Social Responsibility in Pandemic Times: Analysis of the Strategies of Cooperatives in Rio Grande do Sul Based on the Stakeholder Theory

Abstract

Considering the socioeconomic, organizational and territorial impacts of the pandemic, the relevance and the cooperative practices in this context and for territorial development, and the relevance of studies on social responsibility and stakeholders, this article aims to analyze how responsibility social is configured in cooperativism in times of pandemic in the light of the stakeholder theory. To this end, interviews with managers and employees of four cooperatives in Rio Grande do Sul were used as the data collection methodology, and content analysis for data interpretation. The results show that the pandemic affected the dynamics of stakeholder relationships, conditioning the analyzed cooperatives to seek strategies to conduct social responsibility actions, based on stakeholder management. The strategies include the optimization of organizational processes and services, with emphasis on information and communication technologies, as well as the implementation of cooperative strategies of solidarity and awareness and prevention of Covid-19 with stakeholders. The study concludes that social responsibility strategies, implemented by the analyzed cooperatives and combined with stakeholder management, contribute to the sustainability of the cooperatives in the pandemic scenario.

Keywords

• responsabilidade social corporativa
• teoria dos stakeholders
• cooperativismo