Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T19:13:15.133Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Gendering CSR in the Arab Middle East: An Institutional Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Charlotte M. Karam  and
Dima Jamali
Charlotte M. Karam
Affiliation:
American University of Beirut
Dima Jamali
Affiliation:
American University of Beirut
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

This paper explores how corporations, through their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities, can help to effect positive developmental change. We use research on institutional change, deinstitutionalization, and institutional work to develop our central theoretical framework. This framework allows us to suggest more explicitly how CSR can potentially be mobilized as a purposive form of institutional work aimed at disrupting existing institutions in favor of positive change. We take the gender institution in the Arab Middle East as a case in point. Our suggestion is that the current context of the Arab Spring, which combined with increasingly obvious endogenous institutional contradictions, has created a fertile ground for shaping change processes within the gender institution. Finally, we provide concrete examples of CSR initiatives that regional corporate actors can engage in for positive developmental change supporting women.

Keywords

institutional changedeinstitutionalizationinstitutional workgender institutioncorporate social responsibility (CSR)Arab springArab Middle East
Type
Articles
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , January 2013 , pp. 31 - 68
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Abu-Lughod, L. 2005. On and off camera in Egyptian soap operas. In Fereshteh Nouraie-Simone (Ed.), On shifting ground: Muslim women in the global era: 17–35. New York: Feminist Press.Google Scholar
Abu Sahleya, S. 2000. The need to unify personal status laws in Arab countries. Dossier 22. Retrieved July 2, 2012, fromhttp://www.wluml.org/node/338.Google Scholar
Adler, N.J. 2008. Global business as an agent of world benefit: New international business perspectives leading positive change. In Scherer, Andreas Georg and Palazzo, Guido (Eds.), Handbook of research on global corporate citizenship: 374–401. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Adler, P.S. Forbes, L.C. & Willmott, H. 2007. Critical management studies. The Academy of Management Annals, 1: 119–79. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/078559808.Google Scholar
Ahmad, S.Z. 2011. Evidence of the characteristics of women entrepreneurs in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: An empirical investigation. International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship, 3(2): 123–43. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/17566261111140206.Google Scholar
Ahmed, D. al-Mughni, H. al-Talei, R. Breslin, J. Jones, T. Doumato, E. & Kirdar, S. 2009. Women’s Rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Progress Amid Resistance. New York: Freedom House. Retrieved fromhttp://freedomhousedev.forumone.com/report/women039s-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa/womens-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa-2010.Google Scholar
Alinsky, S.D. 1971. Rules for radicals. New York: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
AlTamimi, J. 2012. Green light to Saudi women’s participation in Olympics. Gulf News. Retrieved July 2012 from http://gulfnews.com/sport/other-sports/green-light-to-saudi-women-s-participation-in-olympics-1.1040529.Google Scholar
Alturki, N. & Baswell, R. 2010. Businesswomen in Saudi Arabia: Characteristics, challenges and a aspirations in a regional context. Report prepared by the Khadijah Bint Khuwailid Businesswomen Center.Google Scholar
Arab Human Development Reports, United Nations Development Programme. 2009. Arab Human Development Report 2009: Challenges to Human Security in the Arab Countries. Retrieved May 2012 from http://www.arab-hdr.org/.Google Scholar
Armbruster, R. 1995. Cross-national labor organizing strategies. Critical Sociology, 21: 75–89. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/089692059502100208.Google Scholar
Aubert, J. & Reiffers, J. (Eds.). 2003. Knowledge economies in the Middle East and North Africa: Toward new development strategies. Washington,DC:: World Bank.Google Scholar
Barkemeyer, R. 2009. Beyond compliance-below expectations? Cross-border CSR, development and the UN Global Compact. Business Ethics: A European Review, 18(3): 273–89. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8608.2009.01563.x.Google Scholar
Barnett, J. 2007. Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? An institutional theory of corporate social responsibility. Academy of Management Review, 32(3): 946–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2007.25275684.Google Scholar
Battilana, J. Leca, B. & Boxenbaum, E. 2009. How actors change institutions: Toward a theory of institutional entrepreneurship. Academy of Management Annals, 3: 65–107. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/19416520903053598.Google Scholar
Benantar, A. 2011. Arab democratic uprisings: Domestic, regional and global implications. New Global Studies, 5(1): 1–7. http://dx.doi.org/10.2202/1940-0004.1138.Google Scholar
Benson, J.K. 1977. Organizations: A dialectic view. Administrative Science Quarterly, 22: 1–21. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/2391741.Google Scholar
Bies, R. Bartunek, J. Fort, T. & Zald, M. 2007. Corporations as social change agents: Individual, interpersonal, institutional and environmental dynamics. Academy of Management Review, 32(3): 788–93. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2007.25275515.Google Scholar
Björkman, I. & Lu, I. 2000. Institutionalization and bargaining power explanations of HRM practices in international joint ventures. Organization Studies, 22(3): 491–512. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0170840601223005.Google Scholar
Boswell, T. & Stevis, D. 1997. Globalization and international labor organizing: A World-system perspective. Work and Occupations, 24(3): 288–308. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0730888497024003003.Google Scholar
Coleman, G. 2002. Gender, power and poststructuralism in corporate citizenship: A personal perspective on theory and change. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 1(5): 17–25.Google Scholar
Dacin, M.T. Goodstein, J. & Scott, W.R. 2002. Institutional theory and institutional change: Introduction to the special research forum. Academy of Management Journal, 45(1): 45–57. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMJ.2002.6283388.Google Scholar
Daily Star. 2011. (November 30).UAE gives women right to pass nationality to children. Retrieved July 6, 2012, fromhttp://www.dailystar.com.lb/news/middle-east/2011/nov-30/155637-uae-gives-women-right-to-pass-nationality-to-children.ashx.Google Scholar
de Soto, H. 2011. The free market secret of the Arab revolutions. The Financial Times (November 8).Google Scholar
DiMaggio, P.J. 1988. Interest and agency in institutional theory. In Zucker, L.G. (Ed.), Institutional patterns and organizations: 3–21. Cambridge,MA: Ballinger.Google Scholar
Donaldson, T. 2003. Editor’s comments: Taking ethics seriously–A mission now more possible. Academy of Management Review, 20: 65–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.1995.9503271992.Google Scholar
Doumato, E.A. 2009. Saudi Arabia.In Kelly, S. and Breslin, J. (Eds.), Women’s rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Gulf edition. New York: Freedom House. Retrieved fromhttp://freedomhousedev.forumone.com/event/womens-rights-arab-gulf.Google Scholar
Dubai Women Establishment & PricewaterhouseCoopers. 2009. Arab Women Leadership Outlook 2009-2011 Report, 1st edition.Google Scholar
Economic Intelligence Unit. 2010. (June). Women’s economic opportunity. Retrieved fromhttp://gbaforwomen.wordpress.com/2012/03/10/economist-intelligence-unit-2012-womens-economic-opportunity-index-assessing-progress/.Google Scholar
Eshraghi, I. 2011. Saudi women: Driven to success. The National (10 June).RetrievedJune 10, 2012, fromhttp://www.thenational.ae/news/world/saudi-women-driven-to-succeed.Google Scholar
Fligstein, N. 1997. Social skill and institutional theory. American Behavioral Scientist, 40: 397–405. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0002764297040004003.Google Scholar
Frenkel, M. 2008. The multinational corporation as a third space: Rethinking international management discourse on knowledge transfer through Homi Bhabha. Academy of Management Review, 33(4): 924–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2008.34422002.Google Scholar
Friedland, R. & Alford, R.R. 1991. Bringing society back in: Symbols, practices, and institutional contradictions. In Powell, W.W. & DiMaggio, P.J. (Eds.), The new in-stitutionalism in organizational analysis. 232–66. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Gardberg, N.A. & Fombrun, C.J. 2006. Corporate citizenship: Creating intangible assets across institutional environments. Academy of Management Review, 31(2): 329–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2006.20208684.Google Scholar
Graham-Brown, S. 1981. Feminism in Egypt: A conversation with Nawal Sadaawi. MERIP Report, 95, 1981, pp.24–27.Google Scholar
Greenfield, W.M. 2004. In the name of corporate social responsibility. Business Horizons, 47(1): 19–28. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2003.11.004.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. & Hinings, C.R. 1996. Understanding radical organizational change: Bringing together the old and the new institutionalism. Academy of Management Review, 21: 1022–54.Google Scholar
Greenwood, R. Suddaby, R. & Hinings, C.R. 2002. Theorizing change: The role of professional associations in the transformation of institutionalized fields. Academy of Management Journal, 45(1): 58–80. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3069285.Google Scholar
Grosser, K. & Moon, J. 2005. Gender mainstreaming and corporate social responsibility: Reporting workplace issues. Journal of Business Ethics, 62(4): 327–40. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-005-5334-3.Google Scholar
Hassan, K. 2012. Making sense of the Arab Spring: Listening to the voices of Middle Eastern activists. Development, 55(2): 232–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/dev.2012.13.Google Scholar
Hausmann, R. Tyson, L.D. & Zahidi, S. 2011. The global gender gap report 2010. Geneva: World Economic Forum. Retrieved March 1, 2012, fromhttp://www.uis.unesco.org/Library/Documents/global-gender-gap-report-education-2011-en.pdf.Google Scholar
Hitchcock, Peter. 1993. Dialogics of the oppressed. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Human Rights Watch. 2012. World report 2012: Saudi Arabia. Retrieved July 2012 fromhttp://www.hrw.org/world-report-2012/world-report-2012-saudi-arabia.Google Scholar
Inglehart, R. & Norris, P. 2003. Rising tide: Gender equality and cultural change around the world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
International Labor Organization. 2012. Women in business and management in the Middle East and North Africa: Regional Briefing Note. ILO Employers Bureau Workshop, Beirut, 15–17. May 2012.Google Scholar
International Olympic Committee. 2011. Olympic charter. Retrieved fromhttp://www.olympic.org/Documents/olympic_charter_en.pdf.Google Scholar
Jack, G.A. Calás, M.B. Nkomo, S.M. & Peltonen, T. 2008. Critique and international management: An uneasy relationship? Introduction to special topic forum on international management: Critique and renewal. Academy of Management Review, 33(4): 870–84. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2008.34421991.Google Scholar
Jamali, D. 2010. The CSR of MNC subsidiaries in developing countries: Global, local, substantive or diluted. Journal of Business Ethics, 93(2): 181–200. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-010-0560-8.Google Scholar
Jamali, D. & Mirshak, R. 2010. Business-conflict linkages: Revisiting MNCs, CSR and conflict. Journal of Business Ethics, 93(3): 443–64. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-009-0232-8.Google Scholar
Jamali, D. & Neville, B. 2011. Convergence vs divergence in CSR in developing countries: An embedded multi-layered institutional lens. Journal of Business Ethics, 102: 599–621. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-0830-0.Google Scholar
Johnstone, S. & Mazo, J. 2011. Global warming and the Arab Spring. Survival, 53: 11–17. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00396338.2011.571006.Google Scholar
Kabeer, N. 2005. Gender equality and women’s empowerment: A critical analysis of the third millennium development goal. Gender and Development, 13(1): 13–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13552070512331332273.Google Scholar
Keddie, N.R. 2007. Women in the Middle East: Past and present. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Kelly, S. 2009. Recent gains and new opportunities for women’s rights in the Gulf Arab states. In Women’s rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Gulf Edition. New York: Freedom House.Google Scholar
Kinley, D. & Nolan, J. 2008. Human rights, corporations and the global economy: An international law perspective. In Andreas Georg Scherer and Guido Palazzo. (Eds.), Handbook of Research on Global Corporate Citizenship: 343–73. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Kirdar, S. 2009. United Arab Emirates. In Kelly, S. and Breslin, J. (Eds.), Women’s Rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Progress Amid Resistance: New York: Freedom House. Retrieved fromhttp://freedomhousedev.forumone.com/report/women039s-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa/ womens-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa-2010.Google Scholar
Koerber, C.B. & Fort, T.L. (Eds.). 2008. Corporate citizenship and global conflicts: The baboon moment. In Andreas Georg Scherer & Guido Palazzo. (Eds.), Handbook of research on global corporate citizenship: 208. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Kurzman, C. 1999. Liberal Islam: Prospects and challenges. Middle East Review of International Affairs, 3(3): 11–19.Google Scholar
Landes, D.S. & Landes, R.A. 2001. Girl power: Do fundamentalists fear our women? New Republic, 8: 20–23.Google Scholar
Lawrence, T.B. & Suddaby, R. 2006. Institutions and institutional work. In Clegg, S. Hardy, C. Lawrence, T.B. & Nord, W.R. (Eds.), The Sage handbook of organization studies, 2nd ed.: 215–54. London: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Lopes de Souza, M. & Lipietz, L. 2011. The Arab spring and the city. City, 15(6: 618–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13604813.2011.632900.Google Scholar
Margolis, J.D. and Walsh, J.P. 2003. Misery loves companies: Rethinking social initiatives by business. Administrative Science Quarterly, 48: 268–305. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3556659.Google Scholar
Melucci, A. 1989. Nomads of the present: Social movements and individual needs in contemporary society. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.Google Scholar
Mernissi, F. 1991. The veil and the male elite: A feminist interpretation of women’s rights in Islam, 1st ed. Boston: Addison Wesley Longman Publishing Co.Google Scholar
Metcalfe, B.D. 2007. Gender and HRM in the Middle East. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 18(1): 54–74. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09585190601068292.Google Scholar
Metcalfe, B.D. 2008. Women, management, and globalization in the Middle East. Journal of Business Ethics, 83(1): 85–100. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-007-9654-3.Google Scholar
Moghadam, V.M. 2002. Islamic feminism and its discontents: toward a resolution of the debate. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 27(4): 1135–71. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/339639.Google Scholar
Moghadam, V.M. 2003. Modernizing women: Gender and social change in the Middle East, 2nd ed. Boulder, CO:: Lynne Rienner Publishers.Google Scholar
Moghadam, V.M. 2005. Globalizing women: Transnational feminist networks, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Nachum, L. 2010. When is foreignness an asset or a liability? Explaining the performance differential between foreign and local firms, Journal of Management, 36(3): 714–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0149206309338522.Google Scholar
North, D. 1998. Five propositions about institutional change. In Knight, J. & Sened, I. (Eds.), Explaining institutional change: 15–26. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Oliver, C. 1992. The antecedents of deinstitutionalization. Organization Studies, 13: 563–88. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/017084069201300403.Google Scholar
omair, K. 2008. Women in management in the Arab context. Education, Business and Society: Contemporary Middle Eastern Issues, 1(2): 107–23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/17537980810890293.Google Scholar
Ottaway, M. & Hamzawy, A. 2011. Protest movements and political change in the Arab world: Policy Outlook Paper: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.Google Scholar
Perrow, C. 1979. Complex organizations: A critical essay, 2nd ed. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Pettit, P. 2005. Responsibility Incorporated. Paper presented at the Kadish Center for Morality, Law and Public Affairs, Workshop in Law, Philosophy and Political Theory.Google Scholar
Porter, M.E. and Kramer, M.R. 2011. Creating shared value: How to reinvent capitalism and unleash a wave of innovation and growth. Harvard Business Review. 89 (1/2): 62–77.Google Scholar
Pratkanis, A.R. & Turner, M.E. 1996. Persuasion and democracy: Strategies for increasing deliberative participation and enacting social change. Journal of Social Issues, 52(1): 187–205. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1996.tb01369.x.Google Scholar
Premsingh, M. 2011. Unrest economies: Analyzing the Arab Spring and its implications for India (Working Paper) Retrieved February 10, 2012, fromwww.orbiseconomics.com.Google Scholar
Prieto-Carrón, M. 2006. Corporate Social Responsibility in Latin America: Chiquita, women banana workers and structural inequalities. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 21 85–94.Google Scholar
Rivoli, P. & Waddock, S. 2011. “First, they ignore you…”:The time-context dynamic and corporate responsibility. California Management Review, 53(2): 87–104. http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/cmr.2011.53.2.87.Google Scholar
Scott, W.R. 2001. Institutions and organizations, 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks,CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Scott, W.R. 2008. Institutions and organizations, 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Seo, M.G. and Creed, W.E.D. 2002. Institutional contradictions, praxis, and institutional change: A dialectical perspective. Academy of Management Review, 2: 222–47.Google Scholar
Shmulevitz, S. 2011. The Saudi Women2Drivecampaign:JustanotherprotestintheArabspring?. Tel Aviv Notes, 5(14) (July 26). Retrieved fromhttp://www.tau.ac.il/dayancenter/pdfim/TA_Notes_SHMULUVITZ_Women2Drive_072611.pdf.Google Scholar
Sidani, Y. 2005. Women, work, and Islam in Arab societies. Women in Management Review, 20(7): 498–512. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/09649420510624738.Google Scholar
Skalli, L.H. 2006. Communicating gender in the public sphere: Women and information technologies in the MENA. Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, 2(2): 35–59.Google Scholar
Springborg, R. 2011. The precarious economics of the Arab springs. Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, 53(6): 85–104.Google Scholar
Suchman, M.C. 1955. Managing legitimacy: Strategic and institutional approaches. Academy of Management Journal, 20(3): 571–610.Google Scholar
Tadros, M. 2010. Egypt In Kelly, S. and Breslin, J. (Eds.), Women’s Rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Progress Amid Resistance. New York: Freedom House. Retrieved fromhttp://freedomhousedev.forumone.com/report/women039s-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa/womens-rights-middle-east-and-north-africa-2010.Google Scholar
Thornton, P.H. & Ocasio, W. 1999. Institutional logics and the historical contingency of power in organizations: Executive succession in the higher education publishing industry, 1958-1990. American Journal of Sociology, 105(3): 801–43. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/210361.Google Scholar
Thornton, P.H. & Ocasio, W. 2008. Institutional Logics. In Royston Greenwood, Christine Oliver, Kerstin Sahlin, and Roy Suddaby (Eds.), Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
UAE Interact. 2012 (March 8). UAE women have made qualitative leap in rights and empowerment: Sheikha Fatima. Retrieved July 2012 fromhttp://www.uaeinteract.com/docs/UAE_women_have_made_qualitative_leap_in_rights_and_empowerment_Sheikha_Fatima_/48575.htm.Google Scholar
United Nations Development Programme(UNDP). 2010. Millennium Development Goals: Basic Facts. http://www.undp.org/mdg/basics.shtml.Google Scholar
United Nations Development Programme(UNDP). 2011. Human Development Report 2011: Sustainability and Equity: A Better Future for All. Hampshire, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
United Nations and the League of Arab States. 2010. The third Arab report on the Millennium Development Goals 2010 and the impact of the global crises. http://arabstates.undp.org/subpage.php?spid=20.Google Scholar
Weaver, G.R. & Misangyi, V.F. 2008. Corporations as citizens against corruption: An institutional entrepreneurship perspective. In Andreas Georg Scherer and Guido Palazzo (Eds.), Handbook of Research on Global Corporate Citizenship: 185. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Westwood, G.J. 2007. Manifesto for a post-colonial international business and management studies: A provocation. Critical Perspectives on International Business, 3(3): 246–65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/17422040710775021.Google Scholar
Whiteoak, J.W. Crawford, N.G. & Mapstone, R.H. 2006. Impact of gender and generational differences in work values and attitudes in an Arab culture. Thunderbird International Business Review, 48(1): 77–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/tie.20086.Google Scholar
Wicks, D. 2001. Institutionalization mindsets of invulnerability: Differentiated institutional fields and the antecedents of organizational crises. Organization Studies, 22(4): 659–92. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0170840601224005.Google Scholar
Williams, J. 2011. Arab oil money: Empowering women. INSEAD Knowledge. Retrieved fromhttp://knowledge.insead.edu/INSEAD-knowledge-empowering-arab-women-111024.cfm.Google Scholar
World Economic Forum. 2011. The global gender gap report 2010. Geneva: World Economic Forum. Retrieved March 1, 2012, fromhttp://www.uis.unesco.org/Library/Documents/global-gender-gap-report-education-2011-en.pdf.Google Scholar
Zaheer, S. 1995. Overcoming liability of foreignness. Academy of Management Journal, 38(2): 341–63. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/256683.Google Scholar
Zietsma, C. & Lawrence, T.B. 2010. Institutional work in the transformation of an organizational field: The interplay of boundary work and practice work. Administrative Science Quarterly, 55: 189–221. http://dx.doi.org/10.2189/asqu.2010.55.2.189.Google Scholar
Zucker, L.G. 1987. Institutional theories of organizations. Annual Review of Sociology, 13: 443–64. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.so.13.080187.002303.Google Scholar