Top Managers' Value, Organizational Culture And Corporate Social Responsibility Behavior: From The Perspective Of Upper Echelon Theory

As the great achievement has been obtained in the economy since the reform and openness, the problem of corporate social responsibility emerges. The incidences of 2005 Songhua Liver pollution,2007 Sanxi black brickkiln and 2008 Sanlu milk powder have the word. How to push corporate social responsibility has been an important social issue. In this field, the academic research has put the focus on the cause of CSR, which includes economic, institutional and ethic. The economic and institutional causes of CSR are the mainstream opinions. Corporations fulfill CSR considering that they can improve competitive advantages and get economic benefits or react to the institutions. The ethic cause of CSR has been ignored. The factors related with the ethic cause are blurry, and the discussions about the ethic factors on CSR are qualitative, simple and piecemeal. The ethic cause of CSR is especially important for emerging markets and deserves in-depth study. The problems to be further studied are:(1) whether the ethic cause is important in China, (2) the factors related the ethic cause of CSR, and how to affect CSR behavior, (3) the empirical study on the ethic cause of CSR.At the beginning, this study analyses three causes of CSR, and the survey shows that the ethic cause has become an important force for pushing CSR in China. Out of the ethic cause, the possible relationship between the values of top managers and CSR behavior exists. This upper echelon theory is then used to analyze the mechanism of the effect of top managers'value on CSR behavior, that is, how the top managers' value affects their perception of CSR environment and the eventual CSR choice. Meanwhile, the organizational culture is introduced as an organizational bridge between the top managers'value and CSR behavior, acting as an intervening variable. Based on the mechanism analysis, this paper establishes three conceptual models and 15 research hypothesis, and uses 250 samples to test them empirically by the hierarchical regression and structural equation model. Four research conclusions are acquired.(1) The self-transcendence value of top managers has positive effect on corporate social performance (CSP), but the self-enhancement has not significant effect on CSP. The possible reason is that the CSR is taken by top managers as a means to improve their self benefits. For the dimensions of CSP, the above relationships also exist except that the self-enhancement of top managers has significant negative effect on CSP.(2) The organizational culture has significant effect on CSP. Humanistic culture has positive effect on CSP, but competitive culture has negative effect on CSP.(3). The organizational culture has the intervening role between the values of top managers and CSP. But for the explicit relationship between the values of top managers and CSP, the culture has different intervening role. For the relation of the self-transcendence value and CSP or the specific dimension of CSP, and the relation of the self-enhancement value and CSP3 (charity), the organizational culture has partial intervening role. For the relation of the self-enhancement value and CSP1 (commercial) or CSP2 (environmental), the organizational culture has full intervening role.(4) The corporate resource acts as a moderating factor in the effect of the self-transcendence of top managers on CSP. The more the corporate resource is, the more significant the effect of the self-transcendence of top managers on CSP. But the moderation of the corporate resource in the effect of the self-enhancement of top managers on CSP has not been empirically approved because the corporate resource may be not the important moderating factor for them.The new progresses have bee achieved in this study as follow:(1) This research empirically studies CSR behavior from the perspective of the ethic cause, going beyond the mainstreams of the economic cause and institutional cause, and beyond the research paradigm of CSR-CFP or institution-CSR, especially important in the emerging markets. (2) Based on the ethic cause, the top managers'value is thought as important in CSR decision and to be related with CSR behavior, meanwhile the upper echelon theory is used to analyze two paths of the effect of the top managers'value on CSR behavior, which is seldom discussed in the prior literature. (3) The organizational culture is stressed to affect CSR behavior and act as the intervening role between the top managers'value and CSR behavior, which not only set up the organizational bridge between the individual (top managers) and the organizational behavior, but also established a new mechanism of the effect of the top managers' value on firm behaviors.