Critique of Friedman's Statement on Social Responsibility (BUS3001)

This essay critically examines Milton Friedman's assertion that "the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits." It delves into various models of corporate social responsibility (CSR), including the CSR model, the triple bottom line framework (profits, people, and planet), and stakeholder theory. The essay uses the APS group, a UK-based print and agency services company, as an extended example to illustrate socially responsible behavior. The analysis explores how different approaches to social responsibility can impact a company's profitability and sustainability, contrasting Friedman's perspective with alternative viewpoints. The essay concludes by synthesizing the key arguments and offering a comprehensive understanding of the relationship between social responsibility and business success.

Corporate social
responsibility

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
MAIN – BODY ...............................................................................................................................3
Models of social responsibility........................................................................................................3
CSR- ..........................................................................................................................................4
Triple bottom line- ....................................................................................................................5
Stakeholder theory- ....................................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES ...............................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Corporate social responsibility refers to an effective term that is used to enhance the
profits and revenues on the international and domestic market by fulfilling the goals related to
the society and engaging in the ethically oriented approaches. It is a type of social model that is
used to helping the companies to be accountable on the societal nature towards there
shareholders, public and to itself by increasing the image in the marketplace. This study is based
on the small medium company that is APS group in UK that is the prominent company who
provides the services like print management and production, agency services for handling
accounts, design etc. managing brands of the companies etc. to the people in the innovative way.
This essay report includes the various types of models of social responsibilities so that
organisation may enhance their profit margin and sales with longer sustainability in the
marketplace. It also helps in providing the knowledge related to the social responsibility of the
firms and how their behave to fulfils it for gaining the high market share in the domestic and
international market(Unit, Star and SmartWay, 2015).
MAIN – BODY
Corporate social responsibility
This term defines as an essential responsibility of an individual, group of individuals and
companies to show their best on the welfare of the society and environment as a whole. It is also
resemble as a social responsibility. It is mainly important for the investors who invest their
money for not focusing on profits but focusing on benefits of environment and society and for
customers it helps in enhancing their living standards with good health benefits. This essay
report can shown the social responsibility of the APS group. This company can provides the
varieties of services to their clients who want to accepts the positive change. It involves the
basically three theories like CSR, triple bottom line and stakeholder theory on the basis of which
social responsibility concepts can be understood. It is based on clarify the discussion on the
statement i.e. social responsibility of an organisation helps in increasing their revenues by using
various theories of the social responsibilities that also helps in reflecting the companies socially
responsible behaviour, and it can be shown below(Carroll, 2015).

Models of social responsibility
CSR-
This term represents as a beneficial model for the businesses specially for small and start-
up businesses because adopting this technique within the firm shows the enterprise contribution
in the welfare of society and environment. Here, corporation is related to the making and earning
money and responsibility reflects the ethical interaction of the business firm within the
community. In case of APS group, corporate social responsibility helps in gaining the profits and
revenues so that the organisation may survive for a longer period of time. There are four
obligations on the basis of which Friedman statement can be justified in the context of APS
group(Lins, Servaes and Tamayo, 2017).
Economic responsibility- It shows the specification for making money that showcase the
survival of the human instinct. In this companies can work for earning and making profits by
various sources such as donations, grants selling innovative products to customers for gaining
profits etc. In case of APS group, manager can fulfils their economic responsibility by offering
the quality services like account handling, video, animation etc. to large business without
harming the society benefits. This helps in earning profits by offering services(Ioannou and
Serafeim, 2015).
Legal responsibility- In this obligation legal laws and regulations can be adopted
effceti9vely by the companies so that they can provides the benefits to their employees and
customer so that people faith on the business enterprise can be maintained. In this APS group,
manager can follow proper rules by providing the right related to securing the clients work by
copyright so that customers build their trust and this will shows that Friedman statement is true
that social responsibility helps in giving the profits and revenues to the companies(Flammer,
2015).
Ethical responsibility- This term shows that people and organisation do right things
even when it is not required according to the law imposed by the government and society. It can
be done as a part of voluntary code of conduct that helps in enhancing the image of the company
in the mind of the clients, investors, shareholders etc. in case of APS group, this term shows that
it also a part of the society and to do a things which is beneficial for that helps in gaining the
profits and attraction of people towards the company. In this manager of APS group offers the
print management and production in house that helps the supply chain globally. This will helps

in saving the time and money for the large organisation in finding the best supply networks so
that customers also9 get attracted and due to this business venture may earn higher profits(Wang
and Sarkis, 2017).
Philanthropic responsibilities- It is one of the significant part of the corporate social
responsibility that showcase the responsibility relating to donating funds, services to the other
business venture and enterprises. There major aim is to to provide the proper facility according to
the needs and wants so that so company may generate the high brand image in the marketplace
due to this they can maximise their profit margin. IN case of APS group, this factor helps in
gaining more profits and revenues because in this they can provide the services to the large
organisation as a experience centre setup where they can set up their demos, prototypes for
exploring new ideas as per the needs of customers and society so that they can enhance their
customer base and due to this there profits margin also impacted in a good way(Jamali and
Karam, 2018).
From the above analysis it is to be evaluated that all this four obligations are interrelated
to each other by earning profits for the company like APS group. Because following and
considers this type of behaviour within organisation helps in longer sustainability by earning
profits and revenues. In this if company can mainly focus on fulfilling the legal responsibility
there economic responsibility may be affected because it needs more expenses and due to this at
this time business venture may needs to prepare a proper budget so that task can be achieved in
an effective way of earning profits(Petrenko and et. al., 2016).
Triple bottom line-
This model of social responsibility represents that organisations mainly focus on social
and environmental concerns for getting more profits. It inculcates that there is no single bottom
line but it includes three i.e. profits, people and planet and all three depends on social and
environmental factors not any other. In case of APS Group, this term suggest that Friedman
statement can be fulfilled only focusing on environmental and social aspects on the other hand
CSR model can fulfils the demands of Friedman statement on four basic aspects. It is the best
way for the small firms to sustain in the marketplace for a longer period of time. It can be
depends on the two core terms that can be shown below(Hopkins, 2016).
Social sustainability-In this aspect company can generally focus on the balancing the
people life's by giving them values in the way they live. As people of UK are living their life in a

modern way and totally depends on the technology advancement due to this organisation can
focus on adopting and upgrading the technology so that they can gain more profits and revenues.
In case of APS group, that is one of the leading organisation in UK that provides varieties of
services to the people and other organisation. In this they can focus on using the advanced
technology so that they can get more revenues. And for them they also use intranet for their
employees sob that they will satisfied with their working environment because all task can be
cleared in their mind without any misunderstanding. This helps in longer sustainability of the
firm due to which they can get more profits and high market share. This also helps in showing
the healthy relation of the company and the society people that helps in sustainability. In this
aspect company can focus on the gaining the benefits related to the three bottoms that is people,
planet and profits in a way if the society people are satisfied with the firms products and services
than it will gives the major profits due to this they brand image will be enhanced in the
marketplace and also helps in beating the competitors within the firms(Yakovleva, 2017).
Environmental sustainability- It refers to that term which showcase the responsible
interaction of the organisation with the environment for avoiding the depletion and degradation
of the natural resources so that firm will sustain in the marketplace for a longer period of time
and earns a high amount of profits. In case of APS group, this term is very effective term as it
helps in gaining more profits and revenues by protecting the environment. In this APS can
provides the innovative marketing services to their clients that is eco-friendly so that large base
of customers get attracted and also it helps in saving the environment. This also helps in longer
sustainability of firm and gaining more profits by maximising sales(Saeidi and et. al., 2015).
By analysing the above theory it is to be critically analyse that it shows that Friedman is
said well regarding the social responsibility as it helps in gaining more profits by fulfilling the
demands of people and focusing on environmental benefits. This also helps in improving the
customer transparency across the market.
Stakeholder theory-
This is a signifiant approach of the social responsibility that is proposed by Edward
Freeman. This aspect suggest that the business are looking into the world for gaining profits but
at this time stakeholder theory are in the trend where individuals and group and individuals can
be affected by the company decisions in a positive and negative way. Due to this firm will
majorly focus on their roles and responsibility according to the proper code of conduct so that

business venture can sustain in the marketplace for a longer period of time. IN case of APS
group, according to this model company majorly provides the goods and services as per the
demands of customers and also make transparency with the investors so that they feel secured
with their investments and also provides the healthy and friendly working environment to their
internal employees so that they can complete their task for gaining more profits and revenues. It
also helps in enchaining the living standard of the stakeholder who are connected with the
business enterprise(Watson, 2015).
From the above analysis of the corporate social responsibilities range it is to be critically
analysed that following the social responsibility helps in gaining more profits but in different
ways as using CSR helps in gaining the profit by equally focusing on the legal, environmental,
social and philanthropic aspects without leaving one aspects they can face the loss and major
expenses and in triple bottom line company will focus on the the people, planet and process for
gaining profits they mainly focus on social and economical factors for gaining more profits and
longer sustainability. And in stakeholder matrix they earns the profits by showing their social
behaviour towards the customers, suppliers, employees, clients etc. For APS group, triple bottom
line is the best model for gaining profits and revenues for a longer period of time.
CONCLUSION
From the above explained essay project it is to be concluded that following proper social
responsibilities helps the organisation to attracts the large base of customers and also gaining
more profits and revenues so that they can sustain in the market for a longer period of time. It
shows as an essential corporate behaviour of the companies and also create a more impact on the
business enterprise performance that helps in developing the interest of the outside parties such
as media, people, government etc. that gives the positive signs to the firm. It inculcates the
various models such as CSR, triple bottom line, stakeholder theory that helps in gaining the
knowledge relating to the contradicting results to the framing i.e. in organisation social
responsibility has maximising the profits and their sustainability in the marketplace. In
following the social responsibility company can majorly focus on providing the ethical issues so
that employees can encourages and give their best due to this company profits may be enhanced.

REFERENCES
Books & Journal
Carroll, A.B., 2015. Corporate social responsibility: The centerpiece of competing and
complementary frameworks. Organizational dynamics.
Flammer, C., 2015. Does corporate social responsibility lead to superior financial performance?
A regression discontinuity approach. Management Science. 61(11). pp.2549-2568.
Hopkins, M., 2016. The planetary bargain: corporate social responsibility comes of age.
Springer.
Ioannou, I. and Serafeim, G., 2015. The impact of corporate social responsibility on investment
recommendations: Analysts' perceptions and shifting institutional logics. Strategic
Management Journal. 36(7). pp.1053-1081.
Jamali, D. and Karam, C., 2018. Corporate social responsibility in developing countries as an
emerging field of study. International Journal of Management Reviews. 20(1). pp.32-61.
Lins, K.V., Servaes, H. and Tamayo, A., 2017. Social capital, trust, and firm performance: The
value of corporate social responsibility during the financial crisis. The Journal of
Finance. 72(4). pp.1785-1824.
Petrenko, O.V. and et. al., 2016. Corporate social responsibility or CEO narcissism? CSR
motivations and organizational performance. Strategic Management Journal. 37(2).
pp.262-279.
Saeidi, S.P. and et. al., 2015. How does corporate social responsibility contribute to firm
financial performance? The mediating role of competitive advantage, reputation, and
customer satisfaction. Journal of business research. 68(2). pp.341-350.
Unit, B., Star, E. and SmartWay, E.P.A., 2015. Corporate social responsibility.
Wang, Z. and Sarkis, J., 2017. Corporate social responsibility governance, outcomes, and
financial performance. Journal of Cleaner Production. 162. pp.1607-1616.
Watson, L., 2015. Corporate social responsibility research in accounting. Journal of Accounting
Literature. 34. pp.1-16.
Yakovleva, N., 2017. Corporate social responsibility in the mining industries. Routledge.