ABSTRACT
Scaling up corporate responsibility requires that it be integral to and supportive of, broader sustainable development strategies and policies. Sustainable development depends on the health of the economy and its pattern of social, environmental and economic impacts. Economic health in turn does depend on international competitiveness, which plays a key role in determining a country or region's pace of economic development as well as its social and environmental characteristics. Corporate responsibility clusters throw a different light on the roots of international competitiveness. Vietnam's responses to international criticism about labour standards in its footwear sector are in danger of pricing the country out of this market as manufacturing multinationals shift towards lower-cost parts of the region. Public policies to amplify corporate responsibility practices need to be, and indeed are being, formulated in the context of this complexity, at an international level, and also at regional, national, and even community levels.
