Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T17:11:25.909Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Agri-food firms, universities, and corporate social responsibility: what's in the public interest?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 September 2018

Robert M. Chiles ,
Leland Glenna ,
Amit Sharma ,
Jeffrey Catchmark ,
C. Daniel Azzara  and
Audrey Maretzki
Robert M. Chiles*
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA Department of Food Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA Rock Ethics Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Leland Glenna
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Amit Sharma
Affiliation:
Rock Ethics Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA School of Hospitality Management, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Jeffrey Catchmark
Affiliation:
Rock Ethics Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
C. Daniel Azzara
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA Department of Food Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Audrey Maretzki
Affiliation:
Department of Food Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
*
Author for correspondence: Robert M. Chiles, E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The complexities of the global agri-food system and the singular importance of food as a primary good elevate the need to explore what corporate social responsibility (CSR) might mean for agri-food firms. Although CSR refers to voluntary actions on the part of capitalist firms to exceed legal and regulatory requirements, those requirements are important because they set the institutional foundation for what a firm must do to earn the CSR label. In the case of CSR for agri-food firms, the institutional context includes the regulatory state as well as the publicly supported agricultural and food research and development that tends to be done at universities. The purpose of this paper is to provide greater conceptual clarity to the blur between the state, agri-food firms, and universities and their respective responsibilities to the public. Since the globalization of the agri-food system and the emergence of private forms of governance signal the decline of the state's legal and regulatory influence on corporate firms, we pay particularly close attention to the ethical challenges that have surrounded university–agribusiness collaborations—initiatives, which conjoin the moral concerns associated with each respective institution while also raising new questions in their own right. Although the university would ideally play a critical participatory role in this process by virtue of its public commitments, as we explain, the historical relationship between the university and agri-food firms has complicated the university's potential standing as an independent arbiter. Upon examining each of these issues in greater detail, we conclude the paper with a blueprint for how universities can enhance their ethical leadership when engaging with agri-food firms.

Keywords

Agrarianismagri-food firmscorporate social responsibilityfood and agricultural ethicsgovernancestakeholdersuniversities
Type
Research Paper
Information
Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems , Volume 35 , Issue 2 , April 2020 , pp. 158 - 168
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aviv, R (2014) A Valuable Reputation, The New Yorker, February 10. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/02/10/a-valuable-reputation.Google Scholar
Barham, L (2002) Towards a theory of values-based labeling. Agriculture and human values 19, 349–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barham, E (2003) Translating terroir: the global challenge of French AOC labeling. Journal of rural studies 19, 127–138.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blake, NM (1956) Water for the Cities: A History of the Urban Water Supply Problem in the United States/Nelson Manfred Blake, Maxwell School Series ;3. Syracuse, N.Y: Syracuse University Press.Google Scholar
Block, F and Keller, MR (2011) Where do innovations come from?. Transformations in the US Economy, 1970–2006, Reasserting the Public Interest Knowledge Governance, pp. 81–104.Google Scholar
Bonanno, A and Constance, DH (2008) Stories of Globalization: Transnational Corporations, Resistance, and the State. University Park, PA: Penn State Press.Google Scholar
Brandl, B and Glenna, LL (2016) Intellectual Property and Agricultural Science and Innovation in Germany and the United States, Science, Technology, & Human Values, p. 0162243916675954.Google Scholar
Busch, L (2000) The moral economy of grades and standards. Journal of Rural Studies 16, 273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Busch, L (2011) The private governance of food: equitable exchange or bizarre bazaar? Agriculture and Human Values 28, 345–352.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Busch, L (2014) Governance in the age of global markets: challenges, limits, and consequences. Agriculture and Human Values 31, 513–523.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Busch, L, Lacy, WB, Burkhardt, J and Lacy, LR (1991) Plants, Power, and Profit: Social, Economic, and Ethical Consequences of the New Biotechnologies. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Buttel, FH (2005) Ever since hightower: the politics of agricultural research activism in the molecular age. Agriculture and Human Values 22, 275.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, TID and Slaughter, S (1999) Faculty and administrators’ attitudes toward potential conflicts of interest, commitment, and equity in university-industry relationships. The Journal of Higher Education 70, 309–352.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Casassus, B (2014) Paper claiming GM link with tumours republished. Nature. doi: 10.1038/nature.2014.15463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charles, D (2013) American farmers say they feed the world, but do they? NPR. https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/09/17/221376803/american-farmers-say-they-feed-the-world-but-do-theyGoogle Scholar
Clancy, M, Fuglie, K and Heisey, P (2016) US agricultural R&D in an Era of falling public funding. Amber Waves, 1. https://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2016/november/us-agricultural-rd-in-an-era-of-falling-public-fundingGoogle Scholar
Cotula, L, Vermeulen, S, Leonard, R and Keeley, J (2009) Land grab or development opportunity? Agricultural investment and international land deals in Africa, IIED, FAO, IFAD.Google Scholar
Curry, J and Kenney, M (1990) Land-grant university-industry relationships in biotechnology: a comparison with the non-land-grant research universities. Rural Sociology 55, 44–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eisenberg, RS (1996) Public research and private development: patents and technology transfer in government-sponsored research. Virginia Law Review 82, 1663–1725.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fuchs, D, Kalfagianni, A and Havinga, T (2011 a) Actors in private food governance: the legitimacy of retail standards and multistakeholder initiatives with civil society participation. Agriculture and Human Values 28, 353.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fuchs, D, Kalfagianni, A, Clapp, J and Busch, L (2011 b) Introduction to symposium on private agrifood governance: values, shortcomings and strategies. Agriculture and Human Values 28, 335–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gelles, D (2015) Social Responsibility That Rubs Right Off, The New York Times, October 17, p. BU3, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/18/business/energy-environment/social-responsibility-that-rubs-right-off.html.Google Scholar
Glenna, LL (2017) AFHVS 2017 presidential address. Agriculture and Human Values, Springer: The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), 34, 1021–1031.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glenna, LL, Lacy, WB, Welsh, R and Biscotti, D (2007) University administrators, agricultural biotechnology, and academic capitalism: defining the public good to promote university-industry relationships. The Sociological Quarterly 48, 141–164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glenna, LL, Welsh, R, Ervin, D, Lacy, WB and Biscotti, D (2011) Commercial science, scientists’ values, and university biotechnology research agendas. Research Policy 40, 957–968.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glenna, LL, Tooker, J, Rick Welsh, J and Ervin, D (2015) Intellectual property, scientific independence, and the efficacy and environmental impacts of genetically engineered crops. Rural Sociology 80, 147–172.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Godard, B and Aruldhas, J (2014) Responsible innovation in the food sector, In Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer, pp. 1599–1605.Google Scholar
Graff, GD, Cullen, SE, Bradford, KJ, Zilberman, D and Bennett, AB (2003) The public–private structure of intellectual property ownership in agricultural biotechnology. Nature Biotechnology 21, 989–995.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hanel, P and St-Pierre, M (2006) Industry–university collaboration by Canadian manufacturing firms. The Journal of Technology Transfer 31, 485–499.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hatanaka, M, Carmen, B and Lawrence, B (2005) Third-party certification in the global agrifood system. Food policy 30, 354–369.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayashi, T (2003) Effect of R&D programmes on the formation of university–industry–government networks: comparative analysis of Japanese R&D programmes. Research Policy 32, 1421–1442.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hess, DJ (2007) Alternative Pathways in Science and Industry: Activism, Innovation, and the Environment in an era of Globalization, urban and Industrial Environments. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howard, PH (2016) Concentration and Power in the Food System: Who Controls What We Eat?, vol. 3. New York, NY: Bloomsbury Publishing.Google Scholar
Jones, P, Comfort, D and Hillier, D (2017) European food and drink wholesalers and sustainability. European Journal of Sustainability 1, 1–12.Google Scholar
Jongbloed, B, Enders, J and Salerno, C (2008) Higher education and its communities: interconnections, interdependencies and a research agenda. Higher Education 56, 303–324.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kleinfeld, J (2016) The double life of international law: indigenous peoples and extractive industries. Harvard Law Review 129, 1755.Google Scholar
Kleinman, DL (1998) Untangling context: understanding a university laboratory in the commercial world. Science, Technology & Human Values 23, 285.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kleinman, DL (2003) Impure Cultures: University Biology and the World of Commerce. Madison, Wis: Science and technology in society, University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Konefal, J, Mascarenhas, M and Hatanaka, M (2005) Governance in the global agro-food system: backlighting the role of transnational supermarket chains. Agriculture and Human Values 22, 291.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Konefal, J, Hatanaka, M and Constance, DH (2014) Patchworks of sustainable agriculture standards and metrics in the United States. In Alternative Agrifood Movements: Patterns of Convergence and Divergence. Bingley, UK: Emerald Group Publishing Limited, pp. 257–280.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Korten, DC (1995) When Corporations Rule the World. West Hartford, CT: Kumarian Press.Google Scholar
Lei, Z, Juneja, R and Wright, BD (2009) Patents versus patenting: implications of intellectual property protection for biological research. Nature Biotechnology 27, 36–40.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Link, AN and Siegel, DS (2005) University-based technology initiatives: quantitative and qualitative evidence. Research Policy 34, 253–257.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maloni, MJ and Brown, ME (2006) Corporate social responsibility in the supply chain: an application in the food industry. Journal of business ethics 68, 35–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marks, JH (2014) Toward a systemic ethics of public–private partnerships related to food and health. Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 24, 267–299.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martin, B (1999) Suppressing research data: methods, context, accountability, and responses. Accountability in Research 6, 333–372.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McMillan, GS, Narin, F and Deeds, DL (2000) An analysis of the critical role of public science in innovation: the case of biotechnology. Research Policy 29, 1–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McSherry, C (2001) Who Owns Academic Work: Battling for Control of Intellectual Property. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
McWilliams, A and Siegel, D (2001) Corporate social responsibility: a theory of the firm perspective. Academy of Management Review 26, 117–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mohr, LA and Webb, DJ (2005) The effects of corporate social responsibility and price on consumer responses. Journal of Consumer Affairs 39, 121–147.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mowery, DC and Sampat, BN (2004) The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 and university–industry technology transfer: a model for other OECD governments? The Journal of Technology Transfer 30, 115–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nikulainen, T (2010) The outcomes of individual-level technology transfer and the role of research collaboration networks, ETLA discussion paper.Google Scholar
Nurhadi, D and Wu, MC (2016) Developing partnership program between polytechnic and industry in the remote area: a strategy to improve graduates quality. International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies 17, 1125.Google Scholar
Owen-Smith, J (2006) Commercial imbroglios: proprietary science and the contemporary university. In The New Political Sociology of Science: Institutions, Networks, and Power. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, pp. 63–90.Google Scholar
Pardey, PG and Beintema, NM (2001) Slow Magic: Agricultural R&D A Century After Mendel. Washington, DC: Intl Food Policy Res Inst.Google Scholar
Powers, JB and Campbell, EG (2011) Technology commercialization effects on the conduct of research in higher education. Research in Higher Education 52, 245–260.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Poyago-Theotoky, J, Beath, J and Siegel, DS (2002) Universities and fundamental research: reflections on the growth of university–industry partnerships. Oxford Review of Economic Policy 18, 10–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rohrbeck, R and Arnold, HM (2006) Making university-industry collaboration work-a case study on the Deutsche Telekom Laboratories contrasted with findings in literature, paper presented to ISPIM Annual Conference: ‘Networks for Innovation’, Athens, Greece.Google Scholar
Ross, SA (1973) The economic theory of agency: the principal's problem. The American Economic Review 63, 134–139.Google Scholar
Sellenthin, MO (2009) Technology transfer offices and university patenting in Sweden and Germany. The Journal of Technology Transfer 34, 603–620.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shamir, R (2011) Socially responsible private regulation: world-culture or world-capitalism? Law & Society Review 45, 313–336.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Siegel, DS, Waldman, DA, Atwater, LE and Link, AN (2003) Commercial knowledge transfers from universities to firms: improving the effectiveness of university–industry collaboration. The Journal of High Technology Management Research 14, 111–133.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sterckx, S (2011) Patenting and licensing of university research: promoting innovation or undermining academic values? Science and Engineering Ethics 17, 45–64.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Stevens, DE and Thevaranjan, A (2005) Is there Room Within Principal-Agent Theory for Ethics?.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, PB (2015) From Field to Fork: Food Ethics for Everyone. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UN (2008) United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. pp. 1–18.Google Scholar
Vanloqueren, G and Baret, PV (2009) How agricultural research systems shape a technological regime that develops genetic engineering but locks out agroecological innovations. Research Policy 38, 971–983.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Waltz, E (2009) Under wraps. Nature Biotechnology 27, 880–882.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weidner, CH (1974) Water for A City; A History of New York City's Problem From the Beginning to the Delaware River System. New Brunswick, N.J: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Welsh, R and Glenna, L (2006) Considering the role of the university in conducting research on agri-biotechnologies. Social Studies of Science 36, 929–942.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wright, BD (2007) Agricultural innovation after the diffusion of intellectual property protection. In Kesan, JP (ed.), Agricultural Biotechnology and Intellectual Property: Seeds of Change. Cambridge, MA: CABI International, pp. 1–18.Google Scholar
Xia, Y and Buccola, S (2005) University life science programs and agricultural biotechnology. American Journal of Agricultural Economics 87, 229–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar