Empirical Business Ethics Research and Paradigm Analysis |
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Authors: | V Brand |
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Institution: | (1) The Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia |
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Abstract: | Despite the so-called ‘paradigm wars’ in many social sciences disciplines in recent decades, debate as to the appropriate
philosophical basis for research in business ethics has been comparatively non-existent. Any consideration of paradigm issues
in the theoretical business ethics literature is rare and only very occasional references to relevant issues have been made
in the empirical journal literature. This is very much the case in the growing fields of cross-cultural business ethics and
undergraduate student attitudes, and examples from these fields are used in this article. No typology of the major paradigms
available for, or relied upon in, business ethics has been undertaken in the wider journal literature, and this article addresses
that gap. It contributes a synthesis of three models of paradigms and a tabulated comparison of ontological, epistemological
and methodological assumptions in the context of empirical business ethics research. The author also suggests the likely (and
usually unidentified) positivist paradigm assumptions underlying the vast majority of empirical business ethics research published
in academic journals and also argues for an increased reliance on less positivist assumptions moving forward. |
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Keywords: | cross-cultural business ethics empirical business ethics research ontologies epistemologies and methodologies paradigm analysis paradigm typologies undergraduate student attitudes |
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