How Will BP's Corporate Responsibility Ranking Be Affected by Oil Spill Crisis?

(PhysOrg.com) -- A University at Buffalo expert on corporate social responsibility (CSR) is available to comment on how the BP oil spill disaster will affect the company's CSR ranking.

In recent years, BP may have slipped a few notches in rankings of the most responsible corporations says UB's Trina Hamilton, who studies corporate responsibility and corporate advertising campaigns. But, she notes, it has traditionally been ranked as one of the world's most responsible corporations.

"A lot of the socially responsible investors I've spoken with over the years have used BP as an example of a company that is quite open to dialogue, certainly more so than some other oil companies," she says.

Obviously, the current disaster and its impact on the environment and the worker fatalities that resulted have the potential to change that positive view.

"The safety issue is a big counteracting force against that view," she says, noting that the Gulf disaster comes just a few years after the 2005 explosion at a BP refinery in Texas that also resulted in fatalities.

Hamilton's full commentary is available on UB's "NewsTips" website at newstips.buffalo.edu .

Provided by University at Buffalo