산업 내 경쟁정도와 혁신활동에 따른 기업수명주기와 사회적 책임

This study examines the association between firm life cycle and corporate social responsibility activities and then investigates whether this relationship is affected by the degree of industry competition and firm’s innovation activities. Firm’s strategic decision making and CSR activities can be differentiated by the characteries of firm life cycle stage. As firm faced the internal and external environments, CSR activities are affected complexly by each stage of firm life cycle. The empirical findings of this study are follows. First, we find that firm in growth stage reduces CSR activities. While firm in mature stage is actively engaged in CSR activities due to stable profitability, firm in decline stage shows less CSR activities through the deterioration of management environment. Second, firm in mature stage performs CSR strategically responding to stockholders’ requirement when the market competition is more intensive. Third, High R&D expenditure firm in mature stage actives is actively engaged in CSR activities and CSR activities are improved by high level of innovative activities in spite of declined stage. This study contributes to the previous research by deriving evidence that CSR strategy according to corporate life cycle can be differentiated by internal and external environment factors of company. The discussion is located leads to the implication that CSR can be used as a competitive advantage strategy considering the management environment of the market. It also provides practical implications by identifying the fact that CSR activities serve as a signal to sustainable management.