Ethics of Resistance in Organisations: A Conceptual Proposal

This study suggests a conceptual proposal to analyse the ethics of resistance in organisations, drawing on Foucault’s practising self as a refusal and Schaffer’s ethics of freedom in opposition to the legitimacy of managerial control and the ethics of compliance. We argue that ethics is already part of such politics in the form of ethico-politics on the basis of participation in political action in organisations. Hence, the practising self as resistance in the face of the status quo of managerial power in an ongoing dialectical process with others and for others comprises our conceptual proposal as an ethics of resistance. Acknowledging dialectics as the driver of the continuous reconstruction and co-construction of politics and praxis, we propose an ethics from the bottom up with a critical and radical perspective. Our contribution is based on opening up an ethico-political space for those who are ignored or suppressed in the ethics and organisations literature.     

Corporate Ethics and Compliance Programs: A Report, Analysis and Critique

This research reports on the current state of ethics and compliance programs among business organizations in the United States. Members of the Ethics and Compliance Officers Association (ECOA), the premier professional association for managers working in this field, were asked to provide in-depth responses to a series of questions covering various elements of their corporate ethics and compliance programs. The findings from this analysis indicate that ethics and compliance programs have multiple components that are implemented developmentally, are influenced by regulatory and legal efforts and have evolved into more sophisticated approaches that include risk assessment and employee performance appraisal. However, these programs remain vulnerable to sufficient resource allocation by the organization to be fully effective.     

Universal Values, Behavioral Ethics and Entrepreneurship

This is a comparison of graduate students attitudes in Spain and the United States on the issue of universal versus relativist ethics. The findings show agreement on fundamental universal values across cultures but differences in responses to behavioral ethics within the context of entrepreneurial dilemmas.     

The Use of a Behavioral Simulation to Teach Business Ethics

The purpose of this paper is to describe behavioral simulations, develop a rationale for their use in business education, and outline a business ethics simulation developed for the university classroom. First, we discuss the advantages and disadvantages of traditional classroom approaches for teaching ethics. Second, we describe simulations and discuss the benefits of a using a business ethics simulation as part of the classroom experience. Finally, we outline the simulation development process and describe the Soy-DRI business ethics simulation.     

Run for Your Life: The Ethics of Behavioral Tracking in Insurance

Journal of Business Ethics - In recent years, insurance companies have begun tracking their customers’ behaviors and price premiums accordingly. Based on the Market-Failures Approach as well...     

International Competitiveness and Comparative Advantage: A Survey and a Proposal for Measurement

The concept of competitiveness, or competitive advantage, has been given numerous interpretations and tends to be ambiguous. Comparative advantage, although rigorously defined in the Ricardian trade model, is also subject to different interpretations when extended beyond the classical trade theory and, particularly, with respect to its measurement. The present paper first reviews the literature that deals with definitions and measurements of these concepts, distinguishing their main characteristics, such as macro vs. micro, static vs. dynamic, positive vs. normative, ex ante vs. ex post, as well as the different uses made of the proposed measures. Second, the paper proposes an integrated approach, in which it is demonstrated how competitiveness and comparative advantage are best related to each other and how they differ. The proposed measurement serves the purpose of quantifying the different sources of competitiveness. It is shown how it can be applied to guide policy makers in their evaluation of trade and industrial policies. The latter aspect is illustrated by reference to several applied studies using the method of analysis in the context of policy reforms in India, Mali, Kenya and Uganda.      

Network Ethics: Information and Business Ethics in a Networked Society

This article brings together two research fields in applied ethics – namely, information ethics and business ethics– which deal with the ethical impact of information and communication technologies but that, so far, have remained largely independent. Its goal is to articulate and defend an informational approach to the conceptual foundation of business ethics, by using ideas and methods developed in information ethics, in view of the convergence of the two fields in an increasingly networked society.     

Ethics Problems and Problems with Ethics: Toward a Pro-Management Theory

The move towards having more teaching of business ethics comes in part from a tendency to view managers negatively, drawing on anti-management theories that are presently popular in business schools. This can lead to a misdiagnosis of the causes of contemporary business problems. Teaching business ethics can, however, be ineffectual and counter-productive. Education in ethical philosophy can lead managers to be indecisive, sceptical or to rationalize poor conduct. The ethics of academics become salient and lapses in them undercut their claims to authority. The philosophical viewpoint that stresses free choice runs contrary to the social science mission to reveal the causes that determine human behaviour and provide solutions to problems. Pro-management theory offers a more positive appreciation of managers, with its three components of structural functionalism, strategic functionalism and stewardship. Lex Donaldson is Professor of Management in Organizational Design in the Faculty of Business of the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He has a PhD from the University of London. He is the author of seven books on organizational theory, organizational structure and management. In addition, he has written numerous articles and chapters. His articles have appeared in journals such as Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Learning and Education, Academy of Management Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Management Studies, Organizational Dynamics, Organization Science and Organization Studies.     

Promoting Ethics Through Ethics Officers: A Proposed Profile and an Application

We present an ideal profile of an emerging organizational function: the Ethics Officer. We argue that the main contribution of an EO is to provide management with a broad perspective of the organization's stakeholders – one that emphasizes the interests of all stakeholders, including those not affiliated with the dominant coalitions in the organization. In order to avoid turning the EO into a rubber stamp for management activities, we suggest that certain conditions prevail to enable the person in this position to exercise impartial, independent judgment. These conditions are embodied in our profile, which maintains that an ideal EO should have appropriate organizational status, functional independence, professionalism, knowledge of organizational issues, and knowledge of ethics theory. We suggest that the function of EO may be performed by a professional who is already employed by the organization, and we use the internal auditor as an example.     

Business Students and Ethics: A Meta-Analysis

Given the proliferation of research regarding the ethical development of students in general, and business students in particular, it is difficult to draw conclusions from the contradictory results of many studies. In this meta-analysis of empirical studies from 1985 through 1994, the relationships of gender, age and undergraduate major to the ethical attitudes and behavior of business students are analyzed. The results indicate that female students exhibit stronger ethical attitudes than males. The same is also true for older versus younger students. However, the relationship with undergraduate major is still difficult to interpret.     

Ethics and management: A controversial issue

This paper is a part of a broader research project which aims to examine how ethical paradigms are related to theories of organization and management. Using an analysis of various studies on the issue of Business Ethics as its point of departure the paper points out that there are two converging lines of thought. The first emphasizes that management should be reexamined in the light of the cultural changes taking place and maintains that management is a key factor in this change. The second proposes that ethics in general (and Business Ethics in particular) should be understood to mean more than simply applying certain values and stresses that this definition of ethics should be rethought in order to foster a closer relationship between ethics and the decision-making processes.Josep M. Lozano teaches Social Philosophy and Business Ethics at ESADE (Barcelona). He hasLicenciatura degrees in Philosophy and Theology and is currently working on his doctorate, researching the correlation between concepts of ethics and management. He is a regular contributor to a number of Spanish journals, writing on cultural analysis, ethics and theology. He is the author of three books which are systematic studies of these subjects.     

Entrepreneurship and Ethics: A Literature Review

During the past twenty years, there has been an explosion of new interest in entrepreneurs and their activities. Yet only recently has serious research attention been devoted to the ethical problems encountered by entrepreneurs and their organizations. Entrepreneurs face uniquely complex moral problems related to basic fairness, personnel and customer relationships, distribution dilemmas, and other challenges. This essay surveys contemporary research in entrepreneurial ethics, examines the kinds of ethical dilemmas entrepreneurs confront, identifies major research topics and methodological approaches, and discusses possible directions for future research.     

Studying Ethical Judgments and Behavioral Intentions Using Structural Equations: Evidence from the Multidimensional Ethics Scale*

The linkage between ethical judgment and ethical behavioral intention was investigated. The Multidimensional Ethics Scale (MES) was used to measure ethical judgment ratings of hypothetical behaviors in retail, sales, and automobile repair scenarios. Confirmatory factor analysis on a sample of 300 undergraduate business students showed that a model with three latent variables representing three correlated ethical dimensions of moral equity, relativism, and contractualism, three correlated scenario latent variables, and correlated residuals presented a good fit to the data. Further, structural models of the relationship of ethical judgment to behavioral intentions revealed that behavioral intentions were more highly related to the scenario factors than to the ethical dimensions across three scenarios. Adding a method factor to the model improved goodness-of-fit and changed some structural model conclusions.

互联网金融之辨析

2012年以后,在互联网金融将颠覆传统金融的热议中,中国互联网金融发展进入了高峰期,一些地方政府甚至将其列为发展的重点项目.本文认为,互联网金融在概念上有着明显的局限性,在功能上并无颠覆金融的可能,在机制上更多的是利用了中国金融体制机制的缺陷所进行的监管套利,在发展上具有拾遗补缺的作用但难以成为金融的主流运作方式.在互联网金融热潮中,应防止新一轮的金融泡沫产生.     

Integrating Ethics and Strategy: A Pragmatic Approach

An organizing framework is set out for the diverse literature on business ethics in relation to strategic management. It consists of sets of bi-polar components, spanning themes and topical themes, with a derived typology of contributions. Then, in the spirit of classical pragmatism, the organizing framework is re-cast as an integrative conceptual model of the strategy–ethics relationship. The approach recognizes that both pragmatism and dialectics can underpin progress towards integration, encompassing both normative and empirical aspects.     

Corporate Governance and Ethics: A Feminist Perspective

The mainstream literature on corporate governance is based on the premise of conflicts of interest in a competitive game played by variously defined stakeholders and thus builds explicitly and/or implicitly on masculinist ethical theories. This article argues that insights from feminist ethics, and in particular ethics of care, can provide a different, yet relevant, lens through which to study corporate governance. Based on feminist ethical theories, the article conceptualises a governance model that is different from the current normative orthodoxy.     

Ethics and Expertise: A Social Networks Perspective

Results from three field network studies show that depending on individuals’ network positions (central or peripheral), experts and novices have varying ethical predispositions (EP). In particular, central experts (vs. peripheral experts) have higher EP, while novices in the same positions (vs. peripheral novices) have lower EP. Results demonstrate individuals’ relational-interdependent self-construal mediates these relationships. Importantly, this research suggests that the interaction between network and individual difference variables uniquely affect individuals’ ethical predisposition. Given the lack of research focus on the impact of structural positions on EP, this article demonstrates the importance of combining network and individual variables to investigate individuals’ EP.     

Ethics and HRM: A Review and Conceptual Analysis

This paper reviews and develops the ethical analysis of human resource management (HRM). Initially, the ethical perspective of HRM is differentiated from the "mainstrea" and critical perspectives of HRM. To date, the ethical analysis of HRM has taken one of two forms: the application Kantian and utilitarian ethical theories to the gestalt of HRM, and the application of theories of justice and fairness to specific HRM practices. This paper is concerned with the former, the ethical analysis of HRM in its entirety. It shows that numerous theoretical shortcomings exist, least of which is the disregard of stakeholder theory. These deficiencies are explored and, as such, the analysis is advanced. It is argued that such ethical analysis is outside the scope of the modern corporation. A third way in which ethics may be applied to HRM is suggested. Ethical concerns are used as a basis to develop minimum standards against which HRM, in its various guises and practice, may be evaluated. Yet, even when judged by these standards, HRM is seriously lacking. This begs the question, not of whether HRM is ethical, but of whether HRM can be ethical.