Corporate Character Formation and CSR: The Function of Habit and Practice in the Mining Industry

The mining industry provides a rich context through which to engage the practical and ethical limits of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Recent debates in organizational ethics have drawn attention to institutional constraints which inhibit awareness raising and ethical practice within corporate settings. During the last decade, the mining industry has come under increasing pressure to improve its environmental, social and ethical performance. In an effort to respond to these more ethically-orientated external expectations, the mining industry has developed a range of internal regulatory mechanisms and process, which can be applied individually or in conjunction with other companies and organizations. This combination of internal and external drivers indicates a growing imperative for mining companies to ground CSR principles in their day-to-day operating practices. The challenge is to avoid organizational rules and procedures for CSR that lack depth and meaning and which fail to result in the wise and courageous use of personal agency. Instead mining companies must work to establish appropriate mechanisms that will see ethical norms adopted as organizational principles that guide, and result in, improved corporate conduct. Using the Aristotelean notion of “character formation”, the authors offer practical considerations for how this might occur in the mining industry.