Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop an original framework to explore corporate social
responsibility (CSR) plays a mediation role between green organizational culture and green product
innovation performance.
Design/methodology/approach – This study divides CSR into proactive CSR and reactive CSR.
This research employs an empirical study by means of the questionnaire survey method to verify the
hypotheses and to explore its managerial implications in Taiwanese manufacturing companies.
Structural equation modeling is applied to verify the research framework.
Findings – The empirical results verify that green organizational culture positively affects proactive
CSR and green product innovation performance. This study shows that proactive CSR mediates the
positive relationship between green organizational culture and green product innovation performance,
but reactive CSR does not. Green organizational culture is a driving force for proactive CSR and
green product innovation performance. Organizational members in Taiwanese companies are
exposed to green organizational culture which influences CSR activities. Moreover, this study verifies
that proactive CSR of large companies are significantly higher than those of small and medium
enterprises (SMEs).
Research limitations/implications – There are three limitations of this study. First, this study
verifies the hypotheses by means of questionnaire survey which only includes cross-sectional data.
Second, this study utilize self-reported data may suffer the problems of common method variance.
Third, this study applies a “five-point Likert scale” ranging from 1 to 5 to measure the constructs.
Future research can apply a “seven-point Likert scale” to measure the constructs and compare with
this study to test the significance of the variability of the data. There are two implications emerging
from the study. First, proactive CSR has a positive effect on green product innovation performance,
but reactive CSR does not. Second, green organizational culture is a driving force for proactive CSR and
green product innovation performance.
Originality/value – This study summarizes the literature of CSR into a new managerial framework
and highlights the importance of proactive CSR. Therefore, green organizational culture cannot only
affect green product innovation performance directly, but also influence it indirectly via proactive
CSR in the Taiwanese manufacturing industry. Taiwanese manufacturing companies can increase
their green organizational culture and proactive CSR to enhance their green product innovation
performance. This study also explores that proactive CSR of large companies are significantly higher
than those of SME.
