12. Enhancing Corporate Social Responsibilities in Emerging Business Environments in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a tool that can be applied to reduce risks, build brand equity, elevate market performance and drive business sustainability. In developed countries, CSR is becoming a crucial determinant of organisations’ ability to deliver expected outcomes to stakeholders and attract future investments. However, in Africa and other emerging markets, the practice of CSR is still evolving, inspired more by the philosophy of charity, philanthropy and stewardship than business strategy. Against that background, this chapter interrogates the approach to CSR in Africa from ideation to execution/impact and argues for integrating CSR initiatives with business operating strategies to entrench responsible business practices and unlock profit-making opportunities. From a conceptual perspective and the prism of the stakeholder management theory, the chapter draws attention to the shortcomings in the practice of CSR in Africa. It offers suggestions for improvement across the design and implementation protocols. Specifically, the study recommends broadening the corporate social performance spectrum in Africa to incentivise and energise more participation from Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) as a pathway to scaling CSR impact in the continent, especially in the post-COVID-19 era.