IKEA and Corporate Social Responsibility: A Case Study

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the inadequacy of reliance on the law and the international legal standards in resolving the global ethical issues and to examine IKEA in the context of corporate social responsibility to determine the reasons, if any, as to why IKEA has had more success in the implementation of its CSR policies and Code of Conduct where many other multinational companies seem to have failed. This is a case study, an analytical approach, which focuses on exploring and analyzing the CSR policies to measure IKEA's ethical behavior in a business environment. IKEA stands out as a multinational company whose CSR policies are ingrained into the business itself as a part of its ethical operations, rather than a marketing event. Whether they be human rights issue or environmental issue, IKEA goes beyond giving mere lip service to the ethical issues that arise in the global environment and seeks solution beyond resolution of bad publicity which affects the bottom dollar. Beyond profit, IKEA actively works together with its suppliers and the nation states to eradicate the harmful social causes of the various challenges it faces in the global business environment.