CSR is NOT dead

The Wall Street Journal stirred up much controversy last week with this article describing the case against corporate social responsibility.

In a nutshell, the author argues that if there is a business case for CSR, then companies will perform those duties naturally as they attempt to maximize financial profits, but any separate CSR strategy is pointless and possibly damaging to their fiduciary duties.

Although thought-provoking, there are some strong arguments to the contrary.

Some well-written responses below. What do you think?

• The best of the bunch is this thorough response from Vault.com's Corporate Responsibility Editor (who previously wrote for the WSJ)
• A thoughtful post from GreenBiz.com that says this is an old and very flawed argument
  
• A passionate response from an sustainability academic who asks how good Enron was for the world
• The President & CEO of BSR weighs in on the topic, calling his argument "incomprehensible"