NOT QUITE SOCIALISM BUT ON THE ROAD
AMELIORATING CAPITALISM CSR CPR 

• A team of researchers is calling for companies to be as transparent about what it's dubbed "corporate political responsibility" as they are about corporate social responsibility.
• Covert lobbying for policies that contradict the ones espoused in "green" advertising and branding is getting harder to pull off, and companies can gain a competitive advantage through transparency that customers and shareholders are increasingly demanding.
• This article is part of our ongoing series on Better Capitalism.

That's why Thomas P. Lyon of the University of Michigan and a research team that comprised the Bretesche Workshop on Systemic Change have called on companies to start being transparent about what they dubbed corporate political responsibility (CPR). If a company spends millions on green ad campaigns but tens of millions more lobbying politicians to pass laws that would protect business as usual, then the whole idea of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is undermined.

In an article that those researchers published in the California Management Review last year — cheekily titled "CSR needs CPR" — the authors wrote, "as demands for political transparency grow, it will become increasingly difficult for companies to execute a strategy that involves contradictions between virtuous public statements and self-serving lobbying and other political activities."

They reached three conclusions that they believe will not only benefit consumers, society, and the environment, but also the companies' long-term profits: