Impeding corporate social responsibility: Revisiting the role of government in shaping business — Marginalized local community relations

Abstract This paper is based on a case study of the European space industry as it is organized in the postcolonial setting of French Guiana. It brings the state back into political corporate social responsibility (CSR) by showing how government shapes interactions between business and local communities, more specifically around CSR issues. The paper opens new research avenues in political CSR by making two significant contributions. First, it identifies postcolonial contexts as instances in which government, rather than stepping back, gets actively involved to impede the emergence of CSR. This demonstration is made by building on a conceptualization of the marginalized local community as comprising citizens—rather than mere stakeholders—who expect their government to defend their rights vis‐à‐vis business. Second, by using a longitudinal approach that provides access to dynamics of interactions over time, the paper develops a typology of mechanisms that support a government’s changing role in CSR. Over a 50‐year period, such government is shown to have played the roles of impeding the emergence of CSR, partnering for CSR, symbolically mandating CSR, and finally, disengaging from CSR.