A Transactional Culture Analysis of Corporate Sustainability Reporting Practices

CS Initiatives and CS Reporting Practices in India

India is a particularly interesting country to explore with regard to CS reporting practices for a variety of reasons. First, India is currently the world’s second fastest growing economy, with a population of more than 1.2 billion. Although liberalization, privatization, and globalization have led to rapid growth and poverty reduction in India, these changes have also generated significant concerns about increased inequality and environmental degradation in the country (Goyal, 2006). Literature on CS reporting practices of Indian organizations is scarce. Although some Indian companies are aware of CS reporting guidelines and some advances have been made in this domain, corporate practices and accounting continue to remain below expectations (Chakrabarti, Megginson, & Yadan, 2008). CS reports of many Indian organizations’ lack content and quality (Singh & Joshi, 2009). Similar findings have also been reported from many developed countries (Adams & Frost, 2006; Berthoin-Antal & Sobczak, 2007).

Second, although Indian society expects businesses to be socially responsible, people are skeptical of what companies call CS/CSR. People also doubt the intention behind CSR activities. This skepticism is the legacy of past decades when CSR activities were a way for Indian companies to get tax exemptions (Narwal & Sharma, 2008). Similar skepticism toward CSR activities has also been observed in other parts of the world (Orlitzky, Siegel, & Waldman, 2011). Also there is an assumption in India that if an organization really engages in good deeds, it should remain discrete about such efforts (see Berthoin-Antal & Sobczak, 2007, for similar observations in France). This inherent distrust in CS/CSR activities and CS reports is further reinforced by recent financial scams (Kaur & Mishra, 2010), which have led to losses of more than US$2 billion to investors (Kripalani & Hamm, 2009). Researchers (Singh & Joshi, 2009; Swain, 2009) have therefore called for Indian organizations to work toward generating trust and confidence among people with regard to their CS initiatives. Understanding what CS and CS reporting mean to these organizations and to their members is a first step in this direction.

Third, existing literature on CS/CSR practices in India is sparse. Some scholars (Saha, 2007) show that in India over the years, large companies have established proper systems to implement CS; medium scale companies understand the importance of CS but do not consider it their responsibility, and small companies do not bother themselves with CS. Among the few studies exploring CS-reporting practices in India, some focus on fast-moving consumer goods companies (Shukla, 2009) while others focus on the banking sector (Hossain, 2007; Swain, 2009). Other kinds of organizations such as trade unions, cooperative associations, and not-for-profit organizations have been largely neglected. This article distinguishes itself from its predecessors by focusing not only on large for-profit companies but also on one trade union and one cooperative association.

The Transactional Culture Approach (TCA)

The TCA forms the theoretical background of this study. As mentioned earlier, there is gradually increasing pressure from governing bodies, media, competitors, and consumer protection societies on companies to report their CS practices (Ballou et al., 2006) according to internationally recommended voluntary CS reporting guidelines. Despite this increased pressure, not all organizations choose to report their CS activities according to these guidelines. To explain differences in organizations’ reactions to these guidelines, past studies offer a variety of explanations, some of which invoke firm-level variables such as firm size and firm ownership (public vs. private; Gallo & Christensen, 2011), while others invoke culture. Culture is believed to have an impact on normative ethical beliefs regarding what is morally correct behavior (Cohen & Nelson, 1994). Some scholars (Elgin, 1994) go so far as to state that that sustainability cannot be achieved till underlying cultural issues are addressed. Other scholars trace a more precise relation between national culture dimensions (Hofstede, 1980) and CS-related behaviors (Hu & Wang, 2009; Park, Russell, & Lee, 2007).

Studies invoking national cultural differences as a way of explaining organizations’ varied reactions to voluntary CS reporting guidelines follow conventional business literature where culture is considered as a “given” (Child & Faulkner, 1998; Schein, 1985), as homogenous, and as a relatively stable construct dictating people’s behaviors within fault lines drawn by geographic boundaries at national and/or societal levels (Hofstede, 1980; Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 1997). For proponents of this viewpoint, culture is “the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one human group from another” (Hofstede, 1980, p. 25). Such scholars often transpose national-level cultural dimensions on to companies because they believe that lower levels of culture are embedded within larger more global ones (Leung, Bhagat, Buchan, Erez, & Gibson, 2005).

Conversely, anthropologists, especially from the transactional analysis school (Barth, 1966a, 1966b; Kapferer, 1976) conceptualize culture as emerging through a process of social transactions. Social transactions are defined as a patterned transference of material (shells, animals, food, and labor) and immaterial (status and power) items between individuals and groups (Kapferer, 1976). Social transactions involve a series of interactions systematically governed by reciprocity, with each party trying to ensure that the value it gains is greater than or at least equal to the value lost. Through regular transactions, people create enduring social forms between them. These social transactions provide a way to model both micro level (e.g., interpersonal) and macro level (e.g., social systems) relationships (Barth, 1966b). For transactional culture experts, cultures have a dynamic quality, capable of transforming meaning and redirecting behavior. These experts are generally dissatisfied with any structural-functional approach to culture that engages in a “morphological matching of forms so as to locate differences” (Kapferer, 1976, p. 3). Instead they encourage culture scholars to focus on those social transactions that produce generally shared meanings and to explain how cultures are generated and how they change (Barth, 1967, 2007). They explain that, “If individuals are taken to form the elementary parts, they regularly will prove to hold memberships in groups of a diversity of levels and scales and in groups which transect the boundaries of any designated region” (Barth, 1992, p. 30). Also, some situations are so complex that only schemas where parts of the local system connect in diverse and crisscrossing ways to higher levels are effective in describing them (Barth, 2007). The authors of this article contend that understanding CS practices and reporting preferences is one such complex exercise that requires a multilevel exploratory tool.

Since this article aims to focus on cultural transactions between Indian organizations and their various stakeholders at individual (employees/members), group (the community, different sections of society), national, and international levels (governing bodies and others), it prefers taking a cross-level stance to the problem (following Orlitzky, Siegel, & Waldman, 2011). Such a cross-level stance is made possible through the use of the TCA. Using the TCA implies that not only do the authors treat cultures as being dynamic and independent of geoethnic boundaries but they also consider that different levels of cultures (individual, group, organizational, national, and others) interact with one another in crisscrossing ways to produce overall CS-related outcomes. Exploring the cultural transactions between an organization and its internal and external stakeholders will also lead to a better understanding of why organizations prefer to prioritize certain stakeholders over others with regard to their CS-related activities. The basic underlying question inspiring this article is How do people hold themselves accountable to others and vice versa? Therefore, the authors need a framework which, while being rooted in the TCA, focuses specifically on explaining social accountability. Such a framework was offered by Mary Douglas.

The Douglas Cultural Framework (DCF) as the conceptual framework of this study is discussed next. The authors begin by defining key terms from the DCF perspective. Then we elaborate on DCF’s four forms of social accountability and present DCF’s conventional four-celled model. Next, the authors explain why the more recent triangular model of DCF is better suited in the context of this study than the conventional four-celled model.

The Douglas Cultural Framework: A Transactional Framework of Social Accountability

Douglas defines culture as the system that people use to justify their actions to themselves and others, and to call others to account for their actions (Douglas, 1970, 1978). In other words, cultures represent “a set of plans, instructions, rules or a means of social accounting” (Gross & Rayner, 1985, p. 3). Defined as such, culture is at the heart of the discussion regarding CS reporting practices. DCF explains how different kinds of social transactions lead to the generation of different forms of social accountability. Broadly defined, social accountability implies some duty to provide an account of performance and be subject to appraisal, however informal (Douglas, 1986), and “which leads to forming of more or less stable social patterns” (Jepperson, 1991, p. 145). For the purpose of this article, social accountability implies how individuals hold themselves accountable to different stakeholder groups. Nevertheless, since individual accountability is too varied to capture and since organizations represent an aggregation of individuals, this article focuses on the dominant form(s) of social accountability emerging in organizations. The authors contend that in line with the dominant form(s) of social accountability in an organization, different stakeholder groups (e.g., larger society, specific subsections of society, fellow members/employees of the organization, customers, investors, shareholders, and others) will be prioritized and different preferences for CS reporting guidelines will be manifested.

The foundation of the DCF rests on the two social dimensions: social pressure and social classification. As Douglas (1970) explains, people use these two social dimensions to guide their behaviors. Social pressure is the experience of having no option but to consent to the overwhelming demands of other people. High social pressure results when people spend a lot of their time interacting with other members of their unit. In such a context, the individual is more deeply committed to a group, so choices are more standardized (Douglas, 1996). Conversely, social pressure is low when people lead their lives as individuals, they are neither constrained by other members of the group nor do they apply constraints on others (Gross & Rayner, 1985). For ease of exposition, in subsequent sections of this article, the authors refer to this social dimension as group. The other social dimension social classification, registers increasing complexity of discriminating rules (Douglas, 1996). High social classification occurs whenever roles are distributed on the basis of explicit criteria such as sex, color, position in the hierarchy, holding a bureaucratic office, descent in a senior clan, and others (Gross & Rayner, 1985). Social classification is of low strength when these distinctions weakly limit the range of alternatives. For ease of exposition, in subsequent sections of this article, the authors refer to this social dimension as classification. Plotting high and low strengths of group and classification against one another, results in four forms of social accountabilities, which are presented in DCF’s conventional four-celled model (see Figure 1 below).

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Figure 1.

DCF’s conventional four-celled model of social accountability.

The objective of DCF’s four-celled model is not to force-fit every form of observed accountability into its four forms of social accountability. Rather, the objective is simply to facilitate an understanding of the dynamic social interactions between the four forms of social accountability in daily life. In reality one encounters hybrids of different forms of social accountability within social entities (6 & Mars, 2008). Having clarified this basic premise, the four forms of social accountability are now discussed. In each form of social accountability, the authors begin by describing the values and behaviors that characterize its members, followed by a discussion of how members prioritize different stakeholder groups for their CS initiatives and finally, members’ varied reaction toward CS reporting practices.

The hierarchical form of social accountability emerges when individuals have a high preference for both group and classification. Due to strong group sentiments, members of this form of social accountability engage in frequent interactions with one another. The transactional network for these individuals is organic, that is, they tend to interact with people from different functions and roles (Rayner, 1986). They also have a preference for standardized ways of working and attach considerable importance to ancestry and past. The hierarchical form of social accountability is tradition bound, and every member knows his place although this place might vary with time (Gross & Rayner, 1985). Following principles, rules, regulations, and procedures are more important than the outcome (Gross & Rayner, 1985). Since social classification is also strong in the hierarchical form of social accountability, members will show deference toward and hold themselves accountable to those more powerful than themselves (Coyle & Ellis, 1994), for example, governing bodies. Hence, accepting and conforming to standards will be the most natural choice for these individuals. Regulations are considered essential to overcome any irregularities or risks (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990). Furthermore, these individuals will assume responsibility for the uplift of their weaker brethren because they consider themselves more privileged (Calabresi, 1977; Rayner, 1984).

Regarding CS activities, the authors anticipate that organizations in which the hierarchical form of social accountability dominates will try to address the needs of a variety of stakeholders, both internal and external because members of the hierarchical form of social accountability have a high group inclination coupled with a preference for organic networks (Rayner, 1986). Also, due to high score on classification, stakeholder groups will be clearly ordered in terms of priority and those stakeholders who are weaker members of society will be prioritized for CS initiatives. Finally, organizations in which the hierarchical form of social accountability dominates will readily adopt voluntary CS reporting guidelines due to their inherent preference for standards and their inherent deference toward governing bodies.

The competitive form of social accountability is low on both group and classification. Low group sentiment implies that members of this form of social accountability have the maximum liberty for negotiating contracts, choosing allies, and redefining relationships (Gross & Rayner, 1985). These individuals are entrepreneurs and prefer having total autonomy and freedom to pursue their objectives (Douglas & Wildavsky, 1983). They are less doctrinal and more pragmatic than their hierarchical counterparts (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990). For members of the competitive form of social accountability, the focus is on outcomes and track records rather than rules and procedures. The transactional network for these individuals is ego based: that is, they tend to interact with people with whom they can establish mutually advantageous relations (Rayner, 1986). The low score on classification implies that restrictions on individual behavior are weak. Also, members impose few constraints over others. Hence, mutual accountability is weak. Since these individuals do not appreciate being forced to conform, they do not favor standards and guidelines. Nonetheless being true pragmatists, they can be prevailed on to conform to any developmental path that offers the best financial outcomes (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990).

Organizations with a dominant preference for the competitive form of social accountability will instinctively resist CS-reporting standards and guidelines because they will perceive these guidelines as constraints on innovation and autonomy (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990). However, if convinced that conforming to these guidelines provides them a competitive advantage, they would comply notwithstanding their initial resistance. Under such circumstances, these organizations will focus their CS activities on those stakeholders that have contributed to the company’s financial gains because this focus creates mutually advantageous transactions for them.

The egalitarian form of social accountability is high on group and low on classification. Since members of this form of social accountability have a high preference for group, it is important for them to distinguish the in-members from outsiders and to identify where the group boundary lies. Therefore, for these members the external group boundary is the most important concern (Gross & Rayner, 1985). The transactional network for these individuals is mechanical, that is, they tend to interact with people from similar functions and roles as themselves (Rayner, 1986). Due to high group score, members of this form of social accountability are characterized by high group consciousness, fraternal cooperation, and voluntary respect and concern for one another (Coyle, 1997). Also since the classification score is low, group members apply few constraints on one another (Coyle, 1997). Decision making is participatory and social relations are voluntary and egalitarian (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990).

Regarding CS activities, an organization with a dominant preference for the egalitarian form of social accountability will treat its own members as priority stakeholders. All CS efforts would therefore be geared toward its in-members. Being high on the group dimension, members of the egalitarian form of social accountability will not necessarily oppose CS reporting guidelines and standards, but since their accountability lies toward their own members rather than with external stakeholder (including international governing bodies), they would not necessarily make conforming to voluntary CS reporting guidelines their top priority either. Members of the egalitarian form of social accounting could be prevailed on to conform to these guidelines by assuring them that doing so is in the best interest of their fellow members. However, the same guidelines will be strongly resisted, if perceived as a means of creating inequality within the egalitarian group.

Finally, in the fatalistic form of social accountability, members are subject to low group and high classification. Individuals do not choose to place themselves in this form of social accountability of their own accord. Instead, the fatalistic form of social accountability emerges when people in strongly hierarchical structures have been excluded from decision making or when strongly competitive individuals have been forced out of competition (Gross & Rayner, 1985). In the fatalistic form of social accountability, members’ transactional network includes other fatalists like themselves (Rayner, 1986). Due to high classification, fatalist members are strongly regulated according to their socially assigned positions. Essentially, members of the fatalistic form of social accountability suffer from high segregation like their hierarchical counterparts but without the group support that the latter enjoy. Also, members of the fatalistic form of social accountability have low group score like their competitive counterparts, but without the latters’ autonomy. Members of the fatalistic form of social accountability neither manage nor learn, they simply cope with whatever cards are dealt to them (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990). Since their strategy is one of survival, they will try to avoid accounting to others as far as possible.

Organizations in which members have a predominantly fatalistic form of social accountability can be expected to engage in minimum CS activities, just enough to avoid legal hassles. Small family-run enterprises in India that believe that they have little to contribute to the CS discourse fall into this category. Members of the fatalistic form of social accountability cannot be relied on to commit themselves to CS reporting guidelines or to their underlying principles. These members would consider such guidelines as obligations imposed on them by other forms of social accountability.

Having discussed the four forms of social accountability, three points deserve elaboration. First, proponents of DCF treat social accountability to be an emerging behavioral outcome of members’ preferences for two social dimensions, namely, group and classification. It follows that people may choose to place themselves in different arrangements of group and classification at different times and in different contexts. Therefore the four forms of social accountability of DCF are not rigid categories. Rather, in line with the TCA, they are evolving sets of preferences. Second, every organization has the presence of four forms of social accountability that constantly compete with one another for dominance, with none ever achieving it permanently (Thompson, 1996). However, at a point in time, one or more form(s) of social accountability may dominate. Third, the four forms of social accountability are required in every social system because despite their rivalry, they are complementary to one another (Schwarz & Thompson, 1990). Each form of social accountability does something for another form that the latter cannot do for itself. This dependence implies that if one form of social accountability were to disappear, all others would disappear as well and the system would collapse. For example, if there were no hierarchical form of social accountability, there would be no one to impose rules, restrictions, and standards on members of the competitive form of social accountability. Left unrestrained, the excessive market-focus of members of the competitive form of social accountability would lead to an imbalance and an eventual collapse of the system (Patel, 2007a; Thompson, 1996).

In conclusion, since members of the fatalistic form of social accountability merely avoid social accountability, in the subsequent sections of this article, the authors address only the three active forms of social accountability: hierarchical, competitive, and egalitarian. The six examples of Indian organizations presented in subsequent sections illustrate the dominance of the three active forms of social accountability (either singly or in hybrid forms) but do not address the fatalistic form. Consistent with this approach, Rayner (1994) has refined DCF’s four-celled model (see Figure 1) into a three-celled triangular model of social accountability, which provides more conceptual clarity regarding the interactions between the three active forms of social accountability. This triangular model is discussed next.

From a Four-Celled Model to a Triangular Model of Social Accountability

In the previous subsection, the authors have presented DCF’s four-celled model of social accountability. Rayner (1994) refined DCF’s four-celled model of social accountability into a three-celled triangular model. This triangular model is directly derived from many dichotomous models of social organization proposed by social scientists in the past century: Maine’s (1861) status (in which actors know their place in a hierarchical system) versus contract (in which places and relations can be easily negotiated), Tönnies’s (1887) gemeinschaft (based on relationships, friendship, and kinship) versus gesellschaft (social bonds determined by individualistic competition and contract), Durkheim’s (1893) mechanical (social relations formed on the basis of sameness) versus organic solidarity (relationships formed on the basis of interdependence and specialization) etc. Although many of these dichotomies seem to overlap, Rayner (1994) points out that they are not perfectly congruent and that taken altogether they cannot be reduced to fewer than three ways of organizing. These three ways correspond to DCF’s three active forms of social accountability, resulting in DCF’s triangular model (see Figure 2 below).

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Figure 2.

DCF’s triangular model of social accountability.

The characteristics of DCF’s three active forms of social accountability and how they correspond to the dichotomies offered by social scientists of the past century (Bennett & Dahlberg, 1990; Bernstein, 1970; Durkheim, 1893; Maine, 1861; Tönnies, 1887) are summarized in Table 1 below:

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Table 1.

Characteristics of DCF’s Three Active Forms of Social Accountability and How They Correspond to Conventional Dichotomous Social Science Models.

	DCF’s three active forms of social accountability and their characteristics
Conventional social science models from the past century	Hierarchical form of social accountability	Competitive form of social accountability	Egalitarian form of social accountability
Tönnies (1887)	Gemeinschaft	Gesellschaft	Gemeinschaft
Durkheim (1893)	Organic networks	Organic networks	Mechanical networks
Bennett and Dahlberg (1990)	Specialized roles	Specialized roles	Multifunctional roles
Bernstein (1970)	Positional authority	Personal authority	Personal authority
Maine (1861)	Status relations	Contract relations	Status relations

Source: Rayner & Malone, 1999.

DCF’s triangular model has many advantages over both the dichotomous models proposed in the last century as well as over DCF’s four-celled model of social accountability. In the dichotomous models offered by past scholars, if an actor falls out of one form of social accountability, the only possible option is to land in the opposite form of social accountability, thereby leading to a dead end in the change process. For example, based on Maine’s (1861) model, being thrown out of status implies that an actor has no other choice but to land into contract and vice versa. With DCF (both the triangular and four-celled models of social accountability) on the other hand, when an actor falls out of one state of being, there are still many options available to him. Thus unlike the dichotomous models proposed in the past, DCF allows for the discussion of social change as a complex, never-ending phenomenon (Thompson, 1996). Additionally, DCF’s triangular model of social accountability offers an important advantage over DCF’s four-celled model. While DCF’s four-celled model calls attention to the unique characteristics of each form of social accountability corresponding to the corners of the square, the triangular model calls attention to the perpendicular bisectors of the figure (see Figure 2). DCF’s triangular model exposes how two forms of social accountability share certain features in contrast with a third. Thus it reveals the potential for more complex forms of hybridity than suggested by DCF’s four-celled model. Therefore, in subsequent sections of this article, the authors use DCF’s triangular model of social accountability to make sense of CS activities and CS reporting practices of Indian organizations.

Exploring Social Accountability in Six Indian Organizations

This qualitative and exploratory study offers examples of six Indian organizations to illustrate the three active forms of social accountability, either singly or as pair-wise hybrids. These purposefully chosen organizations include four large conglomerates, one trade union, and one cooperative association. By intentionally selecting one trade union and one cooperative association for this study, we address recent calls for more studies on CS reporting practices of organizations, other than commonly explored large private corporations and large publicly traded corporations (Ball & Grubnic, 2007; Unerman, Bebbington, & O’Dwyer, 2007).

Secondary data sources were used to collect relevant information for each of the six organizations. The web sites of the six organizations were explored to collect information pertaining to the organizations’ values, their CS initiatives, and their CS reports (if any). The authors also studied popular press interviews of organizational leaders to learn about their values, the values that characterize their organizations, and their CS initiatives. The websites of governing bodies such as GRI and UNGC were studied to get more up-to-date information regarding CS reporting practices of these organizations. Books outlining the history of these organizations, their evolution over time, and their current successes and challenges were also consulted. Material collected from these different data sources, was put together to construct a preliminary case file for each organization. Each preliminary case file was first analyzed using content analysis (Hancock, 1998). Based on the findings from this step, and following more data collection, complete case files were created for each organization. These case files were then studied repeatedly to identify emerging themes. Next, thematic analysis (Lacey & Luff, 2001) was conducted across the six case files to identify emerging themes regarding (a) the dominant form(s) of social accountability in these organizations, (b) the kind of CS initiatives that organizations were involved in and the stakeholder groups they prioritized, and (c) their CS reporting practices. In identifying dominant form(s) of social accountability, care was taken not to draw conclusions based on isolated behaviors. The behavioral characteristics of each form of social accountability (as described earlier in this article) were used to identify different forms of social accountability. Tentative conclusions were drawn only when recurring patterns were observed.

This study suffers from certain methodological limitations. First, as the authors’ discussion of the six Indian organizations relies completely on secondary data, there is potential for bias and subjective interpretation. The credibility of tentative patterns drawn solely through the use of such secondary information is therefore questionable. Organizations’ web sites, in particular, could be selective in the information they communicate, evading those actions that can be considered by some as ‘questionable’. It is for this reason that Dey (2007) suggests the use of silent or shadow accounts rather than relying on corporate web sites for CS-related information. Second, the authors have considered only six examples. Although six organizations suffice for this exploratory study, more systematic studies of other organizations will be required to create a more complete picture of CS-reporting practices in India. Also, the six organizations that the authors explore have been purposefully chosen to expose different forms of social accountability. The findings therefore cannot be generalized to other Indian organizations or even to other organizations within the same sector of activity. Finally, the present study relies excessively on the philosophy of founders to identify the dominant forms of social accountability in organizations. Although leaders do have a strong impact on of the way organizations shape up (Hofstede, 1980), followers and employees also have their role to play in organizations (Nowicka, 2000). Therefore, a full picture can only be generated through empirical studies involving both the leaders and followers across a wide variety of Indian organizations.

Despite these limitations, this conceptual article has its merit. It is the first study using DCF’s triangular model to make sense of the different forms of social accountability observed in a variety of Indian organizations and to explore the impact of the dominant form of social accountability on CS-related decisions. DCF, although well-known among anthropologists has hitherto been neglected by business scholars. In each of the six examples presented next, the authors begin by providing a historical overview of the organization and the influence of its founder(s) on its values. The authors then outline the CS activities and CS-reporting practices of the organization. Finally, as a conclusion to each example, the authors plot the organization in question on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability. In all six examples, the authors find evidence of dominant form(s) of social accountability. However, in four out of six examples they find that dominant forms of social accountability exist in pair-wise hybrid forms rather than singly. Past studies such as those conducted by Schwarz and Thompson (1990) in Unilever also provide evidence of hybrid forms of social accountability.

Over a hundred years ago, JRD Tata set up the first steel plant in India. Today, Tata is one of the most well-known family-run businesses in India with activities spanning several sectors: iron and steel, energy, chemicals, higher education, scientific research, automobiles, hospitality, cosmetics, tea, software development, consultancy, and textiles (Lala, 2006). The Tata Group of Companies and its current chairman, Ratan Tata are largely guided by the values of JRD Tata, who had once said that any action that does not benefit the nation isn’t worth attempting (Lala, 2006). The five core values that guide the behavior of Tata employees today are integrity, understanding, unity, excellence, and responsibility (Waknis, 2007). In the context of Tata, “responsibility” is operationalized as “(being) sensitive to the countries, communities and environment in which it [i.e., the company] works, always ensuring that what comes from the people goes back to the people many times over” (Waknis, 2007, p. 50). Ratan Tata stands by these corporate values, and hopes that these values will continue to guide the company on the path of honesty and growth (Lala, 2006). Such dedication to principles, doctrines, and values is characteristic of the hierarchical form of social accountability.

The Tata Group of Companies is considered by some as the uncontested leader of CSR in India. Some experts (Mitra, 2007; Waknis, 2007) believe that Tata set benchmarks in CSR practices even before laws to this effect had been created in India. Tata started investing in the well-being of its mine workers way back in 1969. Despite the many challenges that the company has had to face over time, it continues to spend a higher percentage of its revenues on social welfare of employees as compared to other Indian companies. Figures range from 4% to 13% of its revenues in its most difficult years (Lala, 2006). These figures show that one of the stakeholders that Tata prioritizes for its CS activities are its employees. Other than the employees, Tata also invests in the development of the community and the society at large (IBS Center for Management Research [ICMR], 2005). To address the needs of the various underprivileged sections of the community, Tata has created the Tata Council for Community Initiative (TCCI) which focuses on a variety of projects such as social development, environmental management, restoration of biodiversity, and so forth. Tata has since long worked toward the development of the city of Jamshedpur. In March 2005, Jamshedpur was selected to be part of the UNGC pilot program, where it serves as a model for urban development programs around the world. Tata has also set up educational establishments such as the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS). Recently, Tata was rewarded for its contribution in combating HIV/AIDS when it was selected for the Civil Society Award from UNAIDS (India) and the Award for CSR in Public Health from the U.S.-India Business Council (USIBC). Tata has also initiated the Tata Index for Sustainable Human Development, aimed at directing, measuring, and improving social uplift programs that the company undertakes. ³ Tata’s CS initiatives are not limited to its Indian operations. In 2006 Tata Africa Holdings started offering merit-based scholarships to students at the University of Witswatersrand in South Africa. ⁴ Tata’s focus on a variety of stakeholder groups for its CS activities is consistent with the high group focus and organic networks that characterize the hierarchical form of social accountability. Also, the company’s preference for the hierarchical form of social accountability is evident from its efforts toward the uplift of weaker sections of the community (for instance underprivileged students in South Africa). Being powerful, it instinctively assumes responsibility of weaker members of society.

As seen earlier in this article, the high group and high classification preference of the hierarchical form of social accountability makes its members favorable to standards and guidelines. This claim is upheld in the example of Tata. Tata was among the first Indian companies to conform to voluntary CS-reporting guidelines. Today, Tata is among the few Indian companies that report their CS activities in full accordance with the UNGC, GRI, and SA 8000 guidelines. ⁵ Considering Tata’s clear hierarchical orientation, the authors locate it at the top corner of DCF’s triangular model of social accountability.

The Bajaj Group, which was ranked the fifth largest business family in India by the Center for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) in 2001, produces a wide variety of products: automobiles, home appliances, lightings, iron and steel, insurance, travel, and others. Bajaj currently incorporates 34 companies and employs more than 25,000 people. ⁶ The foundation of Bajaj was laid by Bachraj Bajaj in 1927. His grandson Jamnalal Bajaj contributed significantly to the credibility and trustworthiness that the company commands today (Herdeck & Piramal, 1985). Jamnalal insisted on honest business practices while simultaneously focusing on profitability. Yet he would not hesitate to withdraw from a deal if he disagreed with underlying principles even if this meant immediate losses. For instance, he withdrew from New India Assurance due to disagreements regarding certain practices proposed by the Board of Directors. This steadfastness earned Jamnalal respect and credibility in the business community (Herdeck & Piramal, 1985), which was further enhanced by his closeness to Gandhi.

Today the company’s philosophy originally instilled into it by the founder and then passed on to subsequent generations can be summed up in one word—trust. The company claims that it has always strived for the progress of the nation and the uplift of the weaker sections of society. ⁷ Bajaj holds itself accountable to the legacy of its forefathers. Furthermore, it gives precedence to the nation over itself. ⁸ The significance that the company seems to attach to its ancestry and the past is indicative of its high-group characteristics. This high group sentiment is also evident in the fact that the company attaches importance to the closeness it shares with the country and its people. Its adherence to the principles and values put in place by the founders is also proof of its hierarchical orientation.

With regard to its CS activities, the Bajaj Group spends approximately INR 100 million (US$2.15 million) every year on charity and community uplift activities. Being among the strong business entities in India, Bajaj takes responsibility for the uplift of the weaker sections of society and focuses its CS activities on a variety of stakeholders. It has set up several schools and colleges, for example, the Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies and Jankidevi Bajaj Institute of Management Studies. It has also created a trust to ensure the development of 32 villages around Bajaj Auto’s Pune and Aurangabad plants. The trust works toward improving the quality of life of the rural poor by creating employment opportunities. It also works toward ensuring rural health, hygiene, sanitation, gender equality, literacy, protection of environment and natural resources, and the improvement of agriculture and livestock yield. It provides micro-credits and income generation opportunities to the poor. Bajaj Auto has built a 135-bed hospital at Aurangabad. The company also supports the underprivileged sections of the society through its affirmative action plans. ⁹ These initiatives show that Bajaj prioritizes the weak and needy sections of society in its CS initiatives, thereby revealing the company’s underlying preference for the hierarchical form of social accountability.

The next step is to explore whether Bajaj’s hierarchical orientation is also reflected in its CS reporting practices. Members of the hierarchical form of social accountability, as discussed earlier and as seen in the example of Tata, generally have a preference for procedures and standards and would therefore be favorable to reporting their CS initiatives according to voluntary CS reporting guidelines. However, secondary literature does not provide any evidence of Bajaj’s CS report, either independently or as part of an annual or corporate governance report. The company’s CS activities were reported informally on its web site. ¹⁰ Since Bajaj does not produce a formal CS report, the authors infer that it does not attribute much importance to CS reporting standards and guidelines. Informality in reporting CS initiatives is a characteristic of the competitive form of social accountability, an observation that is further supported by some of the subsequent examples in this section. Therefore the authors conclude that although Bajaj displays a predominantly hierarchical form of social accountability, it also reveals traces of the competitive form of social accountability with regard to its CS reporting preferences. Therefore, on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability, Bajaj is located along the side connecting the hierarchical and the competitive corners, albeit closer to the former.

As seen in previous examples the dominant form(s) of social accountability in an organization is a function, among other things, of the values of its founders. The same can also be said of Reliance, although the form of social accountability observed in this case is predominantly competitive. In 1962 Dhirubhai Ambani created Reliance with INR 15,000 (less than US$300). In subsequent decades, this company grew to a conglomerate worth US$15,000 million, making Reliance the first ever private Indian company to appear on the Fortune 500 list. Today, the Reliance Group is active in many sectors including petrochemicals, petroleum refining, oil and gas, telecommunication, retailing, and so forth. It exports products worth more than US$15 billion to more than 100 countries and has above 25,000 employees. In its initial years, the core of the Reliance Group was composed of Dhirubhai Ambani, his nephew Rasikbhai Meswani, and other relatives. Recalling the attitude of these founders, one old-time collaborator comments ¹¹ that Dhirubhai and Rasikbhai lived simply, but worked like army generals on a battlefield. They worked fast and did not stop till they had achieved their goals. They never rested and did not let others around them rest either.

The low-profile and competitive behavior of the founders suggests the low-group, low-classification characteristics of the competitive form of social accountability, which the company manifests even today. Dhirubhai always encouraged his collaborators to expand their networks, which he considered essential for success in business. The networking strategy is typical of the competitive mind set. Also Dhirubhai is often described in popular press as a person with flexible values. ¹² He was accused of manipulating government policies to suit his own needs, characteristics that further strengthen the impression of his competitive orientation. The blurring of the fine line between “right” and “wrong” is a characteristic commonly observed among members of the competitive form of social accountability (Patel, 2007a, 2007b). As Schwarz and Thompson (1990) report, members of the competitive form of social accountability are pragmatic and less doctrinal as compared to their hierarchical counterparts. Also unlike the latter, who focus more on procedures, the former are outcome oriented. True to the spirit of the competitive form of social accountability, Dhirubhai did not attribute much importance to rules and regulations, which he considered as constraints in the path of entrepreneurship and autonomy. Although there is ample evidence of the competitive form of social accountability in Reliance, there is also some evidence of egalitarianism in this company. In his early years, when Dhirubhai worked as a clerk in a trading firm in Yemen, he would attract small traders into lending him money by promising them that profits would be for all to share, losses would be his alone. Later he used the same argument to get people to invest in Reliance, thereby making it one of the most popular Indian companies with investors. This tendency to narrow down the spread of losses is an egalitarian trait (Rayner, 1984).

Regarding its CS activities, Reliance has invested enormously in the development of the state of Gujarat, in setting up schools and hospitals, in educating the youth of India in sectors such as software development, in providing merit-based scholarship to girl students, handicapped children, and others. ¹³ Yet, its customers and investors remain its priority in terms of its CS focus. Since shareholders contribute the most into the company, followed closely by customers, giving back to shareholders (through dividends and profit sharing) and to customers (through cheap and good quality products) makes the most sense to this company, due to its predominantly competitive social accountability. The competitive form of social accountability is also evident in the corporate governance report ¹⁴ that the company issues on its web site. This report focuses mainly on employees, investors, and shareholders. It speaks of a Corporate Governance and Stakeholder Interface Committee, an Employee Stock Compensation Committee, a Health and Safety Committee, and a Shareholders’/Investors’ Grievance Committee. This report is not structured in accordance with voluntary CS-reporting guidelines, which is consistent with its competitive form of social accountability. As seen in the example of Bajaj, issuing informal web site–based CS reports seems to be a competitive trait. In conclusion, most secondary literature suggests a competitive form of social accountability in Reliance with some traces of egalitarian behavior. Therefore, on DCF’s triangular model, the authors plot Reliance on the side of the triangle connecting the competitive and the egalitarian corners, albeit closer to the former than the latter.

Infosys Technologies Limited is a global information technology (IT) and consulting company based in Bangalore. It also offers outsourcing services and software solutions to companies in varied sectors of activity. Infosys was founded by N R Narayana Murthy and six other entrepreneurs who pooled together INR 10,000 (less than US$200) of family savings as capital for this venture. ¹⁵ Murthy is the current chairman and chief mentor of Infosys. Today Infosys employs more than 17,000 people worldwide and has operations across many countries: Australia, China, Japan, Mauritius, United Arab Emirates, Canada, United States, Mexico, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Netherlands, Spain, United Kingdom, Sweden, Switzerland, and others. ¹⁶ The core values that guide the behavior of Infosys employees are integrity, transparency, fairness, pursuit of excellence, leadership by example, and constant endeavor to surpass customer expectations. ¹⁷

Murthy’s interviews in popular press reveal that the entrepreneurial and competitive spirit that had inspired the creation of Infosys continues to guide the company even today. Murthy has always been a strong supporter of open competition, profitability, and prioritizing customers’ interests. He strongly opposes the Indian government for its defensiveness of local companies and its desire to control foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country (Hayward, 2003). Murthy is a self-confessed “free marketer” and “a compassionate capitalist”. ¹⁸ These arguments reveal Murthy’s preference for the competitive form of social accountability. Murthy also stresses the importance of increased productivity because this, he argues, leads to better incomes, more spending capacity, and more jobs. These arguments again hint at the substantive rationality and the pragmatic materialism of the competitive mindset.

Infosys CEO Kris Gopalakrishnan explains that CSR, for Infosys, combines inspiration and strategic thinking. ¹⁹ This strategic thinking has led Infosys to concentrate most of its CS initiatives on its most important stakeholders: its employees. In fact, Infosys is considered as the pioneer of employee-focused corporate governance in India (ICMR, 2002) and has received several awards for its efforts toward ensuring the well-being of its employees: the Best Employer of India award in 2001, the Global Most Admired Knowledge Enterprise award for three consecutive years from 2003 to 2005, the World’s Best Employer in Training and Development award by the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) and others. Murthy is known to have once said that employees are his “assets, (who) walk out of the door each evening.” It is his priority to “make sure that they come back the next morning.” ²⁰ Infosys’s efforts toward training its employees and providing them excellent working conditions suggests a long-term social contract, a quality that is typical of the hierarchical form of social accountability.

In addition to its employees, Infosys also contributes to the larger society. In 1996, Infosys created the Infosys Foundation headed by Mrs. Sudha Murthy and operating in areas of health care, social rehabilitation, rural uplift, education, arts, and culture. The foundation runs several knowledge-based programs and research collaborations with some of the best universities in the world. The large number of educational establishments it has set up and the variety of training programs it offers, show its commitment toward knowledge-creation and the generation of better qualified knowledge workers in India. ²¹ Education, according to Murthy is the way forward for the country. In one of his interviews, Murthy likens India to a family with two children: one rich, educated, and urban, the other poor, uneducated, and malnourished. To decrease this gap between the two, he argues, the privileged child will have to share his blessings with the other one. Reducing this gap between the fortunate and the deprived, he concludes, is the only way to alleviate poverty in India (Hayward, 2003). Rayner and Cantor (1987) have called this the deep-pocket argument of the hierarchical form of social accountability, which implies that more privileged members of society should take the responsibility of those that are less privileged.

In conclusion, Infosys displays different forms of social accountability vis-à-vis different stakeholders: hierarchical form of social accountability toward its employees and the lesser privileged members of society, and the competitive form of social accountability toward the government and competitors. This hybrid form of social accountability is also manifested in its CS reporting practices. Till 2006, Infosys offered informal reports of its CS activities on its web site, which is consistent with the competitive mindset. However, in 2007 it published its first CS report in compliance with the GRI guidelines. As discussed earlier, reporting CS initiatives according to voluntary guidelines is the intuitive choice of the hierarchical form of social accountability. Members of the competitive form of social accountability, although intuitively disinclined toward any form of control or standards, can nevertheless be prevailed on to support this choice by demonstrating that doing this provides them a competitive advantage. Therefore, on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability, the authors locate Infosys on the side connecting the competitive and hierarchical corners.

The Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), which adopted the brand name Amul in 1955, is the largest food business in India and the largest producer of milk and milk products in the world. Tribhuvandas Patel, the famous freedom fighter, and Dr Varghese Kurien created Amul ²² with the objective of overcoming two problems faced by small milk producers in Gujarat: (a) the souring of milk due to heat and long distances between the milk producers and the buyers and (b) manipulation by middlemen leading to fluctuating and low incomes for milk producers (Patel and Schaefer, 2009). Today, Amul has 2.9 million members, an average daily collection of 9.10 million liters of milk, a revenue of US$2.15 billion (2010-2011), and overseas markets in Mauritius, United Arab Emirates, United States, Bangladesh, Australia, China, Singapore, and many other countries. ²³ In 2006, Amul was acknowledged as a role model for cooperatives all over the world by the Global Conference on Social Responsibility.

Amul’s business model is different from the examples offered so far in this article and therefore deserves some attention. Although Amul aims to provide high-quality products to Indian consumers at affordable prices, its primary goal has always been to provide a platform for fair trade to small milk producers in India. Amul purchases milk from small milk producers at interim prices, which are on average 15% higher than anywhere in the country and once the milk products are sold, the difference is paid back to the milk producers based on revenues earned from them. Amul itself functions at very meager profit margins. Since protecting the interests of its members remains Amul’s priority, it exhibits characteristics of the egalitarian form of social accountability. In his memoirs, Kurien reveals his own egalitarian preferences when he calls for shifting back power from civil servants to the milk producers. He strongly favors Amul’s cooperative business model where all milk producers are equal, with no one acting as the leader (Kurien & Salvi, 2005). This instance echoes Douglas and Wildavsky’s (1983) observation that in the egalitarian form of social accountability, members are organized as groups of equals without a clearly appointed leader and yet each member can be a leader. Kurien’s appeal to minimize the power differential and his distrust of those that contribute to generating inequality among members (e.g., civil servants) suggest his underlying egalitarian preferences.

In addition to the strong egalitarian influence, Amul also reveals traces of the hierarchical form of social accountability. For example, Kurien supports the cooperative business model rather than a contractual one because in the former, profits distributed to members are proportional to their contributions. Proportionality, as Rayner (1994) explains, is a hierarchical value. Amul can therefore be considered as a hybrid of the egalitarian and the hierarchical forms of social accountability with a marked preference for the former. Therefore, on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability, the authors plot Amul on the side connecting the hierarchical and the egalitarian corners, albeit closer to the latter.

Although Amul prioritizes its members, its CS initiatives also benefit its employees, suppliers, consumers, the environment, the local community, and the society, while simultaneously contributing to the development of Amul’s business. ²⁴ Amul spends considerable efforts on training small distributors who are often less educated rural people. These distributors are also invited to visit of the production site at Anand. These training programs and visits of the production site give the distributors a sense of belonging to the Amul group and a sense of pride in having contributed to the development of the rural communities and the nation. The focus on a variety of stakeholders while simultaneously prioritizing its in-members suggests the coexistence of the hierarchical and egalitarian forms of social accountability in Amul.

Despite Amul’s commitments toward its social responsibility, especially vis-à-vis its members, secondary research does not reveal the existence of CS reports, either separately or on its web site, nor is there any suggestion of its inclination toward voluntary CS reporting guidelines in the future. Being of the egalitarian mindset, Amul seems to hold itself accountable toward its members rather than international CS governing bodies or other stakeholders, which explains Amul’s lack of initiatives toward formal or informal CS reports.

SEWA is a trade union of poor, self-employed women, founded in 1972 in Gujarat by Elaben Bhatt, a staunch Gandhian and freedom fighter. SEWA’s initial activities included buying handmade products from its members, selling them in local and foreign markets, and redistributing the profits among the members. As a result of these activities, SEWA’s members increased their income by 600% from 1994 to 1998. Currently SEWA has over 688,566 members from 53 unorganized trades and from five Indian states, making it the largest trade union in India. The values cherished by SEWA are consistent with Gandhi’s teachings of altruism: uplift of the poor, protecting the weak, and ensuring that everyone has the chance to live a life of dignity. Following these principles, SEWA prepares rural women for employment and self-reliance ²⁵ (Patel & Schaefer, 2009; WHO, 2008). In so doing, the leaders of SEWA hope to reduce the disparity between these women and other more powerful sections of society. Bhatt hopes that one day SEWA’s members will be able to voice their concerns in the Indian parliament (Bhatt, 2006). Like a true egalitarian, Bhatt hopes to reduce the disparity between the voiceless and those in power.

Over the years, SEWA has enlarged its scope of activities. It has created cooperatives in varied sectors: dairy, service, labor, trading, vending, and others. It has also created health cooperatives, women and child-development associations, and child care cooperatives. With the aim of giving financial independence to women, SEWA has created savings and credits-based associations ²⁶ and banks. The SEWA Bank with 202,706 savers has issued loans to more than 50,849 members. SEWA has also created its own university called the SEWA Academy. Inspired by the tremendous impact of SEWA, similar but independent trade unions have emerged in South Africa, Yemen, and many other countries.

Since SEWA adheres to the egalitarian form of social accountability, it holds itself accountable to its own members. Therefore, most secondary data on SEWA refer to the activities it carries out for poor and unemployed women in India. SEWA publishes no explicit CS report, nor mentions CS in any of its formal or informal communication. At first glance, it seems almost counterintuitive that an organization whose raison d’être is to offer a sustainable model of existence to society does not mention CS in its communication. Further reflection, however, suggests that it would be unnatural to expect SEWA (or Amul) to talk of its CS initiatives because CS is integral to its existence and all its activities. Since SEWA reveals a strong preference for the egalitarian form of social accountability, the authors place it on the bottom right hand corner of DCF’s triangular model.

In the next section the authors discuss their tentative findings from the six examples offered in this section. First, they summarize the different forms of social accountability observed in each of these organizations. Next, they present the stakeholder groups that are prioritized by these organizations for their CS activities and finally, they expose the CS reporting practices of these organizations in light of the dominant form(s) of social accountability observed in each case.

Discussion

The exploration of six Indian organizations in the previous section reveals a dominance of different forms of social accountability in each organization. Also in four cases out of six, hybrids of two forms of social accountability were found to dominate. The positions of these six organizations on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability are presented in Figure 3 below.

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Figure 3.

Locating the six Indian organizations on DCF’s triangular model of social accountability.

As seen in Figure 3, Tata displays a dominance of the hierarchical form social accountability. Bajaj displays a hybrid of the hierarchical and competitive forms of social accountability, with a stronger inclination toward hierarchy. Reliance displays a hybrid of the competitive and egalitarian forms of social accountability, while Infosys reveals a hybrid of the competitive and hierarchical forms. Amul and SEWA are examples of the egalitarian social accountability although the former also shows traces of hierarchy.

The six examples of Indian organizations also reveal that the different dominant forms of social accountability prioritize different groups of stakeholders for their CS activities. While Tata and Bajaj focus on wide variety of stakeholder groups and consider themselves responsible for the uplift of weaker sections of society, Reliance and Infosys prefer to focus on those stakeholder groups that contribute the most to their own productivity and success, that is, shareholders and customers in the case of Reliance and employees in the case of Infosys. For Amul and SEWA, those stakeholder groups whose protection was the prime inspiration behind the creation of these organizations, are the focus of attention: small milk producers for Amul and unemployed rural women for SEWA. It should be noted that members of the hierarchical as well as the egalitarian forms of social accountability focus on underprivileged sections of the society but for different reasons: while the high-classification characteristic of the hierarchical form of social accountability (e.g., Tata) dictates that as a more powerful stakeholder its members should assume responsibility for the well-being of weaker groups, members of the egalitarian form of social accountability (e.g., SEWA) focus on the uplift of lesser privileged groups because they believe that everyone should have an equal opportunity to live a life of dignity.

The next point of comparison between the different dominant forms of social accountability is the preference that organizational members display toward voluntary CS reporting guidelines. While Tata reports its CS activities in accordance with the UNGC, GRI, and SA 8000 guidelines, Bajaj and Reliance present their CS report informally on their web sites. Infosys chooses to communicate its CS activities through a formal CS report structured according to GRI reporting guidelines. Both examples of the egalitarian form of social accountability, that is, Amul and SEWA, do not report their CS activities. This absence of reporting is despite the fact, or perhaps due to the fact, that in both these organizations, CS is at the core of their existence. Our observation is consistent with findings of other researchers (O’Dwyer, 2007), who report that NGOs while demanding more transparency and accountability from other organizations, make no efforts to do the same themselves. Generally speaking, it can be inferred that issuing formal CS reports structured in accordance to voluntary guidelines is a preference of the hierarchical form of social accountability. Issuing informal reports on company web sites seems to be a competitive trait. As for the egalitarian social accountability, it accords little or no importance at all to CS reports although in this case a lack of CS reports does not by any means suggest a lack of CS activities. Thus organizations’ CS-reporting preferences are embedded in their preference for different forms of social accountability. Table 2 below summarizes these findings:

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Table 2.

Summarizing the Findings From Six Indian Organizations.

Name of organization (sector of activity)	Dominant form(s) of social accountability	Stakeholder groups in decreasing order of priority	Corporate sustainability (CS) initiatives	Corporate sustainability (CS) reporting preferences
Tata Group of Companies (Iron and Steel, Chemicals, Automobiles, etc.)	Hierarchical	Community, employees, underprivileged sections of society	Social well-being of employees, education, anti-AIDS campaigns, urban development	Formal CS report structured according to UNGC, GRI, and SA 8000 guidelines
Bajaj Group of Companies (Automobiles, Home Appliances, etc.)	Hierarchical with traces of competitive	Community, country, underprivileged sections of society	Education, health care, micro-financing, hygiene and sanitation	Informal reports on company web site
Reliance Group of Companies (Polyester, Retail, Oil and Gas, etc.)	Competitive with traces of egalitarian	Shareholders, employees, minority groups	High return to shareholders, cheap and good quality products to customers, education	Corporate governance report presented informally on company website
Infosys Technologies Limited (Technology, Software, etc.)	Competitive toward some stakeholders and hierarchical toward others	Employees, community	Training programs for employees, culture, health care, rural uplift, educational programs	Informal CS reports on web sites till 2006, formal CS report structured according to GRI guidelines since 2007
Amul (Anand Milk Producers Union Limited)	Egalitarian with traces of hierarchical	Small milk producers, distributors	Profit sharing with members, training for distributors	No CS reports, although CS is integral to all its activities
SEWA (Self-Employed Women’s Association)	Egalitarian	Rural unemployed women, children	Profit sharing with members, child care, health care, financing	No CS reports, although CS is integral to all its activities

Implications and Conclusions

This section presents theoretical implications for both transactional culture literature and the broader literature relating national culture to CS reporting practices. Managerial implications are also offered, which include recommendations regarding how managers may secure a buy-in for their CS activities and CS reporting practices from organizational members. The authors conclude the article by offering suggestions for future research.

Conclusions

Through six examples of Indian organizations, the authors of this article show that organizations’ CS practices are embedded in their members’ preferred forms of social accountability, in other words, in their cultures (as defined by Douglas, 1970). Members of different forms of social accountability prioritize different stakeholders for their CS initiatives and also prefer to report (or not) their CS practices differently. It follows that international voluntary CS reporting guidelines will not intuitively appeal to members of all forms of social accountability. Therefore, in light of increasing pressure on organizations to report their CS initiatives in accordance with such reporting guidelines, managers need to know how to identify the dominant form(s) of social accountability in their organizations, the reasons behind their resistance to CS reporting guidelines, and what kind of arguments can be used to secure their eventual collaboration.

The present article makes three contributions to existing literature. First, as explained earlier, there is a scarcity of knowledge on CS practices in developing countries like India (Singh & Joshi, 2009; Swain, 2009). This article addresses this void to some extent. Second, since the present study involves a qualitative exploration of a variety of Indian organizations including for-profit companies, trade unions, and cooperative associations, it addresses calls by recent researchers for more studies on the CS reporting practices of organizations, other than commonly explored large private corporations and large publicly traded corporations (Ball & Grubnic, 2007; O’Dwyer, 2007). This study also meets the need for more qualitative research on the cognitive aspects of how managers respond to the needs, demands, and expectations of their different stakeholders (Laplume, Sonpar, & Litz, 2008). Third, this study is perhaps the first one that uses the transactional culture perspective to make sense of CS activities and CS reporting practices of organizations. By using DCF, the authors reveal the diversity of CS reporting practices within the same nation. Due to this inherent diversity, applying pressure on organizations to report their CS practices through voluntary CS reporting guidelines could actually be counterproductive for CS, unless managers are trained to understand and handle these differences.

Despite its contributions, the present article suffers from some methodological limitations, resulting from excessive reliance on secondary data and purposefully chosen examples. Therefore, more empirical research in the six Indian organizations cited in this article as well as other organizations representing different sectors of activity would be useful. Similar studies should also be carried out in other developing and developed countries. Generating a better understanding of the different forms of social accountability across different kinds of organizations and across different countries would be of use to academics and practitioners alike. By generating a richer and more complete body of knowledge regarding different forms of social accountability, such studies would help managers secure a better buy-in for their CS and CS reporting initiatives, thereby ensuring the success of such efforts.