CSR and corporate sustainability. Theory and policy implications

The increasing globalisation of economic activity has jeopardized CSR and its sustainability in the long run, weakening the ability of stakeholders to monitor the CSR standards of a corporation. This has eroded the incentives of the top management to adopt satisfactory and homogeneous global CSR standards, and has induced the temptation of exploiting the economic opportunities offered by shortcomings in local market regulations and in their enforcement. The paper analyses the features of a sustainable corporation in the framework of the stakeholder theory and business ethics, focusing on the debate between legal regulation and self-regulation.