The ethical problems between law and power： A conceptual framework of business moral conduct

The concept of business ethics ranges from respect of the obligatory law, to attention to mutually shared ethical rules, to the collective well being, and as far as philanthropy. Due to such a heterogeneity of interpretations, it proves useful to attempt to define the concept of moral problems by establishing their contents and limits. Such a matter proves to be of primary importance： Firstly, to be able to establish which situations have underlying questions of ethical implications; Secondly, to be able to evaluate the moral conduct of the company. The objective of this present work is twofold： （1） Identify the distinctive components of an ethical problem; （2） Prepare a support instrument for management to use in the monitoring process of the ethical dimension of the company.     

Identifying and Developing Measures of Information Technology Ethical Work Climates

A model of information technology (IT) ethical work climates is presented. Using these ethical work climates and data collected from a national mail survey of Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) members, empirical measures were developed and evaluated. A mailing of 2446 questionnaires was sent to ACM members and 136 usable responses were returned (5.6%). Using these data, an exploratory factor analysis was performed using principle components analysis to identify the IT ethical work climates from the data. Six of these work climates were identified as predicted by the model. Two ethical work climates that were combinations of the proposed climates were also identified.From the results of the exploratory factor analysis, a confirmatory factor analysis was performed using Calis in PC SAS version 8. The purpose of this analysis was to evaluate the overall fit of these measures to the data and evaluate the psychometric properties of the measures. The fit of the IT ethical work climates model was acceptable. The psychometric properties of these measures were good. Based on these results, conclusions, limitations of the study, and directions for future research are proposed.     

Consumer Ethics: Determinants of Ethical Beliefs of African Americans

This study explores the ethical ideol-ogies and ethical beliefs of African American consumers using the Forsyth ethical position questionnaire (EPQ) and the Muncy-Vitell consumer ethics questionnaire (MVQ). The two dimensions of the EPQ (i.e., idealism and relativism) were the independent constructs and the four dimensions of the MVQ (i.e., illegal, active, passive and no harm) were the dependent variables. In addition, this paper explores the consumer ethics of African Americans across four demographic factors (i.e., age, education, gender, and marital status). A sample of 315 African American consumers was used to explore these relationships. Results confirmed that consumers who score high on the idealism scale are more likely to reject questionable consumer activities, but there was no relationship between relativism and consumers' rejection of questionable activities. Older, more educated and married consumers rejected questionable activities more than younger, less educated and single consumers. Gender did not have any significant relationship to consumers' ethical orientation.     

Ethics in Global Business and in a Plural Society

The contemporary confluence of globalization and ethical pluralism is at the origin of many ethical challenges that confront business nowadays, both in practice and in theory. One of the challenges arising from the development of globalization has to do with respect for cultural diversity. It is often said that the success of economic globalization tends towards social and cultural homogeneity. To the extent that cultural diversity is usually seen as a valuable reality, that global trend seems to contradict our efforts to respect ethical pluralism, both personal and cultural, within society. In this paper I argue that (a) ethical minimalism, despite its emphasis on tolerance and justice, does not take pluralism seriously into account in present-day society, and (b) ethical minimalism is not suited to balancing the homogenizing trend of globalization. Certainly ethical norms are necessary, but by no means are they sufficient in themselves to encourage either justice or tolerance; nor are they sufficient to inspire and encourage good practices and sound regulations. Instead, virtue-based ethics has the capacity of inspiring and encouraging good practices. Particularly, virtue-based ethics is able to inspire a serious dialogue about ethical and legal issues both in the public arena and within organizations.     

The Relationship of Leadership Style and CEO Values to Ethical Practices in Organizations

This study analyzes the relationship between CEO values, leadership style and ethical practices in organizations. The ethical practices of formal statement of ethics and diversity training are included in the study, as well as four categories of values based on Rokeach's (1973) typology including personal, social, competency-based and morality-based. Results indicate that all four types of values are positively and significantly related to transformational leadership, with transactional leadership positively related to morality-based and personal values, and laissez-faire leadership negatively related to competency-based values. When size of company and values are controlled, transformational leadership explains a significant amount of change in formal statement of ethics, and transactional leadership explains a significant amount of change in diversity training.     

Cognitive Theory and Moral Behavior: The Contribution of F. A. Hayek to Business Ethics

This paper shows how business ethics as a concept may be approached from a cognitive viewpoint. Following F. A. Hayek's cognitive theory, I argue that moral behavior evolves and changes because of individual perception and action. Individual moral behavior becomes a moral rule when prominently displayed by members of a certain society in a specific situation. A set of moral rules eventually forms the ethical code of a society, of which business ethics codes are only a part. By focusing on the concept of "limited" or "dispersed knowledge" that underlies the cognitive approach, I show that universal ethical norms that should lead to defined outcomes cannot exist. This approach moreover shows the limits of deliberate rule-setting. Attempts to deliberately impose universal ethical rules on societies may turn out to be harmful for societal development and lead to an abuse of governmental power.     

Ethical Standards and Ideology Among Korean Public Relations Practitioners

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the Korean public relations practitioners' perceptions toward ethical issues, individual practices, and ethical standards in the context of ethical ideology. The survey was conducted with the Korean public relations practitioners. A 2 (Relativism: High/Low) × 2 (Idealism: High/Low) factorial design was devised for the analysis.The MANOVA results showed that ethical ideology (idealism and relativism) had significant effects on ethical decision-making. Idealistic ideology had a main effect on ethical issues, individual practices, and ethical standards. However, relativistic ideology only affected the decision-making process related to ethical issues. No interaction effects were detected. This study indicated that the individual's ethical ideology could be an important variable in explaining the outcomes of the individual's ethical decision-making among Korean public relations practitioners.     

市场经济的伦理缺陷研究

市场经济的伦理缺陷:首先,表现在市场经济基本理念与传统道德价值与原则的根本冲突;其次,表现在市场经济运行过程对经济原则的片面坚持与对伦理价值的顽固排斥与否定。克服市场经济伦理缺陷的根本办法在于重新审视经济理性的合理性,检讨经济发展的终极意义,使市场经济以及经济理性回复到在伦理规则指引下为人类主体性生存服务的合理轨道上来。     

绩效评估的研究取向概述

当前的绩效评估研究主要有三种主流取向,即个人差异观点、情景观点和绩效管理观点。这三种思路的关系并不是孤立的,它们之间存在着联系,实际应用过程中,往往是结合其中的两种甚至三种观点展开研究的。以后的研究中应该在组织绩效研究、绩效概念的科学界定、基于胜任特征的绩效研究、以及结合平衡记分卡的绩效研究等方面继续展开。     

企业员工的伦理决策意向研究——以道德成熟度、道德强度与伦理气候的影响为依据

文章以企业员工为考察对象,探讨个人面临道德困境时的伦理决策意向。样态架构以道德成熟度为预测变项,功利导向性气候为情境变数,经由道德强度知觉影响伦理决策意向。实证资料采用问卷调查,假设验证主要以回归及ANOVA进行分析。研究结果发现：个人道德成熟度是经由道德强度知觉对伦理决策意向产生的影响效果,道德成熟度对道德强度知觉有正向影响关系;在人际亲疏关系为疏远的条件下,道德强度知觉对伦理决策意向具正向影响关系,功利导向性气候则会干扰道德强度知觉对伦理决策意向的影响。