MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
THUONG MAI UNIVERSITY
-------------------------
DINH THI HUONG
CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES
TOWARDS EMPLOYEES OF VIETNAM GARMENT
COMPANIES
Major : Commercial business
Code : 62.34.01.21
DOCTORAL DISSERTATION SUMMARY
Hanoi, 2019
The PhD dissertation is completed at Thuong Mai University
Supervisors: 1. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Minh Nhan
2. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Mai Thanh Lan
Examiner 1:………………………………...................…………………
…………………………………………...................……….
Examiner 2:…………………...................………………………………
…………………………………...................……………….
Examiner 3: ………………………………..................…………………
………………………………..................…………………..
The Doctoral dissertation will be defended at Thuong Mai University-
level Board of Examiners at Thuong Mai University at ……….
The Doctoral dissertation can be found at: The National Library of
Vietnam Thuong Mai University’s library
3
INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale for the study
Regarding scientific aspects, the term “corporate social responsibility” has been
officially used for the first time since 1953 when H.R. Bowen published the book
entitled "Social Responsibilities of the Businessman". Corporate social responsibility
(CSR) is a harmonious combination of environmental, social and economic factors in
enterprises' decisions. More and more businesses have already realized that CSR towards
employees plays an important role in business strategy. With a view to achieving good
results in CSR towards employees, enterprises’ managers must ensure the scientific,
systematic and efficient process of CSR implementation.
Regarding legal aspects, not only are employees indispensable to enterprises but they
are also an important force of the society. Employees are associated with their basic rights
in labor relations which are recognized by the law, namely Article 5 of the Labor Code 2012
of Vietnam. Nowadays, not only the rights of employees are stipulated in the labor
regulations but they are also recognized in CSR standards through the code of conduct.
Regarding practical aspects, Garment is the main economic sector of Vietnam. After
20 years of development, over 5000 garment companies are using more than 20% of
workers in industries. Currently, CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises
has been implemented partially in line with labor regulations. However, it still has many
limitations. For a good CSR towards employees, enterprises must pay attention to its
implementation process. In addition, barriers and challenges of garment enterprises are
subjective and objective factors for more complicated CSR for implementation.
On basis of the mentioned-above analysis, the author realizes that the research on
“CSR towards employees in garment companies” is urgent.
2. Research objectives and tasks
Objectives: To propose major scientific and practical solutions to enhance CSR
towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises.
Research tasks: (i) Develop a theoretical framework on the content of CSR towards
employees, the process of implementing CSR, some subjective factors and objective
conditions having impact on CSR towards employees of enterprises; (ii) Study
experiences of foreign garment enterprises and find out lessons learned for Vietnam
garment enterprises; (iii) Analyze and assess the status of the content and
implementation of CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises; (iv)
Analyze how a number of subjective factors can impact the process of implementing
4
CSR towards employees of Vietnamese garment enterprises; (v) Analyze and identify
objective conditions affecting CSR towards employees of Vietnamese garment
enterprises; (vi) Research orientations and opinions on CSR towards employees to
propose solutions and recommendations to enhance CSR towards employees of
Vietnamese garment enterprises from now to 2025 with a vision to 2030.
3. Research questions
For the foregoing research objectives and tasks, the dissertation has to answer the
following questions: (1) What is the content and process of implementing CSR towards
employees of Vietnam garment enterprises? (2) How can subjective factors affect the
process of implementing CSR towards employees and how can objective conditions
have impact on CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises ? (3) What
should we do to enhance CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises as
well as to improve the objective conditions affecting CSR towards employees of
Vietnam garment enterprises?
4. Object and scope of research
Object of research: CSR towards employees of enterprises in general and Vietnam
garment enterprises in particular.
Scope of research: Survey conduction in 308 Vietnam garment enterprises; Research
time: Analysis of data on CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises, namely:
secondary data are collected from 2010 to 2017, primary data are collected from surveys
conducted; Research content: (i) CSR ensuring rights and interests of employees: Labor
contracts, working hours, occupational safety and health, salary and welfare, freedom of
association and collective bargaining; (ii) The process of implementing CSR towards
employees of enterprises from making plan on implementation, implementation and
evaluation of the implementation of CSR towards employees; (iii) Identification of subjective
and objective factors affecting the process of implementing CSR towards employees.
5. New contributions of the dissertation
With regard to academic aspect: The theoretical framework of CSR ensuring
rights and benefits of employees related to labor contracts, working hours,
occupational safety and health... is developed; The theoretical framework of the
implementation of CSR towards employees of enterprises from making plan on
implementation, implementation and evaluation of implementation of CSR towards
employees is scientifically developed; Some key factors affecting the process of
implementing CSR towards employees are identified, hypotheses are created, variables
5
and scales are selected in line with the research context. Namely, independent variables
are business leadership, strategic planning, corporate finance, corporate culture; control
variables are business size; objective factors are the situation of development and
international economic integration, state management on the implementation of CSR
towards employees, code of conduct related to implementation of CSR towards
employees, other stakeholders affecting CSR.
With regard to practical aspects, the dissertation analyzes and evaluates the
situation in a systematic and objective manner and comes to a conclusion that compared
to SMEs, large-scale garment enterprises stand out in terms of implementing clauses
ensuring rights of employees in labor contracts, carrying out advanced health care
programs, social insurance, health insurance for employees. SMEs still have limitations in
ensuring rights of employees, ensuring working hours in line with their commitments,
strictly complying with regulations on rewards for extra working hours in weekdays...
Large enterprises have initially been interested in the process of implementing CSR
towards employees from making plan on implementation, implementation and evaluation
of implementation of CSR towards employees. However, they still have difficulties CSR
implementation accounting, CSR communication and communication report making.
SMEs do not know the whole process of implementing CSR towards employees. The
dissertation also finds out other stakeholders influencing the most CSR towards
employees. The use of exploratory factor EFA, CFA, SEM and Boostrap tests result: CSR
= 0.271*LD + 0.193*HD + 0.180*TC + 0.158*Size and Leadership variable has the
strongest impact. The dissertation proposes some solutions: to enhance the content of the
implementation of CSR towards employees; to promote the implementation of CSR
towards employees; to improve subjective objectivefactors to create favorable conditions
for CSR towards employees of garment enterprises.
5. The dissertation structure
The dissertation has the following chapters:
Chapter 1: Research overview and methodology
Chapter 2: Theoretical and practical framework of CSR towards employees of enterprises
Chapter 3: Situation of CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises
Chapter 4: Solutions to strengthening CSR towards employees of Vietnam garment enterprises.
CHAPTER 1
RESEARCH OVERVIEW AND RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
