CSR Leaders
At CSR International, we aim to share the CSR insights of the world's best thought-leaders and leaders-in-practice.
Another way is by allowing CSR professionals, students and enthusiasts to tell us who they think are the leaders that have had or are having the biggest impact on CSR. This section of the website allows members to 'vote' on their favourites.
Here, we also present the results of the 2009 CSR International Leaders Ranking, which is based on an online poll conducted during February 2009.
Top 100 Leaders
1. Al GORE – Former US Vice President, An Inconvenient Truth2. Barack OBAMA – US President, The Audacity of Hope
3. Anita RODDICK –The Body Shop International, Business As Unusual
4. John ELKINGTON – Volans, The Power of Unreasonable People
5. Muhammad YUNUS – Grameen Bank, Creating a World Without Poverty
6. Diana VERDE NIETO – Clownfish Marketing
7. Kofi ANNAN – Former UN Secretary General
8. Jonathon PORRITT –Forum for the Future, Capitalism as if the World Matters
9. Simon ZADEK – AccountAbility, Tomorrow’s History
10. Tom ROTHERHAM - Radley Yeldar, UN Principles for Responsible Investment
11. Peter UTTING – UNRISD, Reclaiming Development Agendas
12. Bill GATES – Microsoft, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
13. HRH Prince CHARLES – British Royal, The Prince’s Charities
14. Paul HAWKEN – Natural Capital Institute, Blessed Unrest
15. Naomi KLEIN – No Logo, The Shock Doctrine
16. Ray ANDERSON – Interface, Mid-Course Correction
17. Maria SILLANPAA – Sustainability Advisory Group, The Stakeholder Corporation
17. C.K. PRAHALAD – Michigan University, The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid
18. Mary ROBINSON – Former Irish President, Oxfam International
19. Amory LOVINS – Rocky Mountain Institute, Winning the Oil Endgame
20. Nelson MANDELA – Former South African President, Long Walk to Freedom
21. John RUGGIE – Harvard University, UN Special Advisor on Human Rights
22. Michael MOORE – Roger & Me, Downsize This!
23. George MONBIOT – Heat, Bring on the Apocalypse
24. Bill CLINTON - Former US President, Giving
25. Noam CHOMSKY – MIT, Profit Over People
26. Richard WELFORD – Hong Kong University, CSR Asia
27. Amartya SEN – Harvard University, Development As Freedom
28. David GRAYSON – Cranfield University, Corporate Social Opportunity
29. Jeffrey SACHS – Columbia University, Common Wealth
30. Alan KNIGHT – Single Planet Living, UK Sustainable Development Commission
31. Wayne VISSER –CSR International, The A to Z of Corporate Social Responsibility
32. Jane NELSON – Harvard University, Profits With Principles
33. E.F. SCHUMACHER – Schumacher College, Small is Beautiful
34. James LOVELOCK – Gaia, The Revenge of Gaia
35. David SUZUKI – David Suzuki Foundation, David Suzuki’s Green Guide
36. Vandana SHIVA – Navdanya, Staying Alive
37. George SOROS – The Open Society Institute, The Crisis of Global Capitalism
38. Joseph STIGLITZ – Columbia University, Globalization and Its Discontents
39. Nicholas STERN – LSE, The Economics of Climate Change (The Stern Review)
40. Rachel CARSON – Silent Spring
41. Stuart HART – Cornell University, Capitalism at the Crossroads
42. Georg KELL – UN Global Compact
43. Will HUTTON – The Work Foundation, The Writing on the Wall
44. William MCDONOUGH – MBDC, Cradle to Cradle
45. Herman DALY – Maryland University, For the Common Good
46. Peter DRUCKER – The Age of Discontinuity, Managing the Non-profit Organization
47. Stephan SCHMIDHEINY – AVINA, Walking the Talk
48. Adrian HODGES – IBLF, Corporate Social Opportunity
49. R. Edward FREEMAN – Virginia University, Managing for Stakeholders
50. Zac GOLDSMITH – UK Conservative Party, The Ecologist Magazine (formerly)
51. Allen WHITE – Tellus Institute, Global Reporting Initiative (formerly)
52. Archie B. CARROLL – Georgia University, Business & Society
53. Christopher AVERY – Responsibility Redefined
54. Julia CLEVERDON – Business in the Community, Teach First
55. Peter SENGE – MIT, The Necessary Revolution
56. Ralph NADER – Project for Corporate Responsibility, Corporation Nation
57. Wangari MAATHAI – Green Belt Movement, Unbowed
58. Charles HANDY – The Hungry Spirit, The New Philanthropists
59. Dirk MATTEN – York University, The Oxford Handbook of CSR
60. Jeffrey HOLLANDER – Seventh Generation, What Matters Most
61. Thomas FRIEDMAN – New York Times, The Lexus and the Olive Tree
62. Anita LONGLEY – RWE
63. Aron CRAMER – BSR, Raising the Bar
64. Hernando DE SOTO – ILD, The Mystery of Capital
65. Jared DIAMOND – UCLA, Collapse
66. Jeffrey IMMELT – General Electric (G.E.)
67. L. Hunter LOVINS – Natural Capitalism Inc, Natural Capitalism
68. Tim SMIT – Eden Project, Eden
69. Adrian HENRIQUES – Middlesex University, The Triple Bottom Line
70. David VOGEL – California University (Berkeley), The Market for Virtue
71. Geoffrey CHANDLER – Amnesty International UK Business Group
72. Joel BAKAN – British Columbia University, The Corporation
73. Paul EKINS – Kings College London, Real Life Economics
74. Andrew WINSTON – Winston Eco-Strategies, Green to Gold
75. Bjorn STIGSON – World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD)
76. Donella MEADOWS – The Limits to Growth, Beyond the Limits
77. Fritjof CAPRA – The Turning Point, The Hidden Connections
78. Janine BENYUS – The Biomimicry Institute, Biomimicry
79. Malcolm MCINTOSH – Coventry University, Raising a Ladder to the Moon
80. Philip KOTLER – Northwestern University, Corporate Social Responsibility
81. R. Buckminster FULLER – An Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth
82. T. Boone PICKENS –Clean Energy, Mesa Water
83. Tessa TENNANT – ICE Organisation, AsrIA,
84. Vaclav HAVEL – Former President of Czech Republic
85. Ben COHEN – Ben & Jerry’s, Values-Driven Business
86. OPAL – EPFL Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels, Fair Trade
87. David E. HAWKINS – PSL, Corporate Social Responsibility
88. David PEARCE – UCL (formerly), Blueprint for a Sustainable Economy
89. Deborah LEIPZIGER – SA8000, The Corporate Responsibility Code Book
90. Henry MINTZBERG – McGill University, Strategy Safari
91. James HANSEN – NASA, Columbia University
92. Lester BROWN – Earth Policy Institute, Plan B
93. Manfred MAX-NEEF - CEPAUR, Human-Scale Development
94. Michael HOPKINS – MCH International, CSR and International Development
95. Rob GRAY – Glasgow University, Accounting for the Environment
96. Sandra A. WADDOCK – Boston College, The Difference Makers
97. Steven LYDENBERG – Domini Social Investments, Corporations and the Public Interest
98. Bill MCKIBBEN – The End of Nature, Deep Economy
99. David KORTEN – When Corporations Rule the World, Agenda for a New Economy
100. David WHEELER - Dalhousie University, The Stakeholder Corporation
101. Dexter DUNPHY – UTS, Organizational Change for Corporate Sustainability
102. Hannah JONES – Nike, CSR Europe
103. Howard PEARCE – UK Environment Agency
104. Jeremy LEGGETT – Solarcentury, The Carbon War
105. Jeremy RIFKIN – The Foundation on Economic Trends, The Hydrogen Economy
106. Julia HAILES – Green Consumer Guide, The New Green Consumer Guide
107. Paul C. HUNT – UNEP Finance Initiative
108. Raj THAMOTHERAM – USS, Institutional Investors Group of Climate Change
109. Rhys JENKINS –East Anglea University, Corporate Responsibility and Labour Rights
110. Satish KUMAR – Schumacher College, Resurgence Magazine
111. Thomas HOMER-DIXON – Waterloo University, The Upside of Down
There are over 200 Other CSR Leaders who received votes in the poll, but did not make it onto the Top 10 lists above.
Participants of this public poll that was promoted through various online CSR networks included academics (9%), consultants (35%), government (3%), managers (12%), NGOs/charities (11%), social enterprises (5%), students (3%), CSR 'wannabes' (7%) and others (15%).
We asked participants to: Please select your Top 10 CSR Leaders in terms of their Impact on the Corporate Sustainability & Responsibility (CSR) agenda.
Each participant had only 10 votes and were able to add CSR Leaders who they felt were missing from our list of over 200. We stressed that CSR Leaders could imply thought-leaders and/or leaders-in-practice. We have analysed the over 400 responses from around the world to create the 2009 CSR International Leaders Rankings below, listed according the number of votes they received.