Business Social Responsibility: Perspectives of Businesses and Social Workers

ABSTRACT

This article compares the attitudes of social workers and business employees regarding the community involvement of businesses and the role of social workers in this involvement. The study, based on a structured questionnaire, was conducted in Israel and consisted of 316 participants from two cohorts: social workers and business employees. The principal findings show that social workers are more inclined than business employees to recommend that social workers increase their involvement in business social responsibility (BSR); business employees are more likely than social workers to advocate that the latter assume managerial functions; both groups support a low level of influence for social workers on decision-making processes and a role of exchange of knowledge rather than full partnership. The discussion addresses the implications of the findings for increasing social workers' involvement in BSR and cooperation with the business sector.     

Unique and Interactive Effects of Empathy and Social Status on Involvement in Bullying

This study investigated the relationships between affective and cognitive empathy, social preference and perceived popularity, and involvement in bullying situations by bullying others or defending the victimized children. The participants were 266 primary and 195 secondary school students. Affective and cognitive empathy, as well as the status variables, had some significant main effects on involvement in bullying. In addition, several interaction effects emerged. For instance, the positive association between affective empathy and defending behavior was stronger among boys who had a high status (i.e., were highly preferred) in the group. The results highlight the importance of studying child-by-environment models, which take into account both child characteristics and interpersonal variables in predicting social adjustment.     

The Nature of Social Responsibility: Exploring Emancipatory Ends

Social responsibility (SR) initiatives within a corporate environment (CSR) continue to be met with deep scepticism. My concern is with exploring this scepticism, which I argue is due to there being more to the underlying objectives of SR than has previously been investigated. I begin by outlining and substantiating my project as a social ontological enquiry, one in which I unpack key concepts to reveal the nature of SR. These ontological findings then underpin my argument that SR is problematically grounded in liberalist thinking, and CSR is in fact just one manifestation of SR. I advance the thesis that SR has emancipatory ends, of meeting human needs and flourishing, and that it is best explicated using feminist care ethics. The argument is then focussed on both shoring up and advancing the emancipatory project of SR. The scepticism of interest is revealed to be the incongruity between care and business; that businesses are deemed as being incompatible with SR, at least in their present capacity. Any claims to the contrary by the business community are branded inauthentic and the aforementioned scepticism ensues. The paper concludes with a brief discussion concerning implications for CSR initiatives and future changes and developments are considered.     

Introduction: 21st-Century Conceptualizations of Empathy: Implications for Social Work Practice and Research

ABSTRACT

The articles in this special section seek to better define empathy, discuss how it can be cultivated, and highlight how empathy can strengthen families and empower adolescents. The authors encourage a greater understanding and application of the concept and offer implications regarding how empathy can create insights that help practitioners develop services and policies and further research efforts that are socially and economically just, sensitive to clients’ needs, and based on the reality of their experiences. The introduction to the section discusses the underlying motivation for the focus on empathy and provides an overview of each of the five articles.     

大众文化、现代传媒与社会责任

借助现代化传媒,当代大众文化及其产品对广大受众精神世界的影响既有积极层面的内容,也存在诸多消极影响。面对大众文化媚俗倾向,学理层面和文化层面的文化批判是必要的,但更重要者还在于,大众文化及其产品经营者、制造者应具备社会责任感和责任意识。在追逐经济效益的同时,意识到文化产品的特殊属性,使大众文化及其产品凸显更多的文化价值意义。     

Bullying Involvement and Empathy: Child and Target Characteristics

This study investigated how the bullying involvement of a child and a target peer are related to empathy. The role of gender was also considered. We hypothesized that empathy primarily varies depending on the bullying role of the target peer. Participants were 264 7–12‐year‐old children (M_age = 10.02, SD = 1.00; 50% girls) from 33 classrooms who had been selected based on their bullying involvement (bully, victim, bully/victim, noninvolved) in the classroom. Participants completed a cognitive and affective empathy measure for each selected target classmate. We found no differences in cognitive and affective empathy for all targets combined based on children's own bullying involvement. However, when incorporating the targets’ bullying involvement, bullies, victims, and bully/victims showed less empathy for each other than for noninvolved peers. Noninvolved children did not differentiate between bullies, victims and bully/victims. Girls reported more cognitive and affective empathy for girls than boys, whereas boys did not differentiate between girls and boys. The results indicated that children's empathy for peers depends primarily on the characteristics of the peer, such as the peer's bullying role and gender.     

公民责任：逻辑前提与政治确证

一个健康而有序的公民社会不仅是体现公民价值与权利的民主社会,更应该是倡导公民责任的主体性社会。在伦理思想史上,无论是机械决定论还是意志自由论都没能很好地回答自由与责任的关系,只有马克思主义伦理学揭示了自由与必然的辩证关系,使我们认识到公民责任确立的逻辑前提是公民主体地位的确立,这是一个历史的过程。公民责任的政治确证,是从政治意义上探讨公民为什么可以而且应当负担责任,即公民责任的政治合理性、正当性问题。公民责任实质上表现为公民基于权利作为或不作为的自由以及由此而承担的有利或不利的后果。这种对有利或不利后果的负担,实际上暗含着一种国家或社会对公民的强制,这种强制的正当性,源于国家或社会制度的正义性以及公民对国家政治合法性的认同,二者共同构成了公民责任的基础。     

新闻媒体的社会责任与文化品位

社会责任构成新闻传播活动的基础,提高新闻作品的文化品位是社会责任的题中应有之义。近年来,某些舆论导向出现偏差,使新闻作品呈现泛娱乐化、低俗化的倾向,都是着眼市场占有率、弱化社会责任所致。鉴于此,新闻工作者必须践行社会效益优先的原则,赋予新闻作品以深邃的思想内涵,培养受众健康向上的审美情趣,以促进大众文化品位的提升。     

Understanding Social Inclusion and Its Meaning for Australia

This paper considers the various meanings of ‘social inclusion’ from both sociological and policy viewpoints. It shows how the perspective has been translated into particular policies and approaches to governance. After drawing some lessons from the policy experiences of other countries, it weighs the appropriateness of a ‘social inclusion agenda’ for Australia, a country with a particular history of social exclusion – of prisoners, indigenous people, and immigrants from around the world – and a special emphasis on dignity, respect and equal treatment.     

基于医院社会责任理念的医院价值观重塑

医院社会责任在本质上是医院文化中的价值观念,属于医院的精神文化,并贯穿、体现在医院的制度文化、行为文化和物质文化之中。医院社会责任的提出是对医院文化、医院价值观念的重新塑造和重大创新,并对整个医院文化体系能够产生巨大的促进作用。     

不同心理治疗流派对移情的理解与运用

移情作为一个重要的心理学概念,已经被各个心理治疗流派接纳和运用.精神分析学派对移情进行了全面深入的研究,对其运用达到了登峰造极、炉火纯青的地步;认知行为学派越来越重视潜意识、领悟、早期经历和治疗关系,在实际治疗中已经利用移情来改变来访者的不合理图式,尽管他们更愿意使用行为术语来表达移情;人本主义学派不但重视真实的关系.也开始重视转移过来的移情关系,通过处理移情关系展开治疗,尽管他们并不认为移情比其他技术更重要.可见,移情的理论和技术已经成为各种心理治疗流派的共同工具,发挥了越来越大的作用,它不但促进了心理治疗理论和技术的发展,也促进了心理治疗流派的融合.     

劳工宿舍：企业社会责任还是经济理性——一项基于珠三角企业的调查

与以往仅从政治权利视角研究劳工居住不同,本文以珠三角企业调查资料为基础,从全球资本经济逻辑出发,在探究了劳工居住的资本主导型背后的逻辑后认为,企业为劳工提供住宿,是在面对激烈的全球竞争的情况下,对劳工进行生产控制的竞争策略,是企业经济理性的产物。     

政府在社会救助中的责任及其职能的合理定位

社会救助制度是整个社会保障制度的基础子系统,作为社会保障体系中的“最后一道防线”,它通常被视为政府的当然责任或义务。本文通过对我国社会救助制度中政府失责问题的剖析,探讨了政府在社会救助制度中应承担的责任及其职能的合理定位。     

物流企业中企业社会责任行为对品牌绩效的影响

以物流企业为行业背景进行问卷调查,采用结构方程建模的方法探讨企业社会责任对品牌绩效的作用机制。实证分析结果表明:企业社会责任对品牌美誉度有直接的作用,对品牌忠诚度有无直接作用,但可以通过品牌信任作为中介变量对品牌美誉度和忠诚度有间接作用。物流企业承担社会责任时,当顾客、客户、消费者感知到物流企业积极进行企业社会责任行为时,就会提高他们对企业及品牌的评价、产生品牌认同感,最终提高企业品牌绩效水平。     

追求公共善：当代西方对公民责任的研究

公民责任是指公民履行与其公民身份相适应的、符合社会公共善的义务以及对行为后果的承担。当代西方公民责任研究的兴起有历史和现实两方面的原因。历史地看,西方公民理论家无论主张积极的还是消极的公民资格都承认良好的公民素质对于民主制度的建立、稳定和发展是必不可少的,因此都对公民责任持肯定态度。现实原因则既是政治话语自然递进的结果、是民主实践发展的需要也是对过度强调的权利的修正。当代西方对公民责任的研究主要从四方面展开:其一,公民责任是公民维护民主政治的义务;其二,公民责任被视为公民美德的体现;其三,公民的核心责任是政治参与;培养公民责任具有多种途径等等。     

Children's Anger, Emotional Expressiveness, and Empathy: Relations with Parents' Empathy, Emotional Expressiveness, and Parenting Practices

In Roberts and Strayer (1996 ) we described how emotional factors were strongly related to children's empathy, which in turn strongly predicted prosocial behavior. This paper focuses on how these child emotional factors, assessed across methods and sources, related to parental factors (empathy, emotional expressiveness, encouragement of children's emotional expressiveness, warmth and control) for a subset of 50 two‐parent families from our earlier sample. Parents reported on their emotional characteristics and parenting; children (5 to 13 years old; 42% girls) also described parenting practices. Children's age and parenting factors accounted for an average of 32% of the variance in child emotional factors, which, with role‐taking, strongly predicted children's empathy. In contrast to earlier, less comprehensive studies, we found important paths between parents’ and children's empathy, mediated by children's anger. These countervailing pathways largely neutralized each other, resulting in the low correlations usually seen when parents’ and children's empathy are examined in isolation. Thus our findings are an important confirmation and extension of the theoretically expected link between parents’ and children's empathy.     

Group Work and Social Justice: Designing Pedagogy for Social Change

In this article the authors explore the gap between education and action in putting the social work core value of social justice into practice. Describing how their School of Social Work has taken up this challenge, the authors analyze how a new social action course helps bridge this gap and draw on student reflection on their experiences and assignments in the course to show how students concretize and interiorize the meaning of social action and social justice. Learning by doing social action through a case study, group work becomes the vehicle through which students act on social issues and work for social change.     

企业社会责任:理论与对策

微观企业、企业的利益相关者和宏观社会,都对企业承担社会责任有所要求。仍有很多企业没有积极的履行社会责任。根本原因就是企业履行社会责任的动力不足。履行社会责任的收益如果不能抵偿投入,不履行社会责任的损失又不足以使企业受到实质性的影响,企业就没有动力去履行社会责任。因此,促进企业履行社会责任,就必须要加强对企业社会责任行为的激励和约束。     

Social Policy for Social Work: A Teaching Agenda

Though social justice is a central goal of the social work profession,the actual involvement of social workers in social change isvery limited. Moreover, training in social policy and policypractice in schools of social work is minimal. As such, practitionerslack the tools needed to analyse existing social problems andpolicies and to enable them to intervene in the policy processin order to better serve the needs of service users. This articleseeks to further social policy teaching within social work educationby engaging in a survey of the existing literature on the subjectand by offering a detailed programme for integrating this subjectinto the social work training system. The literature surveythat serves as a basis for this programme includes a reviewof studies on the dilemmas linked to social policy teaching,on the goals and content of social policy courses in socialwork and on preferred teaching methods in this field.     

Citizenship Consciousness,Nonbounded Solidarity,and Social Justice

This article analyzes the concepts of bounded and nonbounded solidarity. It first reviews some fundamental propositions from the sociological literature and then looks at Amnesty International's conception of solidarity. A third part discusses solidarity as it applies to social work with groups. The conclusion raises five questions social workers need to address to make social justice a standard part of social group work theory and practice.