In the January 2020 Academy of Management Review, associate editors Wang, Gibson, and Zander (hereafter WGZ) posed this question: “Is research on corporate social responsibility undertheorized?” They answered affirmatively, pointing to the field’s initial practice orientation and arguing a subsequent lack of “theoretical foundation and coherence” sufficient “to inform practice.” We disagree with WGZ on key points concerning the corporate social responsibility (CSR) field. We argue that the field is “essentially contested,” not undertheorized. We suggest that the case of CSR raises the larger question of how contesting conceptual interpretations of the literature are created, sustained, and, potentially, reconciled. We characterize and discuss the essentially contesting views of CSR as “instrumental/economic CSR” and “injunctive/social CSR.” We believe this characterization and discussion clarifies what exactly is contesting between these views. We note how these contesting views of CSR are generated from differing assumptions and worldviews. We discuss the factors operating in academic fields that tend to support the persistence and defense of such differences in conceptual interpretation. Finally, we offer our approach as a model for scholars to think about other concepts in management science that are also “essentially contested.”

中文翻译：

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CSR：理论不足或本质上有争议？

在 2020 年 1 月的《管理学院评论》中，副主编 Wang、Gibson 和 Zander（以下简称 WGZ）提出了这个问题：“企业社会责任研究是否理论不足？” 他们给出了肯定的回答，指出该领域最初的实践方向，并认为随后缺乏足以“为实践提供信息”的“理论基础和连贯性”。我们不同意 WGZ 关于企业社会责任 (CSR) 领域的关键点。我们认为该领域“基本上是有争议的”，而不是理论不足。我们认为，企业社会责任的案例提出了一个更大的问题，即如何创造、维持和潜在地协调对文献的有争议的概念解释。我们将企业社会责任的本质上有争议的观点描述为“工具/经济企业社会责任”和“禁令/社会企业社会责任”。“我们相信这种描述和讨论澄清了这些观点之间究竟存在什么争议。我们注意到这些对企业社会责任的有争议的观点是如何从不同的假设和世界观中产生的。我们讨论了在学术领域中运作的因素，这些因素往往支持在概念解释中坚持和捍卫这种差异。最后，我们将我们的方法作为一种模型，供学者们思考管理科学中“本质上存在争议”的其他概念。