Visual Analysis of Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Governance Based on CiteSpace

The interaction between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate governance and its impact on corporate sustainable development has become the focus of common attention in both academic and practical circles. Based on bibliometrics and visual analysis methods, this paper systematically reviews the research progress of CSR governance of domestic and foreign platforms from 2004 to 2024, and reveals the evolution mode of the research topic and its correlation with the policy environment and social events. Research has found that corporate governance mechanisms, such as equity structure, board characteristics, and internal controls, have a significant impact on the fulfillment of corporate social responsibility. Among them, internal control reduces agency costs and promotes non-state-owned enterprises to fulfill corporate social responsibility, while the governance advantages of state-owned enterprises bring better corporate social responsibility performance. The fulfillment of corporate social responsibility is closely related to corporate performance and risk management. Good corporate social responsibility performance can improve capital allocation efficiency and reduce debt default risks, but mandatory disclosure may exacerbate bankruptcy risks caused by agency issues. The external institutional environment (such as media attention, social trust, and legal environment) and the nature of property rights (state-owned/non-state-owned) have a regulatory effect on the fulfillment of corporate social responsibility. Among them, the synergistic effect of media regulation and marketization process is particularly prominent. The research topic presents an evolutionary path of “crisis driven policy response mechanism improvement”, from external governance issues after the financial crisis (2008-2009), institutionalization of corporate social responsibility (2012-2014), deepening of property rights reform (after 2015) to governance of media supervision and agency costs (after 2019). With the accelerated development of artificial intelligence technology since 2023, future research needs to combine ESG concepts with artificial intelligence, explore corporate governance methods for AI companies, pay attention to emerging issues such as AI ethics, and promote the theoretical and practical development of corporate social responsibility governance under the trend of AI.