This thesis focuses on the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) implementation process with emphasis on how organisational actors (particularly, managers) make sense of-this process in relation to their social context. It involves interdisciplinary research in businessin- society and organisational theory. Through literature review, the study concludes that existing business-in-society theory and empirical work and specifically, the study of the CSR implementation is -with few exceptions- 'ahistorical, acontextual, and aprocessual'l. This is because organisation theory has not been sufficiently integrated in CSR studies and the research methodologies employed do not allow contextually-rich data collection. Seeking to address these weaknesses, this research rests in the epistemological domain of interpretivism (Burrell and Morgan 1979). The social context-actor interaction in shaping the CSR implementation process is explored, using the theoretical lens of Giddens' structuration theory (1977;1984) and the research approach of contextualism (Pettigrew 1985a; 1985b; 1987). Yin's (1994) case study methodology was employed for the scoping study (3 cases: two publishing companies and a NGO) and the core research (4 cases: water utility, tobacco and two mining companies). In total, 105 managers of large multinational organisations were interviewed. The data findings' first-order analysis contributes to the CSR field by exploring the content, process and contextual aspects of CSR implementation and organisational actors' role in it Furthermore, it is suggested that the CSR implementation is understood primarily as a tangle ofrelationships (rather than responsibilities) among those involved. The fmdings' second-order analysis contributes to the field of organisation theory and particularly, organisational sensemaking. Sensemaking and social context enactment are found to be the product of organisational actors' interaction, an aspect that structuration theory and contextualism have so far underplayed. Organisational actors perceive their social context in a more cluttered way than the literature assumes. Furthermore, they not only make sense of this context but also make use of it. Building on sensemaking and enactment theories and drawing knowledge from legitimacy theories, a 4-part enactment model is proposed. This is a phrase Pettigrew (1985a, p. IS) used with regards to organisational change literature.