Prior studies have examined the influence of firm- and industry-level factors on variations in firms’ corporate social responsibility (CSR), often in a single-country setting. We expand CSR variance decomposition research by incorporating the country level into the analysis of CSR variance, revealing the relative importance of country-specific factors in explaining CSR variance across firms. We also introduce informal institutions—collectivistic and individualistic values—as moderators of the relative importance of firm, industry, and country effects on CSR variance, advancing a multilevel understanding of how informal cultural norms shape CSR variance. Finally, we offer insights into the sources of differences in firms’ substantive versus symbolic CSR, showing that symbolic CSR efforts are more country-driven, especially in collectivistic settings. A panel of 25,309 observations from 4,287 firms across 153 industries in 71 countries for the 2003–2020 period supports our theory, which has implications for understanding CSR strategies within and across countries.
