Corporate Digital Responsibility New Challenges to the Social Sciences

Contemporary practitioners and scientists more and more frequently highlight the extraordinarily rapid process of implementation of new technologies – including those based on artificial intelligence – and unpredictable consequences of such actions. Therefore, it is important to be an active participant in the debate on the relation between human and modern technologies, a debate based on interdisciplinary scientific knowledge. The article refers to selected ideas related to knowledge management, organisational learning, knowledge area, or innovation environment. The challenge which social science researchers face, next to examining the theoretical aspects, is the application of various calculation methods and new technologies to make quicker and easier decisions in social contexts – with regard to various groups of people, e.g. employees, customers, or voters. Apart from the new methods, another serious challenge is to raise social awareness regarding the digital responsibility in certain groups such as managers or, more generally, employers and employees. The responsibility of the elite and scientific authorities should consist in instilling awareness in one another and approaching the new phenomenon with care. Potential threats may completely change our civilisation. The presented discussion is based on literature study which included selected theories and reports of research centres and scientific bodies. A particularly interesting case study discussed in this article includes TOP CDR initiative and a report prepared by SW RESEARCH agency in cooperation with Procontent public relations and digital marketing agency. The conclusions of this report indicate that corporate digital responsibility (CDR) may be a pioneering area for in-depth empirical studies. The nature of the topic, despite being clearly related to

sociology, requires interdisciplinary approach and cooperation of numerous circles, not only scientific ones. K e y w o r d s: corporate social responsibility, corporate digital responsibility, technology, artificial intelligence

Towards Corporate Digital Responsibility -Future or Nowadays Challenges?
Contemporary scientific authorities and, more and more frequently, political leaders highlight new kinds of threats to global labour market posed by automation and mass implementation of solutions based on artificial intelligence (AI). Development of new technologies, robotics, and process automation threatens current workplaces in both industry and the service sector. These processes may create social unrest, and their consequences are difficult to foresee due to the dynamic nature of their progression.
The aim of the article is to characterise new challenges in corporate digital responsibility and new research areas which emerge in that field for social sciences. The author will identify certain theoretical aspects and potential consequences related to threats posed by the development of new technologies, artificial intelligence, automation, and digitalisation of social environment on a large scale. Selected thematically, relevant reports of scientific bodies, employers' organisations, and companies collaborating with scientific circles will be analysed. The author will analyse in particular the TOP CDR initiative, which is the first project of this kind in Poland, focused on digitally responsible enterprises.

A Few Words about Methods
The analysis is based on theoretical considerations substantiated by selected research data. The theoretical themes referred to are part of the author's selective attempt to indicate significant areas of possible future research. The scope of the analysis is largely based on literature study of selected concepts and is therefore significantly limited. All empirical remarks refer to existing data, reports of research centres and scientific bodies. The analysis will also include the TOP CDR report prepared by SW RESEARCH agency in cooperation with Procontent public relations and digital marketing agency.

Development of Technologies in the Field of Artificial Intelligence -Responsibility and Challenges in Social Context
For many years scientists and experts from virtually all scientific fields have been discussing the relationship between human and technology, which is developing at an increasing rate. These considerations include not only new ways of learning or human reaction to resulting changes in the reality, but also possible social processes which occur or will occur in the future due to technologisation and increasing presence of machines and robots in everyday life.
The challenge which social science researchers face is the application of various calculation methods and new technologies to make quicker and easier decisions in social contexts with regard to various groups of people, e.g. employees, customers, or voters. This allows to gather data faster and identify digital traces of human activity -either in social networks or in information obtained during behavioural studies using mobile phones. Access to this type of data provides the ability to stimulate various behaviours. Specialised software used on this kind of data has been perfected at an increasingly fast rate since the 1990s towards study of methods of AI operation. Initially, data compilation software was created to build databases using a specific type of reasoning mechanisms. Nearly 70 years have passed since the first widely recognised definition of artificial intelligence was presented by Alan Turing in 1950. At the time, artificial intelligence was understood, for the purpose of the conducted experiment, as an ability of a machine to perform cognitive tasks effectively without making human interrogator realise that that the respondent is a machine (Turing, 1950). Nowadays, programmers are focused on the creation of intelligent behaviour patterns which may be utilised in computer software. The goal is to develop a model allowing machine to imitate sophisticated human manifestations of intelligence: making decisions under uncertainty, analysis and synthesis of natural languages, conducting logical reasoning, diagnosis, expertise and participation in logic-based games such as chess. Machines already have achieved the ability to learn and perfect their behaviour on the basis of new experience. Using algorithms and specific data, the machines can, through the process of induction, transition from supervised learning to unsupervised learning (Russell & Norvig, 2003).
More and more often, people are being replaced by machines, devices, and appropriate software, all through learning specific forms of response based on the output data. Nowadays, the ethical question should be a top priority for scientists, because many people might be really hurt by these algorithms (Suchacka & Horáková, 2019, p. 917).
This has specific consequences -chances and threats. At the threshold of revolution initiated by introduction of artificial intelligence into various areas of socioeconomic life, an increasing number of socially sensitive practitioners and scientists call for the need to create a complex strategy of AI development. The analysis of selected AI development programmes conducted by Digital Poland Foundation in 2018 points to differences in approach to this matter between various countries. Depending on the government's policy, emphasis is placed on retaining scientific leadership and development of basic research around AI (France), ensuring national security, order and monitoring behaviour of the citizens (China), maintaining leadership in robotics, increasing the level of industrialisation and supporting ageing society (Japan). The report characterises world's most prominent centres of innovation and highlights the need to promote economy based on knowledge, cooperation, and sharing experience with the support of the regional and national level authorities (Digital Poland Foundation, 2018). The aware and responsible decision-makers should create conditions favourable for close integration of the worlds of science and business and accelerated commercialisation of the results of their cooperation.
The responsibility of the elites and scientific authorities should consist in raising awareness about AI and taking the new phenomenon seriously. Potential threats may completely change our civilisation. The research conducted on the matter is still focused primarily on technical and IT issues, despite the fact that great minds of our times like Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Stephen Hawking have been warning us against development of a model of artificial intelligence able to continuously improve itself. It is difficult to image what is becoming the realitymachine surpassing human.
The most controversial is the use of artificial intelligence in the army [armed forces], from rockets or jets to all kinds of infrastructure control systems. At this stage, it is assumed that people are in control, not threatened by computers deciding anything themselves. It will be this way until the artificial intelligence begins to modify its goals. Even if it is possible for the machine to become self-conscious, it will still have to set tasks for itself and find a justification for them, and that part is not immediately obvious. At the moment, intelligent technologies assist us with acquiring knowledge quickly, learning new behaviors outside the traditional system of education, which, however, should not be completely eliminated. A constant reflection, inherently sociological, should accompany these technological changes, for the algorithms behind ethical actions are the very traits of humanity and it is quite difficult to assume that the machine will accept them or will develop them itself without error of proper access path (Suchacka & Horáková, 2019, p. 919).
From the very beginning, the development of artificial intelligence has been examined with disregard for the notion of self-awareness of a machine. This may have dramatic consequences at the onset of final revolution when AI will combine knowledge from three areas of science encompassing mechanisms of matter, life, and mind. It is a matter of time before machine outsmarts and surpasses human intelligence.

Review of Selected Ideas and Initiatives Related to the Impact of Technology on Changes in Global and Local Labour Markets
Setting aside the considerations on futuristic visions of artificial intelligence seizing control over the world, it can be assumed with certainty that the most obvious area of contact between human and machine is the workplace. At work one can observe how changes in production, way of completing certain tasks, or use of more complicated tools can directly affect the entire professional life. This entails the need for continuous learning and, in order to meet that necessity, creation of human capital management strategies. Staff resources, knowledge accumulated by the employees, access to information, and ability to skilfully use it are factors which largely determine the success of contemporary companies. A German researcher Peter Drucker emphasised that traditional importance of current economic resources -labour, land, and money -gradually decreases. Slowly, the income from these sources is losing significance, and the only -or at least the main -sources of wealth are information and knowledge. "In fact whichever traditional industries managed to grow in the last 40 years did so because they restructured themselves around knowledge and information" (Drucker, 1999, p. 149). According to British analysts, "Traditional managerial systems have been developed to persuade bored people to keep their noses to the grindstone. But how do you manage people who keep the company's most valuable resources in their heads? […]" (Micklethwait & Wooldridge, 2000, p. 135).
Moreover, according to an American scholar Peter Senge, contemporary companies owe their competitive edge to their ability to learn and constantly using that ability. Senge points out that: At the heart of a learning organization is a shift of mind -from seeing ourselves as separate from the world to connected to the world, from seeing problems as caused by someone or something "out there" to seeing how our own actions create the problems we experience. A learning organization is a place where people are continually discovering how they create their reality. And how they can change it (Senge, 2004, p. 28).
Undoubtedly, such an approach, in combination with technological development, facilitates achieving high efficiency indicators and economic growth rate. This long-term attitude derives advantages from emphasising the ability of problem identification, skilful adaptation to conditions of the surroundings and innovativeness based on knowledge management. Japanese scholars noted that properly designed knowledge management system allows a company to acquire, analyse, and use knowledge to make quicker, wiser, and better decisions leading to the achievement of competitive advantage.
The main issue related to knowledge-based management is the conversion of the so-called tacit knowledge -personalised and rooted in individual's experience, skills, intuition and values he or she embraces -to accessible, explicit knowledge, usually codified (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 2000, p. 9).
Although their considerations were basic and covered organisation and public undertaking, new ideas referring to broader view on the matter started to develop at that time. These ideas referred to knowledge-based economy development characterised by emergence of regional innovation systems (Cooke, 1997), innovative milieus (Matteaccioli, 2006), clusters of innovation (Porter, 1998) and learning regions (Florida, 1995) for which paradigm of geographical proximity is very significant (Rallet, 2007). Particularly interesting were the analyses conducted in the context of regional networks facilitating formation of knowledge region. An example of such area in Poland is Silesia, which is the most industrialised area of the country and which is undergoing extraordinary metamorphosis into a learning region (Suchacka, 2014).
A special role in this process is played by universities and research institutions which attract creative individuals and collaborate in creation of network of connections with economy: Universities are producers of knowledge and technology. This is a very important function and no other institution of the State can replace them in that role. In the 19th century, Humboldt was the first one to suggest that such task should be given to universities. Universities combine immense potential of highly-educated scholars. Provided that they are properly equipped with tooling and test equipment, a legion of young doctoral student minds is able to complete every research task. Of course, large corporate laboratories and government science bodies conduct research on a massive scale and frequently are leaders in new technologies and factories of new inventions. However, it is university with its freedom of scientific research and great potential of doctorate students which became breeding ground of new ideas and theories taking the lead on the scientific frontier in terms of boldness and originality (Galwas, 2010, p. 11). Undoubtedly, the pace of contemporary economic changes is an effect of unprecedented acceleration of technological innovation development. In these dynamic times, real social responsibility, not only out of concern about company's good image, is often forgotten.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Corporate Digital Responsibility -Origin and Relationships
Contemporary managers are aware that technological and digital development is unavoidable. Their awareness is changing also due to recognition of specific threats. Sense of responsibility unites certain groups of entrepreneurs, scientists, and decision-makers. Specific practical actions, studies, and theoretical academic works were an answer to the rising concerns. Already in the 1960s, the idea of sustainable development gave impulse for a new approach to solving social, economic, and environmental issues. This idea is the source of corporate social responsibility (CSR). The main principles of this approach are related to maintaining balance in business activity between three kinds of capital -economic, human, and natural. This correlates with an increasingly evident civil pressure and growing trend of business self-regulation. Transparency of operation, clarity of rules applied in practice to employees, customers and contractors, as well as participation in major local community events are becoming important for a large portion of the society. Expectations of various social groups -employees and customers, providers and contractors, environmental and social organisations, government and local authorities -are becoming a challenge for many managers. This leads to in-depth analyses, cooperation of certain circles, shaping new kinds of relationships between natural environment, human and business. All social forces more and more often agree that in order to survive and develop they need each other. In long-term perspective, this leads to changes in social awareness and perception of social environment by entrepreneurs. The demands placed on contemporary business are not only related to meeting specific customer needs, but also to preventing any damage or degradation of natural and social resources. Although corporate social responsibility is a voluntary activity of an enterprise, more and more frequently this activity takes place in the context of a wider process -corporate self-regulation. The manifestation of this process is the appearance of the so-called good practices. Those include actions undertaken to reduce corruption and fraud, and to increase transparency of rules and principles which guide entrepreneurs. Integrity of words and actions, concern for customer trust, investors' attention, and employees' pride are proof of social sensibility of an enterprise. Spontaneous practices, which have been applied in this matter for a long time, have been formalised in two EU documents which are considered as archetypal set of guidelines for future development -Green Paper on CSR (2001) and White Paper on CSR (2006). In response to these publications, the interested enterprises concordantly endeavoured to voluntarily integrate and create new forms of cooperation between business and public authorities. Despite continuing absence of developed and implemented standards, attempts are being made to create uniform and generally accepted procedures which would cover all areas of responsibility and suggested procedural instruments. Following the technological and digital development in recent years, more attention is given to socially responsible creation and implementation of innovation. Managers extend their knowledge in that matter by participating in special educational programmes and studies. Higher education institutions continuously strive to improve the level of educational services to train high-grade specialists with desirable abilities and professional skills, regardless of their location. Managers, as an extremely busy group of people, eagerly reach for new forms of acquiring knowledge such as e-learning (Morze, 2016).
For providing the educational services, institutions must create an open information and educational e-environment, which will be used in open learning: an innovative system of evaluation of scientific research, management, and implemented remote access to educational resources, an integral part of which is an e-learning system (Morze & Buinytska, 2019, p. 12).
Corporate Digital Responsibility (CDR), which in recent months has been taking formal shape, is a new initiative within social responsibility. It follows the trend of improvement of knowledge related to responsibility in business. CDR means the awareness of duties binding the organisations active in the field of technological development and using technologies to provide services. Generally, this approach consists in trying to achieve balance and lead technological development in a direction in which technology will have positive impact on the surroundings.
Initiators of this new approach to social responsibility recognise chances and risks presented by deployment of new technologies. New technologies save time, offer new possibilities and improve the standards of living in general. On the other hand, they pose a threat by facilitating new kind of addiction or exposing to invasive and aggressive practices of individuals who exploit sensitive data and destroy trust between people. The dynamic development of technologies threatens also global labour market due to automation and mass implementation of solutions based on artificial intelligence. Jobs are disappearing both in industry and the service sector. This creates social unrest and may even influence changes in political and educational systems. Experts and scholars aware of this dynamic process emphasise that businesses and employees have far less time to thoroughly examine social consequences of ongoing implementations related to digitalisation.
In parallel with these changes attempts are made to introduce systemic regulations and provide support for persons who have lost their jobs as a result of automation and artificial intelligence. An example of these efforts is the reform of the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund adopted by the European Parliament in January 2019. The main task of the fund, which was renamed to the European Fund for Transition (EFT), is to address the negative impact of globalisation and technological changes. Provided that certain criteria are met, companies based in a Member State of the EU which are laying off employees can apply for support from the EFT.
The survey of main sources of fear of average Americans conducted by Chapman University (USA) reveals that the respondents were more afraid of people in the workforce being replaced by machines than death. In the report "American Fear Survey" (2018), these fears placed 48 and 54, respectively. More people realise that in the near future robots will be able to complete the same tasks as humans. The transition to automation and robotisation has already gathered considerable momentum. In Japan, the USA, and South Korea, there are already several hundred robots operating on production lines per 10,000 workers. The manhour costs of human work on production line are also rising.
The fears that technology will destroy more jobs that it will create are on the rise. New positions of employment such as drone operator, social media administrator, or autonomous vehicle engineer are emerging. Robots like Da Vinci, which serves as a surgeon's assistant, help save human lives. Therefore, the main challenge is not to oppose the process of digitalisation, but to skilfully adjust the labour market, effectively use technologies, ensure data security, and improve employees' qualifications, especially with regard to digital competences.
Polish people, compared to other European nations, demonstrate low awareness of threats posed by automation. The study conducted in 2018 by Pew Research Center show that only 24% of the respondents believe that within the next 50 years human workforce will be replaced by robots and computers. In Greece, 52% of the respondents shared this view. The survey was performed in 9 countries from 21 May to 10 August 2018 and in the United States in 2015, 2016, and 2017 on a group of 9,670 respondents. The potential inability to find another job was what respondents feared the most as this may lead to social stratification in terms of income. The majority of the participants believe that the responsibility for preparing the workforce for changes rests on the government. Polish respondents also indicated schools (62%) and employers (46%).
In the era of dynamic digital development, implementation of business targets is executed in a responsible manner. This is especially emphasised by large corporations as part of their PR campaign. Corporate digital responsibility is focused on ensuring that new technologies and, most importantly, data are used productively and wisely. A manifestation of this is the creation of comprehensive framework on data security, training programmes which prepare employees to managing digital information in difficult situations. A serious approach to concerns of customers, employees, and partners can be beneficial for a company.
The main areas of corporate digital responsibility, within which certain measures are taken, focus on potential changes. The measures consist primarily in changing business models -creating new ones as a response to emerging technological products. This is accompanied by changes in the work arrangement: increase in intensity of teleworking or formation of virtual teams. Such changes are accompanied by an influx of data and content in the Internet as well as a rapid improvement of required digital competences. Steps taken by employers with regard to CDR should include allowing employees to obtain necessary digital competences. However, this responsibility does not exclude or is even compliment by taking actions such as: • ensuring that employees can rest through disconnection from digital world of the company, • ensuring that traditional forms of social and inter-employee relationships are maintained, • preventing replacement of traditional forms of contact with virtual communication, • taking interest in and defining standards ensuring protection of the data processed within a company, • fighting against digital addiction and breakdown of social relations caused by technological development (TOP CDR programme document, ). In practice, these actions are already taken by many companies which are aware of the problem and include this kind of goals in their strategies of socially responsible business.

TOP CDR Initiative -Analysis of Assumptions and Survey Report
In spring 2019, as a result of cooperation between SW RESEARCH agency and Procontent public relations and digital marketing agency, a decision was made to start an initiative to promote CDR and conduct a survey among employers on corporate digital responsibility. The programme document defines main goals of Top CDR initiative: • preparation of good practices document based on surveys of employees and employers, • rewarding good practices within CDR and promotion of good CDR practice models, • communicating opportunities and threats related to technological development which should be covered by CDR regulations (TOP CDR programme document, ). The efforts are supported by the Council of Experts which is composed of representatives of government institutions, technological companies, nongovernmental organisations (NGO), and universities specialised in the field of new technologies development. Under the programme, an online platform will be created to gather in one place the debate on CDR in Poland, foreign reports, events, and news related to the notion of CDR. The results of the CDR opinion survey conducted in May 2019 were used to compile the "CDR in Poland" report. During a special debate, experts expressed their opinion on the results. There is also a plan to develop a guide to good CDR practices and to organise a "Technologically Responsible Company" competition. Companies winning that title should be characterised by compliance with good digital practices, concern for safety of their employees in the Internet, and organisation of learning activities rising CDR awareness of their employees.
The "CDR in Poland" report presenting employees' fears related to automation and robotisation of work is particularly interesting. The survey was conducted at the turn of May and June 2019 by SW RESEARCH agency using computerassisted web interviewing (CAWI) via SW Panel available on-line. The study group consisted of 1,010 participants from companies employing more than 50 people. The majority of the respondents were women (53.1%). The majority of the respondents were in 25-34 (36.4%) and 35-49 (32.7%) age groups. Respondents with higher (54%) and secondary education (40.1%) were dominant in the study group.
Survey questionnaire was prepared in cooperation between SW RESEARCH and Procontent agencies. It consists of 5 Likert-type scale questions in which respondents could express their opinion on specific issues and questions concerning personal data. The survey is an analysis aimed at initial investigation of the problem and may be a part of preparation for serious scientific research.
The results yielded by the survey are quite interesting. One of three respondents believe that automation of work through robotics will force him/ her to professionally retrain or change job within the next 10 years. The opposite opinion was expressed by 40% of the respondents which indicates low awareness of the problem or a complete lack of such danger. The latter assumption seems to be confirmed by high percentage of respondents (60%) noting lack of staff reduction due to implementation of new technologies or automation in the last 3 years. However, almost one third of the participants admitted that such reduction had taken place in their workplace. Particularly interesting were the results concerning activities outside working hours: reading e-mails, messages on corporate messengers and social networking profiles managed by their company. Only 16% of the respondents admitted that they dedicate some of their free time to such activities every day. One of four participants do it several times a week and one of four respondents stated that they do not use corporate messengers after work at all. The authors of the survey asked also about associations with the phrase "digitally responsible company" allowing to choose 3 from provided options. The majority of answers (more than 40%) pointed to conducting training related to developing digital competences helping to consciously use devices connected to the Internet, be able to distinguish fake news and propaganda activities from legitimate information. Almost 40% of the respondents indicated also enabling employees to obtain necessary digital competences to prevent job losses due to automation. The participants were somewhat divided on the issue of taking advantage of technological improvements brought by automation and robotisation. Nearly one third of the respondents (30.5%) stated that they do not want help from robots and prefer to use services provided by humans. The majority of the respondents with the opposite opinion would like to use a robot to complete household chores on everyday basis and one in four participants would like to own a "smart house" or be served by an "automatic cashier." According to the survey results, the majority of the participants, provided that they are not aware of any danger from automation, would eagerly chose to benefit from technological improvements, whilst not excluding human contact. Employers are expected to enable their employees to improve their digital competences and provide training related to that matter. The data indicate that there is no relationship between these answers and the educational level, age, or gender of the respondents.
In conclusion, it should be stressed that the conducted survey was not strictly scientific and is preparatory to further and more detailed analyses. There is an evident need for more in-depth investigation of the topic, as evidenced by consulting companies showing particular interest in this issue.

Conclusions
The development of modern technologies, robotics and process automation creates new kinds of threats. The impact of technology on social life is becoming so dynamic that human can no longer anticipate and remedy the consequences. As a result of specific social trends, more and more companies begin to devote attention to the need to take measures and initiate cooperation between scientific, political, and economic circles. Raising social awareness with regard to the impact of technologies -especially the latest ones related to artificial intelligence -on social life and people is a great challenge for many important circles and authorities. The actions taken thus far were basically grounded upon economic motives and constituted an element of PR campaign. Numerous scientific trends such as theory of sustainable development, theories of knowledge management, concepts of learning organisation and region, creation of innovation networks and innovation environments supported and inspired companies to take proper care of their human capital and build social capital in the broader sense. This was facilitated also by the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) which in recent years has been extended with corporate digital responsibility (CDR). This new trend of entrepreneurs' interest is a rich area for profound empirical studies. The nature of this topic, despite being of clearly sociological origins, requires an interdisciplinary approach and cooperation of numerous circles, not only scientific ones. decyzji w kontekstach społecznych -odnośnie różnych grup ludzi, np. pracowników, klientów, czy wyborców. Poza nowymi metodami badawczymi poważnym wyzwaniem jest budowanie świadomości społecznej w zakresie cyfrowej odpowiedzialności w określonych grupach, jak chociażby menadżerowie, czy szerzej pracodawcy i pracownicy. Odpowiedzialność szerokich elit i autorytetów naukowych powinna polegać na wzajemnym uświadamianiu, a także poważnym traktowaniu nowego zjawiska. Potencjalne zagrożenia mogą całkowicie odmienić naszą cywilizację. Przedstawione rozważania oparte są o studia literaturowe uwzględniające wybrane teorie oraz raporty ośrodków badawczych i instytucji naukowych. Szczególnego rodzaju studium przypadku stanowi inicjatywa TOP CDR oraz omówiony w artykule raport przygotowany we współpracy agencji badawczej SW RESEARCH oraz agencji public relations i digital marketing Procontent. Wnioski z tego raportu dowodzą, że cyfrowa odpowiedzialność przedsiębiorstw corporate digital responsibility (CDR) stanowić może pionierski temat do wielu pogłębionych studiów empirycznych. Natura tematu mimo wyraźnie socjologicznych źródeł wymaga podejścia interdyscyplinarnego i współpracy wielu środowisk -nie tylko naukowych.