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The doctrine of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) now enjoys widespread support. Companies are enjoined not simply to seek profit but to demonstrate their 'corporate citizenship' by working with a range of stakeholders to further environmental and social as well as economic goals. Pressures for such behaviour have come from NGOs but have been taken up by academics, other commentators and multinational enterprises themselves.

David Henderson examines the CSR doctrine, subjecting it to fundamental criticisms. In this controversial text he argues that, far from being harmless, its adoption threatens prosperity in poor countries as well as rich. It is likely to reduce competition and economic freedom and to undermine the market economy.

While issues concerning the social responsibilities of business have long been the subject of debate, today's conception of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) marks a new departure.
CSR assigns to business a new role and purpose. They are to embrace “corporate citizenship”, and run their affairs, in close conjunction with an array of different “stakeholders”, so as to promote the goal of “sustainable development”. This goal supposedly has three dimensions, “economic”, “environmental” and “social”.

David Henderson

David Henderson is an economist. He was the Head of the Economics and Statistics Department at the OECD in 1984–1992. Before that he worked as an academic economist in Britain, first at Oxford (Fellow of Lincoln College) and later at University College London (Professor of Economics, 1975–1983); as a British civil servant (first as an Economic Advisor in KM Treasury, and later as Chief Economist in the UK Ministry of Aviation); and as a staff member of the World Bank (1969–1975). In 1985 he gave the BBC Reith Lectures, which were published in the book Innocence and Design: The Influence of Economic Ideas on Policy (Blackwell, 1986).

Since leaving the OECD, Henderson has been an independent author and consultant, and has acted as Visiting Fellow or Professor at the OECD Development Centre (Paris), the Centre for European Policy Studies (Brussels), Monash University, the Fondation National des Scences Politiques, the University of Melbourne, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, the New Zeland Business Roundtable, and the Melboourne Business School. Recently, he has been a Visiting Professor at the Westminster Business School.

In 1992, Henderson was appointed to the Order of St Michael and StSt George as a Knight Commander.

Henderson is prominent as a global warming skeptic and has been critical of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, particularly the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios, and the Stern Review of the economics of global warming. He has also published books that strongly criticize "corporate social responsibility".