Inclusiveness Regime
Corporate social responsibility first became a public policy issue in Denmark in the early to mid-1990s. In January 1994, Minister of Social Affairs, Social Democrat Karen Jespersen launched the campaign:‘‘Our common concern’’ (‘‘Det anga ̊r os alle’’), which became a catalyst for gov- ernmental action on CSR in Denmark as well as other European countries (Metaxas and Tsavdaridou 2010) and would later lead to the introduction of the notion of ‘‘the inclusive labor market’’ to the CSR debate (Bredgaard
1 See Midttun et al. (2012), for an elaborate presentation of the project and its findings. See also Gjølberg (2010).
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2004). The aim of the campaign was to actively involve business in addressing domestic employment-related problems via social—public–private—partnerships and other vehicles (Andersen and Mailand 2002; Nelson and Zadek 2000). Companies were to be engaged, on a vol- untary basis, in modes of collaboration working on top of legislation and collective bargaining agreements. With a strong focus on the inclusion of weak and marginalized groups (immigrants, disabled and long-term unemployed people etc.), the campaign was about preventing unem- ployment, retaining employees through reassignment after illness or accidents, and integrating people into the work- force by encouraging training and employment of the unemployed (Bredgaard 2004; Morsing 2005).