Many firms have responded to the advent of global sustainability norms/codes by adopting policies that seek to mitigate and make transparent their environmental and social impacts. It is unclear, however, the extent to which corporate social responsibility practices influence firms’ other political activities such as lobbying in ways that are consistent with their stated social obligations. The paper addresses this question by conducting a content analysis of the CSR reports of 100 firms from three countries (US, UK, Germany) at two points (1997-2000; 2010-2013). This analysis will reveal: (1) the extent to which firms include lobbying in their definitions of CSR (2) how integrated firms’ lobbying and CSR policies/practices appear (3) the extent to which reporting on lobbying yields information that can empower NGOs/stakeholders. We thus shed light on the extent to which firm CSR practices resemble accusations of ‘organized hypocrisy’ or rather (potentially) can affect political change.
