From Corporate To Shared Social Responsibility: Community Governance and Social Capital Creation Through Collaboration.

Traditional approaches on corporate social responsibility (CSR) are concerned with the definition of a model that identifies the mechanisms through which the adoption of tools and practices of social responsibility by a company translates into better economic and financial performances. Such approaches emphasize possible medium / long term advantages that a company can obtain introducing instruments of corporate social responsibility. Despite the increasing number of initiatives undertaken by companies in order to meet the needs of one or more individuals in the community, the core issue about overall benefits that society as a whole would gains from such initiatives still remains background. As extended as is, the number of stakeholders taken into account by the individual company never comes fully to cover persons who in a territory, regardless of their interest towards the company, have a need and are not able to satisfy it. By adopting the traditional approach to the analysis of corporate social responsibility, is likely to enhance the positive consequences for companies, when those consequences are there, and neglecting if those consequences are beneficial for the community entirely. In the paper perspective, it appears to be more interesting to analyze the concept of corporate social responsibility by expanding its boundaries. It assumes the social capital of a territory as the most important content of corporate social responsibility and of the social responsibility of all other actors playing in the same territory. Thus, processes by which economic actors produce and use through their activities the social capital present in their community become the real focus. The expanded concept of corporate social responsibility in terms of contents suggest to extend also the denotation reflecting about categories of subjects to which the concept refers. In this sense, the paper aims to consider social responsibility as an important element not only with reference to companies, with their production activities, but also to other categories of institutions, such as public administrations and no profit organizations. In this expanded perspective, the diffusion of a socially responsible approach becomes relevant when it involves all actors operating in a territory basing upon the sharing of visions, values and goals about sustainable development and social inclusion. Furthermore it appears to be appropriate to talk about social responsibility only when this responsibility results shared in a context of mutual commitment. Because of this principle, the paper aims to identify a set of hypothesis about mechanisms that support the definition and development of Social Shared Responsibility initiatives.