Corporate social responsibility in face of global financial crisis: evidence from Nigeria

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been an important global issue all over the world. Proponents of CSR claim that it has lots of benefits for the company such as good reputation, competitive advantage and trust; on the other hand opponents claim that CSR cannot protect a firm from financial harm in times of crisis. The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of financial crisis on the level of CSR activities of firms in Nigeria and conceptually examine the behaviour of firms in implementing CSR activities in the time of financial crisis. Also, a survey was conducted to explore the impact of global financial crisis on firm's implementation of CSR project in Nigeria using randomly selected oil firms. Data was generated through the use of questionnaires while descriptive statistics was employed in analysing date. The result shows that there is a significant decrease in CSR activities of firms in times of financial crisis. However, was an overwhelming evidence of CSR strategic benefits to firms during crisis era. The study recommended further in-depth study on the effects of the global financial crisis.