Corporate social responsibility and environmental research and development

The paper models corporate investments in environmental research and development (R&D) as investments in corporate social responsibility. The theory is tested using primary data collected by surveys of U.S. industry along with data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Census, and other public and private sources of information about corporations and their industries. The theory and the empirical study support the hypothesis that socially responsible corporate investments in environmental R&D increase with corporate self-interest in reducing pollution caused by toxic emissions. Consequently, corporate environmental R&D investments depend on both public policy and the structure of markets.