Anlayzing Duty Ethics CSR

¶ … Mattel Inc.'s case study with regard to the principle of corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Corporate Social Responsibility

CSR requires the engagement of a corporate accountability vision to a broad array of stakeholders, aside from investors and shareholders. The main areas of interest are personnel well-being, societal/community well-being, and environmental protection in the present time as well as into future prospects (Corporate social responsibility (CSR) -- Current issues). Underpinning the CSR view is the theory that businesses cannot behave as separate economic units functioning detachedly from the wider society. Conventional attitudes with regard to profitability, competitiveness, and survival are disappearing. A number of organizations still neglect their supply chain-level CSR -- for instance, through the importing and selling of unlawfully harvested timber. Although governmental bodies can impose fines and embargos on offending firms, it would be better for firms themselves to commit to sustainability, through a more careful choice of their suppliers. Today, CSR is firmly entrenched in the international business agenda. However, to progress from the philosophy of CSR to actual action, the business community has to surmount numerous barriers (Corporate social responsibility (CSR) -- Current issues). One of the major challenges the business domain confronts is a need for greater consistency in CSR progress indicators, together with CSR strategy dissemination. Discourse and transparency can increase a company's trustworthiness in stakeholders' view, whilst simultaneously pushing up other companies' standards.

Mattel Shows Social Irresponsibility

In the past two decades or so, multinational companies have been the object of accusations of carrying out unethical and unfair business practices and market power abuse, particularly in the areas of supply chain management and foreign operations (Sethi, et.al, 2009). Such accusations include, but are not limited to, exploitation of workers by paying them disproportionately low wages and making them work too long under hazardous working conditions; undermining natural governments' capacity of safeguarding their citizens' welfare; and contamination and pollution of land, air and ground water resources. Toy-manufacturing giant Mattel assented to pay civil penalties worth 2.3 million dollars for its violation of a federal ban on lead paint, which led to a recall of several million Mattel toys (including branded toys like Dora, Barbie, etc.) in the year 2007. According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), a record high fine was imposed on Mattel and Fisher-Price (its preschool subdivision) (Kavilanz, 2009). In the agency's view, the company (MAT, Fortune 500) knowingly (defined under the 1972 Consumer Product Safety Act) engaged in importing and retailing children's toys coated with material (surface coatings/paints) containing dangerously high levels of lead, thereby violating a three-decade-old federal legislation. In the year 1978, the federal government implemented a ban on children's articles (e.g. toys) painted/coated with material containing lead in quantities over 0.06% (by weight). The agency asserted that the fine settles claims of Mattel importing as many as 900,000 toys that were non-compliant, from September 2006 to August 2007. (This includes innumerable Barbie accessories and the famous Sarge car from "Cars"). It further asserts that the Fisher-Price unit of Mattel imported as many as 1.1 million toys that violated the law, from July 2006 to August 2007 (this includes a few licensed characters) (Kavilanz, 2009). About 95 toy models marketed by Fisher-Price and Mattel in 2007 violated safe lead-usage limits. Lead, if ingested (which is a possibility among little children), can be lethal, and has adverse health effects. Mattel recalled several million toys made in China in the very same year, for dangerous lead levels in paints and tiny toy parts hazardous to little children. The world was shocked in August 2007 when it witnessed Mattel recalling a whopping 1.5 million branded Fisher-Price toys (including Big Bird, Dora, and Elmo) because of lead-related risks and risks linked to the presence of tiny, powerful magnets in toys. In November 2007, it recalled an additional 11 million products in its foreign markets and 9.5 million products in its American market. In August, in the following year, the U.S. Congress passed its Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, giving child-product (toys, books, clothes, etc.) manufacturers and retailers a deadline of 10th February, 2009, by which time they would have to meet more stringent lead standards, phthalate concentration limits, and additional obligatory safety requirements.