This paper underlines the importance of the concept of value for corporate social responsibility (CSR) and then explores it beyond economics, looking for its social and philosophical roots. Considering the most recent literature on the matter, the dilemma between a non‐monetary, multi‐variable conception and a monetary, one‐variable conception is set. To obtain the origins of the meaning for this basic concept in CSR, Italian literature regarding ‘value in accounting’ is explored. The main result from this first survey is the existence of a ‘chain’ from the highest conception of value (philosophical, ethical), to the most practical conception (accounting techniques of measurement). By this first approach, some provisional normative clauses are then deduced, in a ‘problem‐setting attitude’ to be tested by means of further research on the topic, exploring other literature and building a new general paradigm to finally provide a commonly shared measure for social value. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment