CSR from an Executives Point of View

I subscribe to the Economist magazine, which is a magazine targeted to global executives. I am scared to bring this magazine up in Ethics class because the authors tend to be judgemental and highly persuasive towards popular demand and not to scholarly research. Nevertheless, in the January 19th issue of this year, they compiled a large special report on CSR and the many views surrounding how big companies and executives view the "booming" industry of CSR. Here is a link to read part of the report: (Unfortunately, the entire report costs money but I will try to remember to bring in the magazine so if anyone is interested.)

http://www.economist.com/specialreports/displayStory.cfm?story_id=10491077

What I found interesting is how the author of this report summed up CSR into three broad layers:

1. Corporate Philanthropy
2. Risk Management
3. Opportunity

The opportunity layer is described as "trendy" and suggests that by focusing on CSR, companies can create value. Even well known scholars have chimed in on this section of CSR. Porter and Kramer believe that companies that exploit CSR can make their company have an advantage over the competition.

This is where the ethical question comes into play for me, are executives doing CSR out of the goodness of their hearts or only to keep up with the trends of business, to become more profitable? Is it wrong if everyone can do it? And, do we [society] care if companies are acting unethically just to make profits because in the end, CSR helps and benefits society?

I am very interested on this subject so any opinions are highly welcome :)