Social Responsibility of Corporations in 21st Century Capitalist Societies (Essay Sample)

Social Responsibility of Corporations in 21st Century Capitalist Societies Student Name Institutional Affiliation Student course Instructor name Date Social Responsibility of Corporations in 21st Century Capitalist Societies Introduction Corporations in the 21st-century capital society must strive to balance generating profits and being socially responsible. In this respect, while corporations try to maximize their profits, an inevitable conflict between financial goals and urgent social issues regarding poverty, diversity, and poor treatment of labour becomes precipitated. This essay critically explores corporations' social responsibility by examining the social causes of poverty and the factors that perpetuate it. It also explains why poverty is always blamed on personal failures and not realized as a systemic problem. Based on reading the Social Problems textbook and other scholarly articles, this essay will show where corporate social responsibility intersects with societal perceptions about poverty. Social Causes of Poverty Most generally, the causes of poverty reside in systemic causes at the social level rather than in individual choice and personal character. Two prominent social causes include economic inequality and lack of adequate access to education. Economic inequality refers to the unequal distribution of wealth or resources within a given society. This inequality creates a gap between the rich and the poor, making it hard for those at the bottom end to access opportunities that can help improve their circumstances. The Social Problems textbook noted that Economic inequality is one of the leading causes of poverty because it leads to an inability of individuals and families to obtain financial security (Saylor Foundation, 2015). The over-concentration of wealth in the hands of a few makes many barely survive on basic needs, perpetuating a cycle of poverty. Another significant cause of poverty is a lack of access to education. Education relates to social mobility by offering an individual relevant, adequate skills and knowledge that are useful to help the person reach a well-paying job. However, due to funding disparities, geographic locations, or systemic discrimination, quality education may become limited in many communities. That means a person from a low-income family is also often caught up in a low-wage job for most of their life. This inaccessibility to education brings about a vicious poverty cycle, and education often serves as a path out of poverty, but without equity, too many remain stuck in an impoverished class (Saylor Foundation, 2015) Perpetuation of an Impoverished Class The social causes of poverty involve factors like economic inequality and lack of access to education, which ensure the maintenance of a class of citizens that would otherwise be considered unprivileged. Economic inequality creates an imbalance wherein the rich can exert power to make policies and practices that would otherwise defend their interests, mainly at the expense of the poor. This influence can take several forms, from tax policies to labour laws and other regulations that advantage the rich or punish the poor. The rich, of course, disproportionately get wealthier, while the poor cannot escape their condition. As the Social Problems book put it, the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few leads to policies that perpetuate poverty for the many (Saylor Foundation, 2015) Inadequate access to education entrenches poverty by limiting capabilities that enable people to improve their socioeconomic status. Without quality education, there needs to be more development of skills and knowledge to compete in the job market, mainly manifested through low-wage employment with income levels that cannot break from poverty. Consequently, large groups of people can become stuck in a poverty generation cycle where each successive generation experiences all the same issues of the generation that preceded it. This is shown clearly in the book Social Problems, which points out that education is a critical factor in breaking the cycle of poverty, but without equal access, the impoverished class continues to grow. Misattribution of Poverty to Personal Failings Even though poverty is systemic in nature, it often gets blamed on failures of personality and character and poor decision-making on the part of the individual. This occurs for several reasons. First, cultural beliefs and societal norms emphasize individual responsibility and self-reliance. Success in a capitalistic society is viewed as hard work and determination, while failure is brought upon an individual by laziness or lack of effort. Along with this belief system comes the assumption that poverty can be traced back to poor life choices or lack of ambition rather than systemic problems. The media and popular culture tend to present imagery of poverty in ways that substantiate these stereotypes. News stories and TV shows often represent the poor as irresponsible or even morally lacking, which helps cement the idea that poverty is a personal failure. These portrayals completely deny the systemic elements involved in the creation of poverty conditions and, instead, focus on individual behaviours. Because of that, many blame poverty on the individual who makes wrong decisions rather than understanding it as an outcome of social and economic structures. For example, In the U.S., laws and regulations are crafted in a political system where some businesses expend vast sums of money to ensure that the rules favour them and in multiple countries (Fox, 2014). Third, there is a psychic tendency called blame-the-victim thinking whereby people attribute poverty to the failure of individuals to create distance between themselves and the possibility of poverty. That poverty must be caused by personal failings increases one's sense of control over one's life and decreases the likelihood of the realization that one, too, could become poor. This psychic tendency has been bolstered by the "just-world" hypothesis, where it is assumed that people get what they deserve. As Milton Friedman so famously argued, "There is one and only one social responsibility of business to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits " (Friedman, 1970), thus insinuating people are supposed to take responsibility for their success or failure. Factors Blinding Us to the Social Reality of Poverty Several factors explain society's blinders about the social reality of poverty. First of all, the dominance of meritocratic ideals assures people that anyone can get ahead as long as they work hard enough. Thus, the presupposition from the start is that poor people did not work hard enough or make proper choices. Yet, this appeal of individualistic explanations obscures the structural hindrance to economic success and financial security for most people. Other important reasons relate to the emphasis on individualism in capitalist societies. The essence of personal achievement and self-reliance shifts the various emphasis down from the social structures to your personal responsibility. This emphasis on individualism discourages collective action to solve social problems; instead, most people would always focus on viewing personal problems, such as poverty, rather than societal issues. (Denning, 2013). Finally, the stigma associated with being poor leads them to deny its natural causes. Because shame and embarrassment are standard features of poverty, people hide their daily struggle well out of sight, which, by its very nature, makes it much less visible to any other person. This invisibility, mixed with 'blame-the-victim' thought processes, perpetuates a myth that this is a problem of personal failure. (Friedman, 2013). Common Beliefs and Assumptions Hiding the Social Reality of Poverty These shared beliefs and assum...