Full interview with Bernard Giraud, Executive Director, CSR Europe 

Mr Giraud, do you expect a change in the position of on the European agenda as a result of institutional changes in 2004, including the upcoming European elections and the new Commission?

If you look at the European agenda since 1995, CSR has been part one of the hot topics of the European agenda on a regular basis. This is not a matter for people, nationalities or political parties. There is a broad consensus that in order to build a competitive and sustainable economy in Europe, we need the participation of business. There are various opinions on how to do that, but the fact is that we will not succeed if businesses are not part of this effort.

Basically, CSR is about the involvement of business in society. We will see what will be the results of the elections at the European Parliament and what will happen with the new Commission, but we at CSR Europe are confident that the process will move forward. I do not see any major obstacles or people opposing the idea that if Europe wants to build a dynamic economy, we will need companies that are part not only of economic but also social process.

Where is CSR currently in its development?

Today, there still is important work to do to popularise the CSR agenda. But the priority is much more on delivering. So it is more about implementing and mainstreaming throughout the organisation. CSR Europe is therefore supporting companies and all the organisations that are engaged in implementing CSR.

It was a major step to make CSR well known and well spread. Now we are in a new stage, where we have to help practitioners implement CSR throughout the organisation. For example, at the company level, in most of the large companies, there now are CSR managers or directors, there is the team, but the challenge is still open: how they can, with the support of top management, mainstream CSR throughout the company, throughout the functions, the levels of responsibility, within the business decisions.

So CSR Europe is now focussed on helping companies go deeper into the implementation of CSR. This is not opposite to what we did before; it is a new phase.

What is your assessment of the Multi-stakeholder Forum on CSR?

It has been a useful process. It was not obvious at the beginning that a multistakeholder process would work, involving companies, trade unions and NGOs. And the process has showed that something has been created. The dialogue between the different components of CSR, in a way, worked. CSR Europe was very much involved in the provision of concrete examples. For example, Danone came with the head of the trade union to explain to the forum what it had done to set up international agreements on social issues. A lot of other companies came with NGOs or unions to share their experiences as well. It was a learning process at the European level and I think it played an important role.

What was also important is to discover in the process was, that it is not a matter of obligations or regulation, but innovating the ways we can do things together, which is much more complicated. How can all stakeholders make progress working together, recognizing what the other stakeholders are bringing to the process?

This realization is the positive side of the multistakeholder forum. Now we are working on the conclusions. I cannot tell you what these would be because we are only one participant in the forum. We are working very hard with the main business organisations, including UNICE, ERT, Euro commerce and Eurochambres. Of course our members are very much involved; we have had a series of meetings to prepare for the final recommendations. However, CSR Europe does not have a position as such, but we want to find a way that facilitates business and is acceptable for the other players as well.

A minimum consensus w ould be one that allows Europe to go ahead, not to stop the process it has initiated successfully so far. One of the hot topics is transparency; reporting, measurements and many other issues relating to how can you measure that CSR is being implemented. Of course there are still contradictions among the participants; some of the participants want more regulation and the other side, business wants more of a voluntary approach. It would be already a big step forward if we could all agree on clear guiding principles for companies and organizations on how to develop and improve transparency and reporting on CSR. Finally it is worth mentioning that, because of their participation in this learning forum, already many European organizations have started to take CSR on board with their respective affiliates throughout Europe.

How do you see the new Member States' contribution to the CSR debate? Can they afford it?

CSR is about building sustainable business attuned with society. If a company wants to succeed in the mid-term in a country, it must be attuned to society and listen to its costumers, consumers and suppliers. CSR is about building cohesion with employees, it is not a matter of operating in a rich or poor country. CSR is more about corporate behaviour.

The CSR concept as it is, is quite new in the new accession countries. CSR Europe already has two partners in Poland and the Czech Republic and we are in the process of forming associations in other countries, e.g. in Hungary and Slovakia. In the new accession countries, CSR is at a starting phase. If we consider the major stakes for those countries, for example, how to develop sustainable management which empowers people, which enables people to develop from an environmental standpoint, complicated but very obvious issues, the contribution of a corporation to the building of a dynamic and stable society is a necessity. I do not think 'CSR history' will be the same in Eastern Europe as in Western Europe; I do not like this kind of parallelism. Maybe the new EU countries take the subject of CSR differently and take it up much faster than we did for some reason, or maybe not. I do not think 'they will do the same but are behind us'. The new countries will also bring fresh ideas and new views to the CSR debate. They do not have the same background, the same history that we have in Western European countries. I am not saying that ours is good or bad or that theirs is bad or good, but it is different.

When you ask whether they 'can afford it?' you could also say that they have other needs. The new countries will probably come with new ways of thinking and behaving, they want to develop fast, they want to take their part of the debate. They will do it with new ideas and they will bring to us new ways of thinking.

Could you please comment on the Commission's recent efforts relating to corporate governance - what will be the impact on CSR?

It is too early to talk about that. We do not have a CSR Europe point of view so far. As you know, we do not specialise in corporate governance and this is a very sensitive point from a business standpoint.

Where will CSR be in ten years' time? What does the future hold for CSR Europe?

There is still a long way to mainstream CSR in the process of management in companies. As I have already told you, we have succeeded in making it top of the agenda and a lot of companies are really interested and many companies are experimenting and innovating. CSR Europe will develop in the coming years in two directions.

First, we want to build an active network of the best CSR practitioners in Europe - let us say, a hundred companies - mainly large international companies, which are really engaged in the process. We want to build active personal co-operation between the practitioners. We want them to get to know each other and capitalise on best practices. For example, this year, we are focussing on practitioner workshops. We have ten companies with whom we are currently working very concretely on how to make progress on managing the supply chain from a CSR standpoint. This is not a theoretical debate any more but rather about how to implement CSR at the practical level and on that, we have to identify new solutions.

The other leg is through our national partners. They all have an immediate interest in co-operating at the European level. We currently work with 18 national CSR organisations and this network accounts for 1,500 companies. We want to develop this network further. If we want to develop CSR with deeper roots in the countries, we will never be able to do it from the European level.

There is very good expertise that is being built at national level on several topics. For example, CSR Europe's British partner and the French partner have done a very good job on reporting. We should capitalise on what they have done to bring it to the European level and to make sure that other companies in Europe will benefit from that. So it is a strategic move to build CSR Europe as a network of international companies and national partner organisations. We will therefore develop our activities in close co-operation with those national partner organisations.

Thank you