Employee perspective on CSR: a review of the literature and research agenda

Purpose This paper aims to review the available academic literature on CSR from employees’ perspective, with an objective to better understand the individual-level analysis of CSR and clarify the current state of thinking in the area. Specifically, the authors present the evolution of the concept of CSR, from the historical overview to the emergence of recent theory and conceptualizations; the underlying theoretical foundations of CSR; the studied variables for CSR; and the research gaps and future work avenues in the field of CSR. Design/methodology/approach In all, 158 articles from 72 journals were included in the review, and a comprehensive analysis of the reviewed articles was performed. Findings This paper makes a significant contribution to the literature by presenting a comprehensive review of the articles published in academic journals, focusing on employees’ perspective of CSR. The findings advance the understanding of the research trend in employee-focused micro-level CSR research. They will assist organizations better understand “why,” “how” and “when” employees react to CSR initiatives of an organization. This paper also identifies the existing gaps in employee-centric CSR research, which will provide important directions for future research in the area. Research limitations/implications The review focused exclusively on journal publications. Dissertations, conference papers, working papers and practitioner papers were excluded, as they are not peer-reviewed. Originality/value This paper is one of the comprehensive review papers that focus exclusively on employees’ perspective of CSR, by analyzing 158 articles from the period 1961-2017.