘What you give is what you get, they [Ian and

Kate] give out an awful lot, they don’t just take

from an island, they give it back... when they

[local residents] see you are a company putting

something back into the island they will help

you in return, whereas if they are going to see

you as a sort of smash and grab, get every penny,

then they won’t ... the locals do respect Laskari-

na and vice versa’’ (Rep 3).

The functional value of ‘Laska-Greener’ was also

perceived to have an impact on employees, many of

whom expressed that they felt much happier

working for a company that one employee said

‘‘genuinely cares about the environment and con-

tributing to the community’’ (Rep 4) and another

expressed her feelings saying that ‘‘If I ever did move

on from Laskarina it would have to be to a small

company with the same ethos’’ (Area Manager 3).

Whilst it was often asserted that ‘Laska-Greener’ had

a functional benefit, employees also often discussed

their consumption experiences in relation to derived

social value.

Social value


tive’s association with one or more specific so-

cial groups. An alternative acquires social value

through association with positively or negatively

stereotyped demographic, socioeconomic, and

cultural-ethnic groups.

The perceived societal value3 of Laskarina’s projects

was often cited by employees who discussed a range

of benefits to the local community.

‘‘We have things, even odd things, like we have a

group of doctors that come round, they come

round and inject all the children, and so Laskarina

provided them with accommodation, it’s all little

things like that, you know, don’t make the head-

lines so they are not getting good publicity from

it, but certainly the community know about it

and appreciate it.’’ (Rep 1)

The impact of the cat neutering programme was also

frequently commented upon, in that it is ‘‘definitely

helping the islands’’ and has ‘‘made an absolute

improvement... the cat population is reduced and

they are looking really healthy’’ (Rep 1). The music

school was also deemed to be of value to the pop-

ulation of Symi, as one of the reps indicated ‘‘music

is a very big part, because obviously that is a lot of

the kids’ future and the Symiots are music minded’’

(Rep 3). The Samos Restoration Fund was deemed

to be of great value to the local population who

were ‘‘just absolutely over the moon’’ (Kate

Murdoch), as the area manager identified.

‘‘So we purchased it [a Swiss fire engine], we

paid for the shipping for it to arrive here and

there was a big presentation with Ian Murdoch

sitting in the driver’s seat and that... and it was a

huge thing and they were... obviously amazingly

grateful’’ (Area Manager 3).

Societal value was also perceived to be derived by

Laskarina employees, not only for their ‘‘Laska-Greener’’

initiatives, but also for the wider impact they have

had on the islands. Ian Murdoch drew attention to


the fact that when the programme on Halki first

started, ‘‘there was virtually nothing’’, with a pop-

ulation below 200 and many ruined houses. Ian

mentioned that school children had to spend four

hours a day on a boat travelling to and from Rhodes

to attend school. As a result of Laskarina’s pro-

gramme on Halki, the population has returned, the

majority of houses have been restored and there is

now a school catering for children up to the age of

18. As one of the reps for Halki highlighted, ‘‘there

is a lot of gratitude for the fact that it’s turned round

the island’s economy’’ (Rep 2). The social value of

‘Laska-Greener’ was often conveyed in conjunction

with an emotional reaction to this value, as

employees described how they ‘felt good’ as a result

of the value to society.

Emotional value


tive’s capacity to arouse feelings or affective

states. An alternative acquires emotional value

when associated with specific feelings or when

precipitating or perpetuating those feelings.

Whilst the role of emotions has been considered

in relation to CSR (e.g. Fineman, 1996), emo-

tional value has been examined in much greater

depth from a consumer behaviour perspective

(Havlena and Holbrook, 1986; Hirschman and

Holbrook, 1982; Olshavsky and Granbois, 1979).

From this phenomenological perspective, the cri-

teria for consumption decisions are essentially

aesthetic in nature and are based upon an appre-

ciation of a responsible behaviour for its own sake,

apart from any utilitarian or functional purpose

that it may or may not perform (Becker, 1978;

McGregor, 1974). Indeed it has even been argued

that ‘‘without such emotions there can be no

ethics’’ (Solomon, 1991, p. 197). Comparable with

Fineman’s (1996) study of emotional subtexts,

Laskarina employees frequently employed emo-

tional language to describe ‘Laska-Greener’.

‘‘I don’t think Laskarina consciously do things to

get publicity, they get enough publicity with

winning the awards, with word of mouth, with

the huge repeat business, you know, publicity is

not a major issue with them, so I would think it’s

more an emotional thing; they do it because they

want to do it, they want to repay and want to

give something back to the community’’ (Rep 1).

‘‘They [the directors] love Greece, I think it’s as

simple as that, they just... it’s not just a country

that they want to use as a business tool... They

want to bring people to [the Greek islands] so

they can enjoy what they enjoy because these

people really, really love the country. So they

are taking something from it... getting a good

business from it, and they want to give some-

thing back’’ (Rep 8).

Frequently employees stated that they ‘‘love this

company’’ (Rep 8) and that they were ‘‘very proud’’

(Kate Murdoch) of the things that had been done for

the community and the environment. The hedonic

rewards of responsibility also came at a cost for one

rep as he described his emotional response to cleaning

the beaches; a voluntary act that he ‘‘liked to do’’

because it was ‘‘the right thing to do’’ (Rep 6).

‘‘When I get my [bin] bag out, they [the cli-

ents] see me walking along with it, when I do

my picnics I always clean the beach that we do

our picnic on and people always pass comment

on that, but again it’s more embarrassing for me

than anything else, I wish that they wouldn’t say

anything’’ (Rep 6).

Occasionally respondent narratives were framed

around negative emotions, where employees stated

how they ‘‘get very cross’’ (Rep 7) when people

drop litter, or how they ‘‘absolutely hate passion-

ately’’ when the Greeks dump household appliances

on the side of the road (Rep 9). Whilst there is little

consensus on appropriate indicators of emotions, or

a definition of terms (Fineman, 1993; Hochschild,

1983), emotional value was seen to be of great

importance in determining what projects were

undertaken, as one rep poignantly stated Kate does

‘‘whatever she feels passionate about’’ and ‘‘anything

that she finds interesting’’ (Rep 5).

Epistemic value


tive’s capacity to arouse curiosity, provide nov-

elty and/or satisfy a desire for knowledge.


The desire for novelty, variety and exploration are well

documented as factors influencing human behaviour

(Hansen, 1972; Hirschman, 1980; Howard and Sheth,

1969; Venkatraman and MacInnis, 1985). From this

perspective, employees may be motivated by a desire to

experience something different, where CSR may

provide ‘‘a simple change of pace’’ (Sheth et al., 1991b,

p. 162). Although many employees’ narratives related

to the social and emotional value resulting from their

consumption of CSR, epistemic value was also cited as

an outcome of socially responsible behaviour in Lask-

arina. Many of the ‘Laska-Greener’ initiatives were seen

as entertaining and enjoyable activities; as the Mar-

ketingManager stated, ‘‘it’s good fun to do these type of

things... it’s probably good fun for all the staff...’’. The

music school in Symi and the ‘Laskarina Chamber

Players’ can be seen as sources of epistemic value,

resulting from Kate’s ‘‘mania with music’’ and her

passion for ‘‘chamber type music and opera’’ (Area

Manager 1). Kate commented on how tedious it was

listening to people continually playing piano solos (the

island previously had only one publicly owned instru-

ment), and as a ‘‘great classical music fan’’, she saw the

creation of the school and her involvement in the fes-

tival as a ‘‘pet project’’. The latest charitable project

devised by Kate also provides novelty and variety for

two employees in particular.

‘‘It’s a bit different. We are actually supporting a

UK charity, this is Colon Cancer Concern, be-

cause colon cancer is what I’ve had. They are

doing a sponsored trek up Mount Olympus. So

we are sending [two employees, one from the

UK and a rep], and sponsoring them both... as

well as donating £1 from every holiday.’’ (Kate

Murdoch)

Renowned for their sense of humour, the reps for

Halki have also been known to dress up in clothes

made from Laskarina survival bags on the weekly

picnic, as one of the reps stated said ‘‘it’s all good

fun’’ (Rep 1), serving to make clients aware of the

bags and their purpose. Ikaria is also host to the

Laskarina bottle crushing competition, where clients

and locals are invited to produce the smallest crushed

plastic bottle4, which was done ‘‘simply to make my

welcome meeting a bit different and more fun’’

(Rep 14), where the rep sought epistemic value in

order to maintain stimulation (Berlyne, 1960, 1970).

Conditional value

The perceived utility acquired by an alternative as

the result of the specific situation or set of cir-

cumstances facing the choice maker. An alterna-

tive acquires conditional value in the presence of

antecedent physical or social contingencies that

enhance its functional or social value.

Conditional value is dependent on the situation in

which an object is consumed, where different

contexts of consumption and situational factors

influence the value of an alternative (Bearden and

Woodside, 1977; Belk, 1973, 1974; Sheth, 1974).

Whilst Sheth et al. (1991a, b) present conditional

value as a separate construct, it is essentially a

specific case of other values where the antecedent

situation moderates the perceptions of the other

four value types (Sweeney and Soutar, 2001).

Whilst all prosocial endeavours can be seen as

having a conditional value which is determined by

the circumstances under which the value is expe-

rienced, the construct relates to situations that may

cause the company to deviate from their ‘‘typical or

planned behaviour’’ (Sheth et al., 1991a, p. 69).

One example of the conditional value of a prosocial

endeavour is Laskarina’s purchase of the fire engine

and equipment for the Free Volunteers of Mara-

thokampos in response to the fire on Samos in

2000.

‘‘People felt, particularly those who had been

there, when the fire was happening that they

wanted to help the island, which is nice, which

means that the clients feel very much as we do.

That was a disaster, most of the other things

we’ve been involved in haven’t been a disaster’’

(Kate Murdoch).

The value of the fire engine was conditional on the

events surrounding its purchase; evidently if there

had not been a major fire, then the donation of such

equipment would not have been as valuable to the

recipients. Other examples of conditional value can

be cited such as the decision made by one rep to

clean a particular beach on their island.

‘‘It’s a very special beach on Lipsi, it was where

the hermit... on the island, who lived there at the

little chapel for over 30 years and it just really


annoyed me that it was just really, really filthy and

that no one was doing anything about it, and the

same with Rena [the local agent] and so we

thought right okay, we’ll go and do it’’ (Rep 5).

The notion of conditional value asserts that

employees may be disposed to behave in a certain

way as a result of antecedent circumstances. The

effects of situational contingencies impact upon the

value of CSR and influences the behaviour of

employees, drawing attention to the dynamic busi-

ness environment that faces organisations.

Multiple and coexisting values

Whilst the functional, social, emotional, epistemic

and conditional values derived by Laskarina

employees have been separated for theoretical par-

simony, the complex notion of consuming respon-

sibility, is essentially a rich and multifaceted

construct that is conveyed through interweaving and

interlaced narratives. Engaging in this process of

narrativisation, many employees did not identify a

singular value derived from CSR, but described a

plurality of rationalisations to explain their behav-

iour. In response to a question relating to her

motivations for ‘Laska-Greener’ and possible reasons

as to why other companies do not behave similarly,

Kate Murdoch was dismayed by the failure of many

of her competitors to adopt a similar stance on

responsible tourism.

‘‘No it’s silly, I don’t know why they don’t,

because it generates a lot of good feeling with the

clients, it makes you feel good personally and also

with the locals, you know, they can see that you

are not just take, take, take, that you are actually

interested in their community and putting

something back if you can’’ (Kate Murdoch).

The multiplicity of the values derived from CSR

was evident in many employee narratives, who each

mentioned different consumption values and placed

varying degrees of importance upon them.

‘‘The primary reason is to put something back

into Greece... of course it’s great if you can kill

two birds with one stone, fantastic, you can do

a bit of advertising whilst helping’’ (Rep 10).

‘‘Yes, we don’t have endless pits of money to

give to charity so... and I suppose from a com-

mercial point of view greenness is also a busi-

ness ploy, there’s that side of it, it’s a selling

point the fact that we are green. So you... it’s a

juggling act and okay it’s altruistic up to a

point, but you know, it would be unrealistic to

think that nobody thinks, ‘oh this is good for us

as well’’’ (Reservations Manager).

‘‘Of course it has a marketing angle because

people want us to do that sort of thing and

it’s... but it’s sincere, I mean the want to help is

sincere but yes, at the back of the mind, you’ve

got a business person there thinking that this is

good for business as well because the clients are

going to like it.’’ (Finance Director)

It is the harmonious coexistence of multiple values

that serves to differentiate our approach to CSR

from the traditional binary and oppositional

approaches in business and society literature. The

following discussion aims to elucidate the primary

benefits from viewing CSR through this lens of

consumption.

Theoretical implications

So what are the implications for both theory and

future research arising from our use of the lens of

consumption to view the Laskarina narratives? We

argue that our consumption perspective has

numerous and profound theoretical benefits over

extant theories of CSR. In this discussion we

endeavour to highlight four primary advantages,

examining how this perspective has necessarily

refocused on the individual; the preference for value;

the elucidation of additional CSR consumption

experiences and types of values; and the theoretical

reconciliation of CSR and the existence of multiple

and coexistent values.

The individual

The language of corporate social responsibility and

corporate citizenship has resulted in a dominant research

agenda which has examined CSR from an organisa-

tional perspective where there is ‘‘a tendency to view


the corporation as the agent’’ (Hemingway and

Maclagan, 2004, p. 33); authors have primarily

focussed their research upon the ‘‘motivations of

firms’’ (Bansal and Roth, 2000, p. 728) and ‘‘corporate

motives’’ (Hemingway and Maclagan, 2004, p. 34) for

CSR. This anthropomorphisation has served to con-

ceptually differentiate between the organisation and

the individuals who inhabit it. The priorities of the

organisation are seen as dominant over those of the

individual employees who ultimately initiate and

enact socially responsible behaviour (Wicks, 1996).

Following various authors (e.g. Buchholtz et al.,

1999; Hemmingway and Maclagan, 2004; Hoffman,

1993; Shaw and Post, 1993), it is our assertion that the

locus of responsibility lies with individuals. Hence the

study of socially responsible behaviour within an

organisation can only meaningfully be examined by

focussing on the meanings that individual employees

associate with their behaviour.

Intrinsic to our consumption perspective on CSR

is the focus on the individual and their personal

preferences for value. Holbrook’s (1994, p. 27)

definition of value as ‘‘a relativistic preference cha-

racterising a subjects’ experience of interacting with

some object’’ serves to enrich an understanding of

the theoretical benefits our perspective on CSR

provides. Given that ‘‘value’’, in this context,

essentially represents an individual employee’s rela-

tivistic construction of socially (ir)responsible

behaviour, the concept of CSR can only be

understood in a meaningful way by examining

individual’s discursive interpretations of their

behaviour and the behaviour of others; as Brightman

(1962, p. 33) states ‘‘value is entirely dependent on

and relative to the human experience of it’’.

Preference for value

Given the tendency to view CSR as driven by

‘strategic or moral’ concerns, extant perspectives are

unable to determine why organisations engage in

what may deemed ‘egotistical’ or ‘self-oriented’

behaviour (e.g. premium pricing) in some circum-

stances yet are ‘altruistic’ or ‘ethical’ in other situa-

tions (e.g. philanthropy). The notion of value as a

type of preference (Holbrook, 1994), relates to

Morris’s (1956, 1964) conceptualisation of axiology

as the study of preferential behaviour, where

individuals have preferences for some values, or

‘‘end states’’ (Rokeach, 1973), over others. There-

fore the individual chooses consumption experiences

which are ‘‘optimal according to his preferences’’

(Debreu, 1959, p. 65), where some socially

responsible behaviours are valued over others.

Whereas the ‘ethical’ and ‘altruistic’ motives dis-

cussed in the CSR literature (Neiheisel, 1994; Shaw

and Post, 1993; Solomon, 1992a) fail to explain why

an ‘organisation’ may behave ‘ethically’ or ‘altruis-

tically’ in some circumstances and not in others, the

notion of preferential consumption experiences

serves to highlight that individual employees derive

‘‘values of various types’’ under different circum-

stances (Floch, 1988, p. 244). Given our assertion

that value is a relativistic construct and influenced by

individual preferences, it is likely that groups, sub-

groups and individual organisational stakeholders

will author heterogeneous, overlapping, and poten-

tially competing, narratives relating to the potential

value derived from CSR (Humphreys and Brown,

2002a, b). Indeed, CSR activities (or lack of them)

can result in negative value for some stakeholders,

whose discursive perferences for value are likely to

compete for prominence with those of the organi-

sational decision makers, who will ultimately

determine, and potentially act upon, the legitimacy

of any dissonant and contesting voices.

Types of value derived from CSR

It has been argued that ‘‘the most egregious and

constant problem in the firm objectives value

dichotomy is the acceptance (implicit or explicit) of

the economic character of business as the driving force

in the mission of the firm’’ (Wicks, 1996, p. 104). The

hegemonic view that CSR is an instrumental tool has

promulgated the notion that prosocial organisational

behaviour is essentially a rationalised and program-

matic endeavour to maximise profit (Maignan and

Ferrell, 2001; Mescon and Tilson, 1987; Murray and

Montanari, 1986; Varadarajan and Menon, 1988).

Adopting a consumption perspective on CSR serves

to question this dominant perspective as economic

rationality implies only one desirable ‘‘end state’’

(Rokeach, 1973). It is our assertion that employee’s

and ‘organisations’ seek ‘‘values of various types’’

(Floch, 1988, p. 244) when engaging in socially


responsible behaviour. Whilst the functional and so-

cial values derived from CSR are well established in

the literature (e.g. Dunn and Yamashita, 2003; King,

2001; Waddock and Graves, 1997), our perspective

on CSR has drawn attention to other important

consumption phenomena that have been neglected in

extant literature. The notion of the employee as a

consumer suggests that employees do more than

simply process information to make decisions and

maximise organisational utility: it is suggested that

they also engage in imaginative, emotional and

appreciative consumption experiences (Holbrook and

Hirschman, 1982; Holbrook et al., 1984; Woods,

1981). CSR activities such as fundraising, charity days

and community events are inherently more involving

than simple functional and instrumental activities and

are likely to involve employees adopting a play

mentality (Huzinga, 1970). Autotelic behaviours such

as playful consumption, aesthetic enjoyment and

emotional responses (Holbrook et al., 1984; Osborne,

1979; represent a source of experiential value that has

been neglected in the CSR literature.

Multiple and coexistant values: theoretical reconciliation

It is indeed a cornerstone of our thesis that ‘various

types’ of value can be derived from CSR, coexisting

and commingling in any one consumption experi-

ence (Hillard, 1950; Holbrook, 1994; Lewis, 1946).

Our assertion that the consumption of CSR is

characterised by ‘‘more than one type of value

simultaneously’’ Holbrook (1994, p. 56) has pro-

found implications for the study of business and

society and serves to highlight the ‘‘poor and

unconvincing’’ (Crane, 1999, p. 237) nature of

extant theoretical perspectives.

It has been argued that the business and society

literature is replete with self perpetuating dichoto-

mies that have resulted in the illegitimate bifurcation

of theory and empirical research (Buchholz and

Rosenthal, 1995; Frederick, 1994; Freeman, 1994;

Swanson, 1999; Victor and Stephens, 1994; Wicks,

1996). The vast majority of authors researching

CSR have framed their research as if ‘organisations’

have only one preference or ‘motivation’ for

engaging in socially responsible behaviour. The two

primary perspectives on CSR, the ‘values perspec-

tive’ from which the original managerial philosophy

of CSR was seen to emerge (Stroup and Neubert,

1987) and the now dominant ‘economic perspec-

tive’ are often deemed to be oppositional perspec-

tives on CSR. As Wood (1996, p. 119) argues,

dichotomies ‘‘have long staked out the field of

business and society’’ and it is indeed evident in the

case of organisational objectives or ‘motivations’ for

CSR. Research has often been framed from this

binary perspective, examining whether CSR results

from ‘‘business motives or corporate benevolence’’

(Campbell et al., 1999, p. 377), whether contribu-

tions are ‘‘philanthropic in nature or instrumentally

motivated’’ (File and Prince, 1998, p. 1529),

‘‘altruistic or for profit’’ (Fry et al., 1982), ‘‘instru-

mentally motivated...or...driven by non-material

and benevolent motivations’’ (Sanchez, 2000, p.

364), resulting in the view that ‘‘it is always difficult

to tell whether behaving ethically towards external

stakeholders is prompted by altruism or self-preser-

vation’’ (Rollinson, 2002, p. 44). The predominat-

ing perspective that an ‘organisation’s’ objectives for

engaging in CSR are ‘‘strategic or moral’’ (Hem-

ingway and Maclagan, 2004, p. 41) has been further

embedded and reinforced, somewhat ironically, by

authors who have tried to argue that there is more

than one objective for CSR. Authors such as

Drumwright (1996) and Hemingway and Maclagan

(2004) have suggested that ‘‘motivations’’ for CSR

can be placed along a ‘‘continuum’’ and ‘‘located on

an axis’’ (Hemingway and Maclagan, 2004, p. 41) in

an attempt to determine to what extent objectives are

‘‘commercial or... idealistic’’ (p. 34). Whilst there is

an assertion that multiple objectives are ‘‘real’’ and

‘‘truly mixed’’ (Drumwright, 1996, p. 77), these

geometric representations are fundamentally flawed

as the implication remains that there is a single

objective, albeit a ‘‘mixed’’ one, and that somehow

a greater economic interest results in a reduced so-

cial concern, reinforcing the fallacious notion that

the values derived from CSR cannot co-exist.

Our consumption perspective on CSR funda-

mentally differs from these approaches and we argue

that not only are there multiple values derived from

the consumption of CSR, evident in the value laden

discourses of Laskarina employees, but that these

values coexist harmoniously. This perspective not

only presents a challenge to hegemony of the

instrumental perspective on CSR (e.g. Maignan and

Ferrell, 2001; Murray and Montanari, 1986), but it


also provides an entirely original view on CSR

where the economic model has indeed been

‘‘transformed, rather than supplemented’’ (Wicks,

1996, p. 104). The notion that CSR is driven by

strategic or moral objectives has prevailed for too

long and resulted in an unhealthy cynicism towards

prosocial organisational behaviour. Viewing CSR as

a source of value is an inherently richer and more

meaningful theoretical perspective than the simplis-

tic and polarised concepts that have become the

established norms of business and society literature.

Conclusion

In the search for a ‘‘robust model’’ (Bansal and Roth,

2000, p. 719) of CSR, the apotheosis of the

positivistic approach to human behaviour, we have

argued that existing perspectives on CSR have been

plagued by a reliance on quantitative methodolo-

gies that have been based on fallacious embedded

theories and assumptions. An implicit theme

throughout our thesis is that the authors of CSR

literature have failed to look beyond the realms of

extant CSR theories and examine alternative para-

digmatic approaches to the study of organisational

behaviour. By employing an interpretive method-

ology in a single organisation, we have highlighted

that the meanings employee’s attribute to CSR are

relativistically constructed, interpreted and mobilised

by organisational actors to describe and rationalise

their behaviour. This case highlights that organisa-

tions are not monolithic entities and are inherently

pluralistic and polyphonic (Humphreys and Brown,

2002); individual employees utilise discourses which

are inherently rich and multifaceted, describing the

multiple and coexistent values that they derive from

CSR. The desperate cries from authors such as

Wood (1996), Wicks (1996) and Swanson (1999)

have been realised with a perspective where previ-

ously opposing views on CSR are reconciled in such

an inclusive way that it does indeed make ‘‘little

sense to try and pull them apart’’ (Wicks, 1996,

p. 114). Our consumption paradigm has provided a

‘‘creative theory’’ (Lewis and Grimes, 1999, p. 685),

which has resulted in a thought provoking means of

reconciling many divergent perspectives and further

encourages interdisciplinary research. Given the

profound theoretical advantages that we have cited,

we argue that future research should begin, not by

asking the question of why organisations assume

responsibility, but by contemplating the notion of

why organisations consume responsibility.

Notes

1 Operationalising this concept of multiple values; a

car for example, does not simply have functional value

in transporting the consumer, it also has symbolic value

and serves to communicate cultural meaning (Levy,

1959; McCracken, 1986). Clothes do not simply keep

the consumer warm, they are also a means of represent-

ing the self (McCracken, 1988) and may provide com-

binations of social, emotional, epistemic, conditional

and functional values.2 The company had been named after Laskarina

Bouboulina, the heroine of Spetses who was instrumental

in the uprising against the Turks in the Greek war of

Independence of 1821. Employees argued that the name

was appropriate in locating the organisation as both

distinct from other tour operators and embedded within

Greek culture.3 Holbrook’s (1994, p. 42) notion of ‘‘self-oriented’’

and ‘‘other-oriented value’’ serves here to distinguish

between functional and social value in this context,

where functional value results from the ‘‘use-value’’ of

CSR to the company, in contrast with social value

which results from the effect CSR has on ‘society’.

Essentially value is derived from the perceived effect of

corporate behaviour on society and in this context it is

seen to contrast with functional value which refers to

the instrumental and utilitarian functions of CSR.4 Crushing bottles before disposal minimises the space

they take up in land fill sites. As a lot of water on the

islands is brought in by tanker, all residents are advised

to only drink bottled water.

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Paul M. Gurney

Business School,

Nottingham University,

Wollaton Road,

Jubilee Campus, Nottingham,

NG81BB, U.K.

E-mail: [email protected]


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