Mensah, V: Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility on Sust

The document explores Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and its impact on the sustainable development of people living in a gold mining community, Obuasi in the Ashanti region of Ghana. Through observations, document analysis and conduct of interviews of local citizens, it seeks to assess the impact of gold mining operations on various aspects of the lives of the local people. The virtue of CSR as a voluntary incorporation of social and environmental concerns into business conduct has become an international norm. Businesses, intellectuals, local and international development agencies have embraced this concept with the hope that it could bring about sustainable development. Although AngloGold Ashanti (AGA) seems to uphold the concept of social responsibility, their zeal to ensure the realisation of such policy is almost non-existent. CSR is best implemented through partnership with local people; however, AGA formulates and implements its own CSR with minimal consultation. As a consequence, it expects the community to see their social responsibility as a philanthropic gesture regardless of the hazards resulting from their mining activities