IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v12y2020i3p1009-d314738.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Role of Consumers in the Achievement of Corporate Sustainability through the Reduction of Unfair Commercial Practices

Author

Listed:
  • Borko Mihajlović

    (Faculty of Law, University of Kragujevac, Kragujevac 34000, Serbia)

Abstract

The subject of this article is a determination of the potential of the prohibition of unfair commercial practice, as an institution of consumer law, established to strengthen consumers’ protection, to contribute to the achievement of corporate sustainability. The main objective of the paper is the identification of situations in which certain companies’ actions may at the same time be considered as unsustainable and socially irresponsible behavior, as well as unfair commercial practice. There are three such characteristic situations that were the subject of thorough analysis in the paper: (1) company’s constantly invoking to the concepts of corporate sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) in its marketing activities, which is essentially incorrect because the company in practice breaches some of the basic postulates of these concepts, (2) breach of company’s code of conduct which contains the principles of corporate sustainability and CSR, and which the company has undertaken to be bound, (3) conducting many concrete acts which represent unfair commercial practice, and simultaneously have negative impact on the corporate sustainability and CSR. From the analysis of these three situations arises the conclusion that there is a possibility for indirect legal sanctioning of the unsustainable and socially irresponsible behavior of companies through the application of the consumer law rules on the prohibition of unfair commercial practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Borko Mihajlović, 2020. "The Role of Consumers in the Achievement of Corporate Sustainability through the Reduction of Unfair Commercial Practices," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-20, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:3:p:1009-:d:314738
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/3/1009/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/3/1009/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tobias Hahn & Mandy Scheermesser, 2006. "Approaches to corporate sustainability among German companies," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 13(3), pages 150-165, July.
    2. Carroll, Archie B., 1991. "The pyramid of corporate social responsibility: Toward the moral management of organizational stakeholders," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 34(4), pages 39-48.
    3. Jane Williams & Caroline Hare, 2010. "Early Experiences of the Enforcement of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive in Scotland," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 33(4), pages 377-401, December.
    4. Hiss, Stefanie, 2009. "From Implicit to Explicit Corporate Social Responsibility: Institutional Change as a Fight for Myths," Business Ethics Quarterly, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(3), pages 433-451, July.
    5. Claude Didry & Elodie Bethoux & Arnaud Mias, 2007. ""What Codes of Conduct Tell Us: corporate social responsibility and the nature of the multinational corporation"," Post-Print hal-00178718, HAL.
    6. Élodie Béthoux & Claude Didry & Arnaud Mias, 2007. "What Codes of Conduct Tell Us: corporate social responsibility and the nature of the multinational corporation," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 15(1), pages 77-90, January.
    7. Jouni Paavola, 2001. "Towards Sustainable Consumption: Economics and Ethical Concerns for the Environment in Consumer Choices," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(2), pages 227-248.
    8. Candice Stevens, 2010. "Linking sustainable consumption and production: The government role," Natural Resources Forum, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 34(1), pages 16-23, February.
    9. Atle Blomgren, 2011. "Does corporate social responsibility influence profit margins? a case study of executive perceptions," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 18(5), pages 263-274, September.
    10. Tom Kuhlman & John Farrington, 2010. "What is Sustainability?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 2(11), pages 1-13, November.
    11. Stefan Schaltegger & Markus Beckmann & Erik G. Hansen, 2013. "Transdisciplinarity in Corporate Sustainability: Mapping the Field," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(4), pages 219-229, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Salma Khalil & Ayman Ismail & Seham Ghalwash, 2021. "The Rise of Sustainable Consumerism: Evidence from the Egyptian Generation Z," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(24), pages 1-25, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jędrzej G. Frynas, 2008. "Corporate Social Responsibility and International Development: Critical Assessment," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(4), pages 274-281, July.
    2. Hildegunn Mellesmo Aslaksen & Clare Hildebrandt & Hans Chr. Garmann Johnsen, 2021. "The long-term transformation of the concept of CSR: towards a more comprehensive emphasis on sustainability," International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 1-14, December.
    3. Svensson, Göran & Wood, Greg & Callaghan, Michael, 2010. "A corporate model of sustainable business practices: An ethical perspective," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 45(4), pages 336-345, October.
    4. Qinghua Zhu & Fei Zou & Pan Zhang, 2019. "The role of innovation for performance improvement through corporate social responsibility practices among small and medium‐sized suppliers in China," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(2), pages 341-350, March.
    5. Virginia Bodolica & Martin Spraggon, 2015. "An Examination into the Disclosure, Structure, and Contents of Ethical Codes in Publicly Listed Acquiring Firms," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 126(3), pages 459-472, February.
    6. Robert Huber & Bernhard Hirsch, 2017. "Behavioral Effects of Sustainability‐Oriented Incentive Systems," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(2), pages 163-181, February.
    7. Mehrnaz Ashrafi & Gregory M. Magnan & Michelle Adams & Tony R. Walker, 2020. "Understanding the Conceptual Evolutionary Path and Theoretical Underpinnings of Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-17, January.
    8. Jung-Fa Tsai & Phi-Hung Nguyen & Ming-Hua Lin & Duy-Van Nguyen & Hsu-Hao Lin & Anh-Tuan Ngo, 2021. "Impacts of Environmental Certificate and Pollution Abatement Equipment on SMEs’ Performance: An Empirical Case in Vietnam," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(17), pages 1-17, August.
    9. Hajdu, Anna & Daziano, Marcos F. & Visser, Oane, 2021. "Institutions and individual values motivating corporate social responsibility activities in large farms and agroholdings," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 24(4), April.
    10. Cézanne, Cécile & Rubinstein, Marianne, 2012. "La RSE comme instrument de gouvernance d’entreprise : une application à l’industrie française des télécommunications," Revue de la Régulation - Capitalisme, institutions, pouvoirs, Association Recherche et Régulation, vol. 12.
    11. Thorey S Thorisdottir & Lara Johannsdottir, 2020. "Corporate Social Responsibility Influencing Sustainability within the Fashion Industry. A Systematic Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-64, November.
    12. Laura Broccardo & Elisa Truant & Adrian Zicari, 2019. "Internal corporate sustainability drivers: What evidence from family firms? A literature review and research agenda," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(1), pages 1-18, January.
    13. Francisco J. García‐Rodríguez & José León García‐Rodríguez & Carlos Castilla‐Gutiérrez & Silvério A. Major, 2013. "Corporate Social Responsibility of Oil Companies in Developing Countries: From Altruism to Business Strategy," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 20(6), pages 371-384, November.
    14. Hyder Kamran & Irfan Khurshid & Fawaz Ali & Nitin Raj Srivastava, 2012. "Value Creation Through Corporate Social Responsibility in Developing Countries: A Case Study of Proctor & Gamble Pakistan," International Journal of Business Research and Management (IJBRM), Computer Science Journals (CSC Journals), vol. 3(6), pages 279-293, December.
    15. Chassagnon, Virgile & Dubrion, Benjamin, 2015. "Responsabilité sociale de l’entreprise et manipulation des salariés au travail : un éclairage institutionnaliste à partir d’une analyse de la littérature sur les codes de conduite," Revue de la Régulation - Capitalisme, institutions, pouvoirs, Association Recherche et Régulation, vol. 17.
    16. Monowar Mahmood & Janet Humphrey, 2013. "Stakeholder Expectation of Corporate Social Responsibility Practices: A Study on Local and Multinational Corporations in Kazakhstan," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 20(3), pages 168-181, May.
    17. Kenneth Amaeshi & Olufemi Amao, 2009. "Corporate Social Responsibility in Transnational Spaces: Exploring Influences of Varieties of Capitalism on Expressions of Corporate Codes of Conduct in Nigeria," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 86(2), pages 225-239, March.
    18. Gao, Lei & Brink, Alisa G., 2017. "Whistleblowing studies in accounting research: A review of experimental studies on the determinants of whistleblowing," Journal of Accounting Literature, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 1-13.
    19. Antony Paulraj & Injazz J. Chen & Constantin Blome, 2017. "Motives and Performance Outcomes of Sustainable Supply Chain Management Practices: A Multi-theoretical Perspective," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 145(2), pages 239-258, October.
    20. Goran Svensson & Greg Wood & Jang Singh & Emily Carasco & Michael Callaghan, 2009. "Ethical Structures and Processes of Corporations Operating in Australia, Canada, and Sweden: A Longitudinal and Cross-Cultural Study," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 86(4), pages 485-506, June.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:3:p:1009-:d:314738. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.