South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Volume and Issues Obtainable at Center for Business Research and Consulting,

IBMAS, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur Pakistan

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies
ISSN: 2710-5318; ISSN (E): 2710-5164

Volume 5, No.1, June 2023

Journal homepage: https://journals.iub.edu.pk/index.php/sabas

Foundation of Corporate Social Responsibility and Innovation for Achieving

Competitive Advantage

Muhammad Gulraiz, University of the Punjab, Pakistan
Dr. Rab Nawaz Lodhi, University of the Punjab, Pakistan

ARTICLE DETAILS ABSTRACT

History

Revised format:

May 2023

Available Online:

June 2023

Keywords
Corporate social
responsibility,
bibliometric analysis,
frugal innovation,
competitive advantage

The modern business environment requires organizations to constantly
look for ways to gain a competitive advantage. This study bibliometrically
describes and depicts the knowledge about corporate social responsibility
and innovations as a source of competitive advantage. We have extracted
the 428 articles from WoS database during 2009 to 2023. This study
applied a two stage bibliometric approach to analyze the sampled articles.
In the first stage, the selection of the keywords: “corporate social
responsibility” OR “frugal innovation” OR “disruptive innovation” AND
“competitive advantage” being used in the search bar of WoS database. In
the second stage, VOSviewer software was used on the data file extracted
from the WoS database for bibliometric analysis techniques. The findings
enabled us to identify how different regions of the globe that have
contributed most significantly to the expansion of this field of knowledge
as well as the most significant authors, articles and journals. Current study
has some limitations like documents were extracted from only one
database e.g. WoS and this study ignored the other sources like Scopus
and Google scholar. The findings have implications for research scholars,
practitioners and policy makers for in-depth knowledge of the current
study indicators. This research further provides future trends in the
development of CSR knowledge. The originality of the paper contributes
to the knowledge of bibliometric approach to disseminate trends in CSR as
most relevant source of competitive advantage from the WoS database.

Commercial 4.0 international license

Corresponding author’s email address: gulraiz907@gmail.com

DOI: 10.52461/sabas.v5i1.1811

Introduction

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is an essential concept in contemporary business, reflecting

the increasing awareness of companies of their social and environmental responsibilities (Abbas

& Dogan, 2022). The utmost goal of every organization is to increase customer trust and gain

competitive edge (Hang et al, 2022). Companies are introducing new research directions that

combine CSR and innovation in an effort to sustain their competitive position in global economy

(Nyuur et al., 2019). As a result, there has been a significant increase in the literature on CSR. The

reason is that the innovation is not just focused by the progress of new knowledge and skills, but

https://journals.iub.edu.pk/index.php/sabas
mailto:gulraiz907@gmail.com

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

also by the increasing worlds’ emphasis on CSR issues. Companies must now take into account

the social and environmental impacts of their operations, foster employee creativity, work with

suppliers, customers, and other partners to develop novel products and services that integrate CSR,

innovation, and competitive advantage in order to succeed and foster innovation. Reputation and

performance of firms is improved by taking various measures to cater customers’ consciousness,

environment, and market competition (Lewin et al., 2020). As a result of their ability to provide

value for their commercial competitiveness while also having a beneficial influence on society and

the environment, firms must integrate CSR and innovation if they want to succeed in the

contemporary worldwide economy. Business success depends heavily on innovation because it

forces organizations to customize their goods and services in novel ways that provide them a

distinct advantage over rivals. There has been upward interest in the connotation among CSR,

innovation, and competitive advantage. However, research on the relationship among these three

concepts is still needed. This paper aims to conduct a bibliometric analysis of the literature on

CSR, innovation, and competitive advantage to find out new trends, gaps, and future directions

and to provide a comprehensive summary of the current research on the incorporation of CSR,

innovation and competitive advantage. The paper will also create a visual map to present an overall

pattern of research in this field, helping researchers to understand the current development trend,

and the predicted future trail. To achieve this goal, the paper addressed the following research

questions (RQs):

i. What are the publications by year in CSR, innovation and competitive advantage?
ii. What are the most frequently cited articles, frequently occurred keywords, top authors, top

countries and collaborations in CSR, innovation and competitive advantage?

iii. What are the implications and future directions for CSR, innovation and competitive
advantage?

Methods

Current study has performed bibliometric techniques of the extant literature on CSR, innovation,

and competitive advantage extracted using the WoS database. The reasons to use bibliometric

analysis are twofold; first, a large amount of data over a period of time can be analyzed with

bibliometric analysis and it uses the mathematical, statistical and graphical tools (Song & Wang,

2020). Second, it also offers novel research ideas to researchers working on core literature around

the world (Sedita et al., 2020).

Data Collection

For this study the researchers extracted the articles which were published in Web of Science

database between 2009 and 2023 that included the terms "corporate social responsibility,"

"disruptive innovation,", "frugal innovation," and "competitive advantage" in the title as keywords.

Scientific papers were collected and analyzed from WoS publications which is most acceptable

database (González-Serrano et al., 2020). WoS database has a significant number of journals and

publications which fulfill the requirements of peer review (Vázquez-Ingelmo et al., 2019).

Figure 1 depicts the logical order of gathering the data from WoS database. First, the original

published papers were included in the field of management. Second, Books, editorials, conference

proceedings papers, and book chapters and Non-English articles were eliminated (Hartling et al.,

2017; Lee et al., 2019). Finally, 428 articles based in WOS were included for bibliometric analysis.

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Bibliometric Analysis

Bibliometric analysis methods are categorized in various ways (Aria & Cuccurullo, 2017; Donthu

et al., 2021; Durieux & Gevenois, 2010; Zupic & Čater, 2015). By applying bibliometric analysis

method, VOSviewer software and R package were used on the data file extracted from the WoS

database for analysis of co-citation, co-occurrence of keywords, citation, co-authorship by country

and bibliographic coupling.

Results

The results of the bibliographic analysis reveal several important developments in the CSR,

innovation and competitive advantage literature. First, there is growing interest in the link between

CSR and innovation. Numerous studies have found that CSR can foster innovation by presenting

fresh ideas, resources and perspectives. Second, there is a direct link between innovation and

competitive advantage. Several studies highlight the role innovation plays in building lasting

competitive advantage. Third, further research is needed to understand the complex relationship

between CSR, innovation and competitive advantage, especially in the context of emerging

markets and small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

The analysis also identified numerous gaps in the literature. For example, currently there is a lack

of understanding of how CSR can support disruptive innovations that could transform industries

and open up new markets. Similarly, more research is needed to understand the precise ways in

which CSR fosters innovation and creates competitive advantage, including stakeholder

engagement, knowledge sharing and networking.

Year base Publications

In this paper, publication patterns from 2009 to 2023 were thoroughly examined. The publishing

trend for publications on CSR, innovation, and competitive advantage from 2009 to 2023 is

depicted in Figure 2. Only 51 out of 428 articles, or around 11.92%, were published between 2009

and 2013; the number of publications began to clearly increase after 2013. This increasing trend

is due to ISO 26000, which offers guidelines to organizations regarding accountability for the

effects of their actions on society and the environment. The increasing trend suggests that these

subjects are being studied academically, especially in recent years. Moreover, 88% of papers (377)

were available in the last decade 2014-2023 whereas 54% of papers (231) were available in the

last five years 2019-2023.

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Co-Citation Analysis

A bibliometric technique that identifies the most frequently cited authors in a particular field of

study is co-citation analysis (Pilkington et al, 2006). Table 1 reports the top 10 co-cited authors in

the literature on CSR, innovation, and competitive advantage, based on the WoS database. Results

show that Carroll, AB is the most co-cited author with 291 citations and 3801 total link strength

during the sampled period.

Table 1: Top 10 Co-Cited Authors

Ranks Keyword Citations Total link strength

1 Carroll, AB 291 3801

2 McWilliams, A 195 3008

3 Porter, ME 156 2186

4 Jamali, D 131 1858

5 Orlitzky, M 109 1915

6 Brammer, S 100 1744

7 Matten, D 93 1654

8 Friedman, M 84 1309

9 Aguinis, H 78 1463

10 Maignan, I 75 1112

Source: WoS

Figure 3: Co-citation analysis

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Figure 3 shows a co-citation network map that visualizes the relationships between the top 10

authors. Each author is represented by a node, and the thickness of the line connecting the nodes

indicates the strength of the co-citation analysis. This network map lists groups of authors who are

often cited together, showing that researchers have significant contributions to the CSR,

innovation, and competitive advantage literature. The current study may also indicate that some

authors are well-known within the network, meaning they are frequently cited with many others

and could have a significant impact on the field. Overall, co-citation analysis provides valuable

insight into the subject's intellectual structure and the major authors who contributed to its

development. It helps researchers identify key issues, trends, and research gaps to guide research

directions for future studies.

Co-Occurrence Analysis

Co-occurrence analysis depicts visual map that can be used to analyze the frequency of occurrence

of keywords in the literature (Jalal, 2019). Table 2 shows the top 10 keywords that are most

frequently used in the literature on CSR, innovation, and sustainability, etc. based on the WoS

database. Most frequent keyword is corporate social responsibility with 234 frequencies and 178

total link strength.

Table 2: Top 10 frequently occurred keywords

Ranks Keyword Frequency Total link strength

1 Corporate social responsibility 234 178

2 Sustainability 23 35

3 Sustainable development 17 22

4 Corporate governance 14 21

5 Stakeholder theory 14 22

6 Frugal innovation 12 6

7 Social responsibility 12 11

8 Stakeholder engagement 11 19

9 Financial performance 10 15

10 Corporate reputation 8 13

Source: WoS

Figure 4: Occurrence of keywords

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Figure 4 depicts a co-occurrence network map that visualizes the relationships between the mostly

occurred keywords. Each keyword is represented by a node, and the thickness of the line

connecting the nodes indicates the strength of the co-occurrence analysis. A cluster of keywords

often used together indicates that they are closely related concepts in the CSR, innovation, and

competitive advantage literature. Certain keywords are the center of the network. This means they

often appear alongside many other keywords and may be of particular importance to the subject.

Co-occurrence network maps help researchers visually explore and analyze relationships between

keywords in the literature, enabling a deeper understanding of intellectual patterns in the field.

Citation Analysis

The most highly cited documents are identified in the literature through citation analysis (Alshater

et al., 2022). Table 3 shows the top 10 most highly cited documents in the literature on CSR,

innovation, and competitive advantage, based on the WoS database. Marquis (2014) explores the

role of cultural and institutional factors in modeling corporate social responsibility, while Chatterji

(2009) identifies links between environmental and financial performance. Other frequently cited

documents highlight areas such as stakeholder engagement (Gond, 2017), frugal innovation (Melo,

2012), and multinational corporate social responsibility (Maon, 2010).

Table 3: Top 10 cited documents

Ranks Keyword Citations Total link strength

1 Marquis (2014) 714 6

2 Chatterji (2009) 583 9

3 Albuquerque (2019) 341 1

4 Gond (2017b) 305 8

5 Tang (2015) 255 3

6 Melo (2012) 255 7

7 Bauman (2012) 246 2

8 Dobers (2009a) 226 5

9 Edmans (2012) 204 1

10 Maon (2010) 192 1

Source: WoS

Figure 5: Citation analysis

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Figure 5 presents the content of the most cited literature to identify key themes and literature

contributions on CSR, innovation and competitive advantage. Overall, citation analysis provides

valuable insight into the most influential and impactful documents in the literature on a particular

topic. This helps researchers identify the major themes, theories, and contributions that have

shaped the field, and can guide future research directions. By analyzing the content of frequently

cited documents, researchers gain a deeper understanding of the scientific structure, key debates,

and existing controversies in the field.

Co-authorship by Country Analysis

The patterns of collaboration among researchers can be analyzed by using co-authorship technique

(Kalhor et al, 2022). Table 4 shows the top 10 countries for the number of co-authored publications

on CSR, innovation and competitive advantage, based on the WoS database. Looking at the top 10

countries, results show that the majority of co-authored documents were produced by UK

researchers, followed by Spain, the US and China.

Table 4: Top 10 co-authorship by countries

Ranks Keyword Documents Total link strength

1 United Kingdom 83 91

2 Spain 50 35

3 USA 46 44

4 Peoples of China 40 39

5 Netherlands 31 34

6 Australia 26 24

7 France 25 36

8 Italy 24 21

9 Germany 21 20

10 Brazil 15 10

Source: WoS

Figure 6: Top 10 country collaborations index

Figure 6 shows that countries are particularly dynamic in research cooperation related to CSR,

innovation and competitive advantage. It is noteworthy that all of the top four countries are

geographically diverse, suggesting that international collaboration is a major driver of research in

this area. Furthermore, the inclusion of countries such as the Netherlands, Australia and Italy in

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

the top 10 suggests that research on CSR, innovation and competitive advantage is a truly global

effort with contributions from various countries and regions.

Figure 7: Co-authorship by country analysis

Figure 7 depicts visualization of co-authorship analysis that provides impactful insight into

cooperation patterns among researchers from different countries in specific fields. This network

map identifies the most active and productive countries and helps to provide better understand the

intellectual networks and communities that have developed around CSR, innovation and

competitive advantage research. This can help determine future research directions and facilitate

further collaboration between researchers in different regions working on this field.

Bibliographic Coupling Analysis

Bibliographic coupling analysis visualizes the relationships between documents based on shared

references (Nájera-Sánchez et al., 2020). Based on the WoS database, table 5 presents the 10 most

cited authors in CSR, innovation and competitive advantage literature. Results show that among

the top 10 most cited authors; Cuili Qian was cited 969 times and had the highest overall link

strength of 894. This shows that Cuili Qian has made significant contributions to research on CSR,

innovation and competitive advantage. It is also worth noting that some of the top 10 authors have

published papers together. This is reflected in the overall link strength of the joint. The results

show that Swaen, Valerie had a very strong overall connection with Gond, Jean-Pascal and Maon,

Francois proposing that they collaborated on some multiple publications.

Table 5: Top 10 cited authors

Ranks Keyword Citations Total link strength

1 Qian, Cuili 969 894

2 Marquis, Christopher 739 335

3 Swaen, Valerie 529 1431

4 Gond, Jean-Pascal 443 1032

5 Chen, Guoli 388 880

6 Tang, Yi 388 880

7 Scherer, Andreas Georg 338 742

8 Lindgreen, Adam 330 1672

9 Maon, Francois 330 1672

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

10 Melo, Tiago 324 693

Source: WoS

Figure 8: Bibliographic coupling analysis

Figure 8 shows the most cited authors, including Marquis and Christopher; Swaen, Valerie; Gond,

Jean-Pascal, Chen, Guoli. All of these authors have made significant contributions to this area of

research, as proved by their network visualizations. A visualization map provides impactful insight

into the associations between documents within a particular area. By ascertaining the most cited

authors and the associations between them, this research may lead to a better understanding of

scholarly networks and communities developed around research in related fields.

Research Implications

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and innovation are two significant research themes that have

been widely studied in the literature and are closely related. The most cited authors and keywords

provide insight into the most impactful researchers and research topics in the field and can be used

to guide future research. A bibliographic coupling analysis found several leading authors who have

been widely cited and have made significant contributions to the areas of CSR, innovation and

competitive advantage. Their work can serve as a basis for future research and guide the

development of theory in this field.

Conclusion

Bibliographic analysis provided insight into the most dominant authors, research themes and

countries in the areas of CSR, innovation and competitive advantage. The results highlight the link

between CSR and innovation and the importance of considering how these practices can lead to

competitive advantage for companies. The results of this analysis will serve as a guide for future

research and as a basis for theoretical development in this area. Bibliographic analysis provides

insight into the current state of research on CSR, innovation and competitive advantage. Research

results show that the importance of CSR and innovation is increasingly recognized for creating

competitive advantage, but the composite interaction of these concepts requires further research.

This study highlights several areas where future research could make an important contribution in

understanding the links between CSR, innovation and competitive advantage, especially in the

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

context of emerging economies and SMEs. The analysis also identified numerous gaps in the

literature. For instance, there is a current lack of understanding of how CSR can support disruptive

innovations that have the potential to transform industries and go for new markets.

Research Limitations

Current study has some limitations like documents were extracted from only one database e.g.

WoS and this study ignored the other sources like Scopus, and Google scholar etc. Only published

articles were included in the analysis for the period of 2009 to 2023.

References

Abbas, J., & Dogan, E. (2022). The impacts of organizational green culture and corporate social

responsibility on employees’ responsible behaviour towards the society. Environmental

Science and Pollution Research, 29(40), 60024-60034.

Alshater, M. M., Hassan, M. K., Rashid, M., & Hasan, R. (2022). A bibliometric review of the

Waqf literature. Eurasian Economic Review, 12(2), 213-239.

Aria, M., & Cuccurullo, C. (2017). A brief introduction to bibliometrix. Journal of Informetrics,

11(4), 959-975.

Chatterji, A. K., Levine, D. I., & Toffel, M. W. (2009). How well do social ratings actually measure

corporate social responsibility? Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, 18(1), 125-

169

Donthu, N., Kumar, S., Mukherjee, D., Pandey, N., & Lim, W. M. (2021). How to conduct a

bibliometric analysis: An overview and guidelines. Journal of Business Research, 133, 285-

296.

Durieux, V., & Gevenois, P. A. (2010). Bibliometric indicators: Quality measurements of

scientific publication. Radiology, 255(2), 342-351.

González-Serrano, M. H., Añó Sanz, V., & González-García, R. J. (2020). Sustainable sport

entrepreneurship and innovation: A bibliometric analysis of this emerging field of research.

Sustainability, 12(12), 5209.

Gond, J. P., El Akremi, A., Swaen, V., & Babu, N. (2017). The psychological microfoundations

of corporate social responsibility: A person‐centric systematic review. Journal of

Organizational Behavior, 38(2), 225-246.

Hang, Y., Sarfraz, M., Khalid, R., Ozturk, I., & Tariq, J. (2022). Does corporate social

responsibility and green product innovation boost organizational performance? a moderated

mediation model of competitive advantage and green trust. Economic research-Ekonomska

istraživanja, 35(1), 5379-5399.

Hartling, L., Featherstone, R., Nuspl, M., Shave, K., Dryden, D. M., & Vandermeer, B. (2017).

Grey literature in systematic reviews: a cross-sectional study of the contribution of non-

English reports, unpublished studies and dissertations to the results of meta-analyses in

child-relevant reviews. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 17, 1-11.

Jalal, S. K. (2019). Co-authorship and co-occurrences analysis using Bibliometrix R-package: A

casestudy of India and Bangladesh. Annals of Library and Information Studies (ALIS),

66(2), 57-64.

Kalhor, G., Asadi Sarijalou, A., Sharifi Sadr, N., & Bahrak, B. (2022). A new insight to the analysis

of co-authorship in Google Scholar. Applied Network Science, 7(1), 1-21.

Lee, A. M., Chavez, S., Bian, J., Thompson, L. A., Gurka, M. J., Williamson, V. G., & Modave,

F. (2019). Efficacy and effectiveness of mobile health technologies for facilitating physical

activity in adolescents: Scoping review. JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 7(2), 11-47.

Maon, F., Lindgreen, A., & Swaen, V. (2010). Organizational stages and cultural phases: A critical

review and a consolidative model of corporate social responsibility development.

International Journal of Management Reviews, 12(1), 20-38.

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023

Marquis, C., & Qian, C. (2014). Corporate social responsibility reporting in China: Symbol or

substance? Organization science, 25(1), 127-148.

Melo, H. (2012). Prosperity through connectedness. Innovations: Technology, Governance,

Globalization, 7(2), 19-23.

Nájera-Sánchez, J.-J., Ortiz-de-Urbina-Criado, M., & Mora-Valentín, E.-M. (2020). Mapping

value co-creation literature in the technology and innovation management field: A

bibliographic coupling analysis. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 588-648.

Nyuur, R. B., Ofori, D. F., & Amponsah, M. M. (2019). Corporate social responsibility and

competitive advantage: A developing country perspective. Thunderbird International

Business Review, 61(4), 551-564.

Pilkington, A., & Teichert, T. (2006). Management of technology: Themes, concepts and

relationships. Technovation, 26(3), 288-299.

Sedita, S. R., Caloffi, A., & Lazzeretti, L. (2020). The invisible college of cluster research: A

bibliometric core–periphery analysis of the literature. Industry and Innovation, 27(5), 562-

584.

Song, P., & Wang, X. (2020). A bibliometric analysis of worldwide educational artificial

intelligence research development in recent twenty years. Asia Pacific Education Review,

21, 473-486.

Vázquez-Ingelmo, A., Garcia-Penalvo, F. J., & Theron, R. (2019). Information dashboards and

tailoring capabilities-a systematic literature review. IEEE Access, 7, 109673-109688.

Zupic, I., & Čater, T. (2015). Bibliometric methods in management and organization.

Organizational Research Methods, 18(3), 429-472.

South Asian Review of Business and Administrative Studies Vol. 5, No. 1, June 2023