Business, Society and Subalterness: Revisiting Political CSR from a Creolized Perspective

This conceptual paper proposes a new research agenda for political CSR (PCSR) by drawing from a Creolized perspective to reconceptualize the interactions between business, government, and marginalized groups of society. Based on based on the work of scholars from literature studies, cultural theory and political science, the Creolized perspective proposed here offers unique insights into the way marginalized groups create their own opportunities to express themselves despite their invisibilization or silencing from the public sphere. The paper makes two important contributions to PCSR. First, it challenges the dichotomous view of society held in the literature by showing that a subaltern sphere complements the public–private divide so far discussed. Second, the paper shows that in the subaltern sphere, marginalized groups express their agency in ways that remain invisible to business and government until unexpected crises occur. Overall, the proposed creolized perspective paves the way for a profound rethinking of (P)CSR to align it with the times of division that characterize the current world and create new challenges for business.