Social responsibility is essentially concerned with public interest, social responsibility is seen as the intelligent and objective concern for the welfare of the society which restrains individual and corporate behaviour from ultimate destructive activities,n matter how immediately profitable, and which leads in the direction of positive contributions to human betterment (Cook and Mendleson 1977)
Social responsibility has already been identified as the obligation of decision makers such as marketers to take actions which protect and improve the welfare of society as a whole along with their own interest (Davis and Blosmstrom 1975). In a very broad sense,the effect of social responsibility is to improve the quality of life for members of the society. It also harmonises business actions aimed at achieving the traditional economic gains of business, for example, social benefits. Davis and Blomstrim (1975) are of the view that each person is attached to an extended social system on which he or she is partly dependent. Consequently, certain obligations or social responsibilities arise from attachment. The same reasoning obviously applies to groups and institutions.
Do marketers have any social responsibility? The answer is yes some socially responsible marketer behaviour include:
1) Being conscious of the impact or effect of his offerings or products on the larger society.
2) Actively participating or encouraging his employer to participate in contribution towards the welfare of the target society.
3) Endeavouring wherever and whenever possible to participate in reducing environmental pollution.
4) Participating in enhancing the quality of life of the generality of the public.
5) Supporting consumer education to a level that is greatly beneficial to all.
6) Cooperating with the government on it's effort to increase consumers and also societal well being through proper information on products,improved product quality and so on.
7) Discouraging the purchase and consumption of products that are injurious to health and consequently to the society.
8) Constantly thinking of how to improve and contribute toward achieving economic growth and development.
9) Participating in the elimination of malpractice in the marketing environment.
10) Supporting the cause of social justice.
11) Participating in enhancing conversation and recreational facilities.
12) Encouraging better utilization of available resources and improvement to technologies for production.
13) Encouraging the enhanced utilization of local materials and national resources (Adirika 1998)
