ABSTRACT
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has burgeoned into a vast field of research and practice. The literature has provided ample insights into how companies can engage with CSR and on motivations for doing so. Moreover, CSR has increasingly been advocated as a response to some of the most pressing social and environmental problems that humanity faces. However, most research has focused on the organisational level, and pertinent questions regarding the societal-level impacts of CSR have remained scarcely explored. Given the criticality of the sustainability transition that will not be possible without private sector contributions, there is an urgent need to improve our understanding of the wider societal-level impacts of CSR. In this introductory chapter, we present our motivations for this book exploring the social and environmental impacts of CSR at the societal level. We then introduce the chapters included in this volume and conclude with remarks concerning the current state of scholarship on CSR impacts as well as promising avenues for future research. We hope that the present book will unveil new evidence about the contribution CSR can make to society-at-large and encourage further research in this regard.
