Business Ethics: A Compromise Between Politics and Virtue

This article examines and synthesizes two different approaches to determining the content of business ethics courses and the manner in which they ought to be taught. The first approach, from a political perspective, argues that the institutional framework within which business operates ought to be tested by theories of distributive justice. The second approach, from the perspective of virtue theory, argues that we ought to examine the character of individual employees and the responsibilities associated with the roles which these individuals play within organizations. I argue that Gadamer's interpretation of Aristotle's notion of phronesis shows an inseparable, bidirectional, conceptual link between the approaches of politics and virtue as well as providing insight into how business ethics might best be taught.     

Virtue Is Good Business: Confucianism as a Practical Business Ethics

This paper argues Confucianism is a compelling managerial ethic for several reasons: 1) Confucianism is compatible with accepted managerial practices. 2) It requires individuals and organizations to make a positive contribution to society. 3) Recognizes hierarchy as an important organizational principle and demands managerial moral leadership. 4) The Confucian "golden Rule" and virtues provide a moral basis for the hierarchical and cooperative relationships critical to organizational success. The paper applies Confucianism to the H. B. Fuller in Honduras: Street Children and Substance Abuse case.     

Vocational Virtue Ethics: Prospects for a Virtue Ethic Approach to Business

In this essay, I explore the prospects for a virtue ethic approach to business. First, I delineate two fundamental criteria that I believe must be met for any such approach to be viable: viz., the virtues must be exercised for the sake of the good of one’s life as a unitary whole (contra role-morality approaches) and for the common good of the communities of which one is a part as well as the individual good of their members (contra egoist approaches). Second, I argue that these two criteria can be met only if we are able to reconceive and transform the nature of work within contemporary business organizations. In particular, what is needed, I argue, is a retrieval of something like the older ideal of work as a “vocation”, or “calling”, whereby work can be viewed as a specific aspect of a more general calling to pursue, through the practice of the virtues, “the good life” both for ourselves and for others. Lastly, I consider some important challenges to this “vocational virtue ethic” approach to work within contemporary business organizations and offer a few suggestions for how they might be met.     

Virtue Ethics in Business and the Capabilities Approach

Recently, Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum have developed the capabilities approach to provide a model for understanding the effectiveness of programs to help the developing nations. The approach holds that human beings are fundamentally free and have a sense of human dignity. Therefore, institutions need to help people enhance this dignity by providing them with␣the opportunity to develop their capabilities freely. I␣argue that this approach may help support business ethics based on virtue. Since teleology has become problematic, virtue ethics has had difficulty giving itself an ultimate justification. By combining virtue ethics with the capabilities approach, it becomes possible to ground virtue ethics on the basis of the existence of human dignity. This frees virtue ethics of the need for a strict teleology, replacing it with the notion that people must work to develop the capabilities of others although those capabilities are not pointed toward a definite goal. I further suggest that by grounding virtue ethics in capabilities, the actions of a virtuous manager become clearer. Rather than simply charging a manager with serving the public, the manager is charged with serving the stakeholders in a way that develops their capabilities. For example, a manager should not just give their employees what is just but must give them the environment and the encouragement to grow and to find fulfillment in their job.     

On Being a Consultant in Business Ethics

What does it take to be a consultant in business ethics? Is the role of the ethical consultant like that of an engineer, a playwright or an interpreter? And where are the women consultants? The author is a scientific researcher in Ethics at Nijenrode, The Netherlands School of Business.     

Teaching Business Ethics: The Role of Ethics in Business and in Business Education

The paper begins with an examination of traditional attitudes towards business ethics. I suggest that these attitudes fail to recognize that a principal function of ethics is to facilitate cooperation. Further that despite the emphasis on competition in modern market economies, business like all other forms of social activity is possible only where people are prepared to respect rules in the absence of which cooperation is rendered difficult or impossible. Rules or what I call the ethics of doing, however, constitute just one dimension of ethics. A second has to do with what we see and how we see it; a third with who we or what I describe as the ethics of being. Of these three dimensions, the first and the third have been most carefully explored by philosophers and are most frequently the focus of attention when teaching business ethics is being discussed. I argue that this focus is unfortunate in as much as it is the second dimension which falls most naturally into the ambit of modern secular educational institutions. It is here that moral education is most obviously unavoidable, and most clearly justifiable in modern secular teaching environments. I conclude by describing the importance of this second dimension for the modern world of business.     

The Development of a Virtue Ethics Scale

Drawing on conceptual works by Murphy (1999) and Solomon (1999), we develop a virtue ethics scale. Other ethics scales, which are grounded in deontological and teleological principles, may be used to classify people according to their beliefs about (1) the criteria they use to make ethical decisions, or (2) the ethicality of those decisions. We suggest augmenting these scales with our virtue ethics scale, which may be used to classify people according to their beliefs about the virtuous qualities of businesspeople.     

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.     

FOCUS: Business Ethics in Europe Current Developments in German Business Ethics

Germany is at the leading edge of European reflection on the nature and requirements of ethical business. Two scholars in the field provide a survey of the main lines of discussion in the current German business ethics scene, and discuss three important books which are helping set the scene for further developments. Prof. Dr. Horst Steinmann holds the Chair for Business Administration and Management at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Lange Gasse 20, D-90403 Nürnberg, and Dipl.-Hdl. Brigitte Kustermann is research assistant to the same chair.     

Business Ethics in Finland:

Dramatic economic developments have served to highlight ethical questions and responses within business life in Finland, particularly regarding the crisis of the Finnish banking system. Other issues which have aroused public discussion are maintaining the natural biodiversity in the Northern hemisphere forests, and Finland's trade with Russia. The authors, listed alphabetically, are all research fellows at the School of Business Administration in the University of Tampere, PO Box 607, 33101 Tampere,Finland.     

Reconsidering Virtue: Differences of Perspective in Virtue Ethics and the Positive Social Sciences

This paper describes differences in two perspectives on the idea of virtue as a theoretical foundation for positive organizational ethics (POE). The virtue ethics perspective is grounded in the philosophical tradition, has classical roots, and focuses attention on virtue as a property of character. The positive social science perspective is a recent movement (e.g., positive psychology and positive organizational scholarship) that has implications for POE. The positive social science movement operationalizes virtue through an empirical lens that emphasizes virtuous behaviors. From a virtue ethics perspective, a behaviorally based account of virtue is a weak theory of virtue. Observations are suggested for integrating the two perspectives. First, virtue should always be understood as an excellence and is often an optimal point between extreme dysfunctions on continuum of potential states. Second, an empirical exploration of virtue needs to account for character and context. Finally, the properties of organization-level virtue need to be further specified and explored. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.     

Virtue as a Benchmark for Spirituality in Business

Business people often consider spirituality a means of increasing integrity, motivation and job satisfaction. Yet certain spiritualities are superficial and unstable. Religion gives depth and duration to a spirituality, but may also sew divisiveness. A spirituality's ability to develop good moral habits provides a positive test of the "appropriateness" of that spirituality for business. Many successful business executives demonstrate a spirituality that does develop good moral habits.     

FOCUS: Research in Business Ethics* Business Ethics Research: Shaping the Agenda

“The most significant outcome of effective business ethics research would be an improvement of ethical standards and ethical behaviour in organizations”. So how can such research be made effective? The author is Lecturer in Management Studies, University of Cambridge, and Fellow of Lucy Cavendish College.