Corporate governance and corporate social responsibility: issues for Asia

An increasingly important aspect of CSR is the recognition that sound practices are often based on good standards of corporate governance. Good corporate governance provides the foundations of good CSR by creating value‐creating relationships with all stakeholders. This article seeks to review corporate governance issues from an Asian perspective. Ownership and control of many companies in the region differ from those commonly seen in the West and there are therefore specific issues that need to be addressed in this context. It is argued that the fact that so many Asian companies are dominated by controlling shareholders (often families) means that corporate governance may have to be even stronger in the Asian region than elsewhere.