The influence of gender on corporate social responsability in social economy enterprises

Abstract

The Social Economy Enterprises (SEE) operation, based on values such as democracy, equality, equity, solidarity and, consequently, opposed to all forms of discrimination, might be expected to guarantee the gender equality in all their areas, especially on the decisionmaking position. However, as it is frequently happening in the most of the business, the participation of men and women in decision-making is not equal in the SEE. These organizations are sensible to the effects of vertical segregation, according to several explanatory theories. Nonetheless, the female management style is quite different to their male colleagues, although the corporate culture and gender stereotypes difficult their effective differentiation.

On the other hand, society demands more and more social and environmental commitments to the companies going beyond the economic sphere. Consequently, companies in general, and the SEE in particular, are required to adopt practices of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). In this context, given the parallelism between the values and principles of the Social Economy and Social Responsibility (CSR), this paper analyzes the gender impact on the CSR in the SEE. A sample of 134 cooperatives and worker-owned companies has been used. The findings show that increased participation of women in decision-making of Social Economy enterprises does not affect CSR as a whole or each of its dimensions (economic, social and environmental).