Alienation and empowerment: Some ethical imperatives in business

The issue of worker alienation in the context of business ethics is critically examined. From a normative perspective, it is assumed that the minimal ethical requirement in business should include accountability for adverse consequences of management practice for workers in organizations. Using this standard, managerial actions that are responsible for worker alienation are considered unethical. The nature of work alienation and the organizational conditions responsible for it are outlined. Several dealienation measures in the form of empowerment strategies for management are presented as ethical imperatives.Rabindra N. Kanungo, Chaired Professor of Management, McGill University. Concentrating on the basic and applied areas of psychology and management, his publications include eight books and more than 100 articles in professional journals.The preparation of the paper is supported by the Power Corp. International Management Centre. The author is thankful to Manuel Mendonca for his suggestions and critical comments.     

Social contracts and corporations: A reply to Hodapp

In this reply to Professor Hodapp's criticism of my social contract theory, I focus on the misinterpretations I believe Professor Hodapp makes of the social contract tradition as well as my version of the contract. By misinterpreting the underlying purpose of social contract theory, he neglects the contract's heuristic or functional dimension, something that leads him to downplay the importance of the contract as a conceptual catalyst. And by adopting an overly narrow notion of rationality, he imagines circularity where none exists. Later, Professor Hodapp questions the effect of the contract upon individual liberties, and in doing so broaches a critical issue. But I attempt to show that his concerns are eliminated by close attention to the theory itself. Thomas Donaldson is the John A. Largay Scholar, and Professor, at the School of Business, Georgetown University, where he also holds the positions of Adjunct Professor, at the Department of Philosophy, and Senior Research Fellow, at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics. His most recent book is Ethics in International Business (Oxford University Press, 1989).     

Bribery and implicit agreements: A reply to Philips

The author has elsewhere defended the view that accepting a bribe involves the violation of an implicit or explicit promise or understanding associated with an office or position that one occupies and that therefore it is prima facie wrong to accept a bribe. Michael Philips has criticized this position in a recent paper. He argues that (a) there are cases in which accepting a bribe violates no promises or agreements, and (b) there are cases in which there is no prima facie duty to refuse an offer of a bribe. The author offers replies to both of these objections.Thomas L. Carson is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University in Chicago. He was awarded the NEH Fellowship for College Teachers. He is the author of The Status of Morality (D. Reidel, Philosophical Studies Series, 1984), and he has written numerous articles concerning both ethical theory and applied ethics.     

Rational interaction for moral sensitivity: A postmodern approach to moral decision-making in business

Moral dissensus is a distinct feature of our time. This is not only true of our post-modern culture in general, but also of business culture specifically. In this paper I start by explaining how modernist rationality has produced moral dissensus without offering any hope of bringing an end to it in the foreseeable future. Opting for a form of post-modernist rationality as the only viable way of dealing with moral dissensus, I then make an analysis of a number of ways proposed by both specialists in the field of business ethics, as well as philosophers to deal with moral decision-making in this situation of moral dissensus. The conclusion reached is that none of these attempts succeeds in coming to terms with moral dissensus. I then formulate an alternative approach to moral decision-making which I call: Rational interaction for moral sensitivity. After explaining this approach, I defend it against some of the most obvious objections that might be raised against it in a business environment.

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A reply to professors Metcalfe and Steedman

This reply argues that those points raised by Metcalfe and Steedman which are valid were in fact axiomatic to my original paper. Thus, when properly interpreted, their comments simply reinforce my conclusions. Three new propositions are presented in the course of the argument.     

Organizational imperatives and cultural modifiers

The different structures may best fit a company as it changes its size or mission or type of business is fairly evident. What may not be so widely known is that certain structures better fit a given national culture than others. National differences have many implications for how the separate divisions of a multinational are organized.     

Public sector consumer problems: A reply to the responses

In this paper, the author replies to Bish, McKean, Offe, Stevens, and Bull, concerning his original paper Consumer Problems in the Public Sector, JCP, 1, 1977/3. The reply elaborates on the concepts of tax-price, political and organizational failures, and the relationships of these failure modes to public sector consumer problems. The present paper also develops a more explicit classification of public sector consumers, and it relates the discussion of public sector consumer problems to branches of the literature concerned with fiscal illusion and consumption costs.

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Verbraucherprobleme im Bereich öffentlicher Leistungen: Eine Antwort auf die Stellungnahmen von Bish, McKean, Offe, Stevens und Bull

Zusammenfassung Die Antwort klärt und verteidigt die Verwendung des Steuer-Preis-Konzepts bei der Ableitung von Unzulänglichkeiten einerseits im Bereich der politischen Willensbildung und andererseits im Bereich der Bürokratie, aus denen im ersten Beitrag des Autors seine Systematik von Verbraucherproblemen bei öffentlichen Leistungen abgeleitet wurde. Die Antwort arbeitet schärfer die Unterschiede und Wechselbeziehungen zwischen den beiden Arten von Unzulänglichkeiten und ihre Beziehungen zu einzelnen Verbraucherproblemen heraus. Darüber hinaus entwickelt sie eine Klassifikation von Verbrauchern öffentlicher Leistungen, behandelt die Unterschiede von Verbraucherproblemen und allgemein gesellschaftlichen Problemen und diskutiert kurz, durch welche institutionellen Reformen öffentliche Anlaufstellen für Verbraucherprobleme geschaffen werden können. Schließlich zeigt die Stellungnahme einige Linien für die Weiterentwicklung der Forschung im Bereich von Verbraucherproblemen bei öffentlichen Leistungen auf.

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Dennis R. Young is an Associate Professor at the W. Averell Harriman College for Urban and Policy Sciences, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, New York 11794, U.S.A. He is grateful to Professor John Russell of the Germanic and Slavic Languages Department at Stony Brook, for his translation of Hans Peter Bull's comments from German to English, and to Professor Richard Silkman of the Harriman College at Stony Brook for his suggestions on this reply.     

Reliability criteria bolster product classification decisions: A reply to Jones

We empirically test the robustness of the Easingwood approach to classify early product life cycle forms for infrequently purchased major products. Our results indicate that the key classification parameters could be unstable to variations in the sample size used for estimation, thereby producing more than one classification for several products. We demonstrate that the problem of multiple classifications can be effectively addressed by using the more rigorous criteria of joint confidence regions (as opposed to point estimates) of classification parameters. The benefit of such rigorous classification is that it increases researcher confidence in Easingwood's classification system.     

The Principle of Moral Projection: A reply to Professor Ranken

This article responds to two criticisms by Professor Nani Ranken of the Principle of Moral Projection in business ethics. In the process it enlarges upon our understanding of the moral agenda of management and the corporation as a participant in ethical transactions. Kenneth E. Goodpaster is Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Business Administration at Harvard University. He has published articles in a wide variety of journals, including the Journal of Philosophy, Ethics, Environmental Ethics, the Journal of Business Ethics, Thought, and the Harvard Business Review. He has also edited or authored five books: Perspectives on Morality: Essays of William Frankena (1976) Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century (1979) Regulation, Values and the Public Interest (1980) Ethics in Management (1984) and Policies and Persons: A Casebook in Business Ethics (1985). Work in progress includes a monograph on management and moral philosophy (1987).     

Tips in business transaction: A moral issue

Has one the right to expect favor because he or she has given tip? Or is one obligated to bend the rule of law in favor of his friend from whom he has received tip or favor? The paper undertakes an analysis of the different tip situations, the different forms of tip and attempts to show in what sense the term tip is applicable and finally examines the usefulness of tip and its possible effect on a moral conscience. The paper argues that tip considered as a transaction wherein money or favor is offered for the purpose of gaining an advantage illegally is nothing but bribery and as such immoral. Tip as a “forced gratuity” is argued to be an organized exploitation. The paper then concludes that tip in its proper sense of voluntary and gratuitous transaction can maximize individual utility and enhance social solidarity, noting at the same time, that its possible adverse effect on the moral conscience is worth taking cognizance of.     

Corporate moral agency: A case from literature

I analyze a well-known and moving passage from John Steinbeck's novelThe Grapes of Wrath. This passage provides an excellent illustration of one of the central questions about corporate moral agency: Is corporate moral agency anything over and above the agency of individual human beings? The passage in question is a debate about whether or not the actions of a particular company are anything over and above the actions of individual human beings.     

Responsibility and moral reasoning: A study in Business Ethics

This essay was written for the 1984 General Motors Intercollegiate Business Understanding Program. It consists of three sections, each responding to a separate issue posed by General Motors. The opinions expressed are not those of the General Motors management.The first section attempts to document, through the use of Harvard Business Review articles, a shift in the notion of managerial responsibility from a narrowly focused role responsibility to a more widely focused moral responsibility.The second section explicates the different conceptions of Justice behind the United States and West German economic systems. It gives examples of the consequences of the different conceptions both in methods of policy formation and results.The third section deals with business ethics in international contexts. It argues that law is by itself inadequate in the regulation of business activity and must be supplemented by public discussion, which employs the traditional methods of moral reasoning.John Davis Feldmann, John Kelsay, and Hugh E. Brown III are or have been graduate students in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia. Their essay, written under the direction of James F. Childress, Edwin B. Kyle Professor of Christian Ethics, won first prize in the 1984 General Motors Intercollegiate Business Understanding Program.John D. Feldmann, currently writing a dissertation on justice and tax reform, holds a law degree from the University of Virginia. He has practiced business law, served as a Vice-President of a banking corporation, and worked for the Center for Applied Ethics at the University of Virginia's Darden Graduate School of Business Administration.John Kelsay, an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church U.S.A., holds a Ph.D. in Religious Ethics from the University of Virginia and has been serving as an Instructor there. His dissertation dealt with ethics and society in Islam.Hugh E. Brown III, now preparing for the Episcopal ministry at Virginia Theological Seminary, holds an M.A. in Religious Ethics from the University of Virginia. Prior to entering graduate school, he had experience in business as a supervisor for an AT&T affiliate.     

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: A legal and moral analysis

The author examines the categories of bribes that are prohibited under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act from the perspective of three significant moral theories: utility, rights and justice. He concludes that the Act does not go too far in demanding ethical behaviors from U.S. business people doing business in foreign markets, therefore, it is not in need of a major revision. With regard to accounting provisions, movement from a reasonableness standard to one of materiality would be appropriate however. Bill Shaw is Professor of Business Law at the University of Texas at Austin. His research interests are in the area of business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and environmental law. During the Spring Semester, 1987, he held the Lynn S. Autrey Visiting Chair of Business Ethics, Rice University. His articles have appeared in various journals and he is the author of Environmental Law: People Pollution and Land Use (1976) and The structure of the Legal Environment (1987) (with Art Wolfe).     

Psychometric vs. C-OAR-SE measures of brand love: A reply to Rossiter

Rossiter (Marketing Lett 23: 905–916, 2012) provides a critique of the brand love measure from Batra et al. (J Marketing 76: 1–16, 2012) and offers a new measure of brand love to be used in its stead. In this reply, we argue that our measure is more consistent with the best available understanding on love and brand love. We also note several serious problems in the underlying definition of love used by Rossiter and problems in the way his definition is operationalized in his measure.     

The informative and persuasive functions of advertising: A moral appraisal

Advertising can be regarded as having two separate functions, one of persuading and one of informing consumers. Against some who claim that persuasive advertising using irrational means is moral as long as the product or service it represents is good or useful, this paper argues that by denigrating human reason such advertising is always immoral. On the other hand, advertisements which present information in a straight-forward and truthful way are always moral no matter what they advertise; indeed, only such advertisements are moral.     

中印反倾销对对碰——从一则案例谈国内企业如何应对国外反倾销

根据多项调查显示,自中国加入WTO以来,国内企业被提起反倾销的数量和被裁决征收反倾销税的数量都处于“世界领先水平”。我国已经成为全球遭受反倾销调查案件最多的国家,也是世界反倾销浪潮的最大受害者。各国对我国出口产品的频频反倾销已经构成了对我国经贸发展的实质性障碍。