The importance of customer expectations : an analysis of CSR in container shipping

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been increasingly embraced by corporations to demonstrate effort to reduce negative environmental and social externalities resulting from their business activities. CSR covers a wide range of issues, including environmental concerns, occupational health and safety, local community social-economic welfare and workers’ rights and welfare issues. Through a detailed content analysis of the CSR-related documents on the websites of the top container shipping companies in the world, this paper examines CSR adoption in the container shipping business. The analysis reveals that while institutional pressure plays an important role, shipping companies are more sensitive to market demands and their focus on CSR elements is selective depending on anticipated customer expectations.