The primary purpose of this thesis is to provide a better understanding of the motivations that lead companies to engage in CSR reporting practices and to explore how such practices differ among industries within Sweden. Furthermore, the study attempts to explain the phenomena from the perspective of stakeholder theory. To do so, the study adopts a semi-structured qualitative interview with four Swedish companies which are currently reporting CSR performance and four companies which are not reporting CSR performance in four industrial categories. The companies selected in the study were asked to explain what made them decide to issue CSR reports or do not.The results show that the most important motivating factors are increasing shareholder value and reputation management by means of CSR reporting. The motivations in CSR reporting of different industrial sectors in Sweden are found similar to the cases of the previous research except for environmentally-sensitive industry. When companies in this industry decide to start reporting they do so to be perceived as environmentally-responsible to a broad set of stakeholders. In the next step, companies recognize that it can be important to a more narrow range of stakeholders such as institutional investors.When applying a stakeholder strategy matrix, two industry groups − environmentally sensitive industry and corporate governance-issues-sensitive industry show that the practice of CSR reporting is to communicate with traditional stakeholders, specifically, the shareholders, not with multi-stakeholders. This means that motivations for companies to engage in CSR reporting are led by diversified interests of traditional stakeholders rather than diversified types of stakeholders (Freeman, 1984). On the other hand, the supply chain issues-sensitive industry employs CSR reports as a mean of defending potential risks so as to manage the relationship with multi-stakeholders. In an ethical issues-sensitive industry, a more important factor considers incorporating sustainability to be beneficial to business which indicates taking care of traditional stakeholders.

Cette recherche se propose d’étudier, d’un point de vue ethnométhodologique, la manière dont des entreprises de deux pays (le Chili et le Canada) et trois secteurs productifs (Banque, télécommunications et forestier) construisent leur responsabilité sociale à partir de leur discours, c’est à dire à la manière dont elles s’auto-positionnent par rapport à cette question. Sans vouloir généraliser, la comparaison des entreprises canadiennes et chiliennes a pour objectif de savoir dans quelle mesure des entreprises établies dans des pays représentant différents degrés de développement construisent des discours différents ou similaires par rapport à la question de leur responsabilité sociale. Pour tenter de répondre à cette question, nous étudierons ce sujet à travers l’analyse du message ou de la lettre du Président Directeur Général (PDG) présentées sur leurs rapports de responsabilité sociale, ce qui nous permettra de montrer comment les entreprises construisent et s’auto-positionnent, dans leur discours officiel, par rapport à la question de leur responsabilité sociale. En nous basant sur ces analyses, nous discuterons des similitudes et des différences identifiées et nous montrerons ainsi dans quelle mesure la responsabilité sociale est construite sur des références globales plus larges, ou sur des contingences qui émergent du contexte. / This research’s objective is to study, from an ethnomethodological perspective, how firms of two countries (Chile and Canada) and three productive areas (Bank, telecommunications and forestry) construct their social responsibility from their discourse, that is, the way they position themselves in relation to this topic. Even we do not want to generalize, this comparison between Canadian and Chilean firms aims to know to what extent firms established in countries representing different degrees of development construct different or similar discourses in relation with the question of their social responsibility. In order to address this question, we will study this subject by analyzing the CEOs’ messages or letters introducing their social responsibility reports, which will allow us to understand how firms construct and position themselves in relation with the question of their social responsibility. Based on these analyses, we discuss the similarities and differences identified and clarify so to what extent social responsibility is constructed on global references, or on the contingencies that appear from the various contexts in which these discourses are produced.

Cette recherche se propose d’étudier, d’un point de vue ethnométhodologique, la manière dont des entreprises de deux pays (le Chili et le Canada) et trois secteurs productifs (Banque, télécommunications et forestier) construisent leur responsabilité sociale à partir de leur discours, c’est à dire à la manière dont elles s’auto-positionnent par rapport à cette question. Sans vouloir généraliser, la comparaison des entreprises canadiennes et chiliennes a pour objectif de savoir dans quelle mesure des entreprises établies dans des pays représentant différents degrés de développement construisent des discours différents ou similaires par rapport à la question de leur responsabilité sociale. Pour tenter de répondre à cette question, nous étudierons ce sujet à travers l’analyse du message ou de la lettre du Président Directeur Général (PDG) présentées sur leurs rapports de responsabilité sociale, ce qui nous permettra de montrer comment les entreprises construisent et s’auto-positionnent, dans leur discours officiel, par rapport à la question de leur responsabilité sociale. En nous basant sur ces analyses, nous discuterons des similitudes et des différences identifiées et nous montrerons ainsi dans quelle mesure la responsabilité sociale est construite sur des références globales plus larges, ou sur des contingences qui émergent du contexte. / This research’s objective is to study, from an ethnomethodological perspective, how firms of two countries (Chile and Canada) and three productive areas (Bank, telecommunications and forestry) construct their social responsibility from their discourse, that is, the way they position themselves in relation to this topic. Even we do not want to generalize, this comparison between Canadian and Chilean firms aims to know to what extent firms established in countries representing different degrees of development construct different or similar discourses in relation with the question of their social responsibility. In order to address this question, we will study this subject by analyzing the CEOs’ messages or letters introducing their social responsibility reports, which will allow us to understand how firms construct and position themselves in relation with the question of their social responsibility. Based on these analyses, we discuss the similarities and differences identified and clarify so to what extent social responsibility is constructed on global references, or on the contingencies that appear from the various contexts in which these discourses are produced.

The thesis deals with corporate social responsibility (CSR) of Plzeňský Prazdroj, a.s., where first of all I focused on analysing programme Občanská volba with the help London Benchmarking Group and suggested how to cultivate activities with local community. The first chapter of my diploma thesis describes general data about corporate social responsibility and the history of it. In the second chapter, the practical one, is described corporate social responsibility of Plzeňksý Prazdroj in detail. The following chapter deals with programme Občanská volba. In addition of analysis of economic contributions corporate social responsibility I tried to find out the answer on a question if Plzensky Prazdroj fulfils the CSR conception. This is very important for internal users but also for stakeholders.