Migrants’ engagement in CSR: The case of a Ghanaian migrants’ transnational social enterprise

Academic debate has questioned whether CSR norms and practices are globally converging and highlighted the need to develop a South-centered CSR agenda. Drawing on the concept of codevelopment, we analyze the extent to which immigrant-led transnational businesses can implement Southern-driven CSR actions to address development needs in developing countries. We study the case of Ghanacoop, a transnational agro-food cooperative owned by Ghanaian immigrants in Italy, which implemented philanthropic and Corporate Responsibility Innovation actions. Our analyses are based on 18-months ethnography carried out in Italy and Ghana from 2007 to 2009. We discuss several key aspects of CSR from a management and anthropological view, applying an interdisciplinary discipline. We show how immigrants-led transnational businesses, being rooted both in Western and Southern institutional contexts, can lead CSR practices to globally converge, but also how diaspora engagement in CSR does not necessarily guarantee the conception and implementation of Southern-driven CSR discourses and actions.