Yury Masliukov: social responsibility is a product of co-operation of employer and employee

In connection with the international round-table conference devoted to the problem of social responsibility in business Pravda.ru addressed State Duma depute Yury Masliukov with the following question: What is social responsibility in business? – is it a good will of the administration or necessity of the market economy? - The problem Social responsibility has ripened in Russia. Big business, creating a kind of territory-corporation, takes a burden of social responsibility. Employees of corporation, who are electors at the same time, become an object of double interest. A worker, living in a small town where only one factory exists, has no choice when he applies for a job. But the factory doesn’t have other workers, too. The labour-market is limited. Social contradiction grows into political one, though both parties of the conflict are interested in the peaceful adjustment of it. Until recently the attitude of businessman to workers could be expressed in words: “Where else shall you go?”. But while the crisis is being overcame, while the economy develops, the businessman is getting more and more interested in his company. He becomes interested in production and in its quality. The profit becomes dependent on wage earner. In fact social responsibility is a product of equitable co-operation of employer and employee. It’s a product of agreement. It’s not an object of good will of an employer but a result of his interest in the wage earner.