Toyo Keizai Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) project: Investigation of CSR Indicators Calculation

Toyo Keizai Inc. is a Japanese leading publisher in the field of economic and corporate information, providing both on line and printed materials. Publications by Toyo Keizai include such well known directories as Japan Company Handbook (a quarterly publication in Japanese, and published once a yerar in English), and a number of other directories published every year, such as Nihon no Kigyo Grupu, on Japanese group relationships, Kaigai Shinshutsu Kigyo Sôran, on foreign investments by Japanese companies, and many others. Publications by Toyo Keizai are widely used by firms, by investors, and also by researchers (for instance Beamish, 1993; Delios & Beamish, 199; Jaussaud, Schaaper & Zhang, 2000; Amann, Jaussaud & Martinez, 2012, just to mention a few). One of the Toyo Keizai Publication, which has been released every year since 2005, is devoted to CSR issues. It is called CSR Kigyô Sôran (for "CSR Directory of firms", in Japanese). This publication releases a number of information on every firm which is investigated regarding CSR issues such as HRM, corporate governance, environmental protection, and so on. T6oyo Keizai Inc., has a strong experience in collecting all kinds of information from firms, and checking information reliability. However, CSR Kigyô Sôran also provides synthetic indicators in the fields of CSR in corporate governance, CSR in HRM, CSR in environmental protection, and CSR towards the society. These calculations are widely regarded as highly reliable, based on general trust towards Toyo Keizai Inc., but information about method they use is rather limited in CSR Kigyô Sôran. Thus our project of contribution to the 24th Euro-Asia International Research Seminar in Barsac, France, is to investigate more deeply the calculation method of CSR synthetic indicators by Toyo Keizai Inc. It appears that the calculation method of CSR synthetic indicators by Toyo Keizai Inc has been developed in close cooperation with Professor Yamamoto, from Meiji Daigaku, a leading private university in Japan. We are currently investigating various publications by Professor Yamamoto, both books (Yamamoto, M., ed. (2014), Yamamoto, M., ed. (2009)) and research papers (Hagiwara, M., Yamamoto, M. and Yamashita, H (2013)), and also various publications by Toyo Keizai (Tôyô Keizai, (2017)) which may help shed light on the calculation method. Then, if needed, we will contact directly Toyo Keizai to get more information on that sensitive issue. This contribution should provide both to Japanese researchers and to researchers outside Japan a better understanding of the calculation method of CSR synthetic indicators by Toyo Keizai Inc, indicators that they are strongly incited to rely on when looking to CSR in Japan.