Business Ethics: Interdisciplinary Perspectives and Future Challenges

2021 ◽  
pp. 305-306
Author(s):  
Christoph Lütge ◽  
Matthias Uhl
Keyword(s):  
Business Ethics ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Corporate Citizenship ◽  
Positive Development ◽  
Corporate World ◽  
Academic Subject ◽  
Future Challenges

Over the years, business ethics has become an established discipline, which is taught in many business schools around the globe, often as a mandatory class. But its success reaches far beyond being an academic subject. Throughout the corporate world, and despite undisputable delays, sometimes mere lip service and real setbacks, business ethics, together with its sister enterprises like CSR, Corporate Citizenship, or Compliance, has seen a huge boost in terms of being respected and taken seriously. In spite of the necessary criticism against corporate practices that business ethicists daily raise, one should also not overlook this positive development....

Ethical Preferences among Business Leaders: Implications for Business Schools

2000 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger N. Conaway ◽  
Thomas L. Fernandez
Keyword(s):  
Business Ethics ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Environmental Risks ◽  
Business Leaders ◽  
Ethical Values ◽  
Business Faculty ◽  
Insider Information ◽  
Ethics Program ◽  
Arthur Andersen

Since 1976, the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) has encouraged business schools to include ethics in their curricula. Because lan guage is the means for conveying values, including ethical values, business com munication faculty play an important role in deciding what should be taught, and how. But until very recently, most researchers failed to look specifically at actual practices and perceptions in the workplace. To address that need, we conducted a survey of 250 business leaders concerning their ethical preferences and compared our results with an earlier study of business faculty and students. The survey, adapted from one used in the Arthur Andersen Business Ethics Program, consists of 20 narratives which presented respondents with the need to judge the impor tance of certain issues and their approval or disapproval of the action or decision described. We found no significant differences in responses to the 14 items which addressed ethical issues in such areas as creating health and environmental risks, taking credit when credit is not due, focusing on disability issues, deceiving cus tomers with products and services, and using insider information to gain personal advantage. We did find significant differences in responses to six narratives focused on ignoring wrongdoing in the workplace, doing special favors for others to gain personal advantage, and covering up flaws in merchandise or operations. Our results, and the survey instrument itself, provide useful tools for the business com munication classroom.

Rethinking Ethics Education in Business Schools in the Post-Financial Crisis Epoch

2012 ◽  
pp. 342-356
Author(s):  
Vlad Vaiman ◽  
Throstur Olaf Sigurjonsson
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Business Ethics ◽  
Ethics Education ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Moral Character ◽  
Business Leaders ◽  
Direct Part ◽  
Financial Industry ◽  
Continuous Education ◽  
Business Elite

This chapter deals with a multitude of perspectives on ethics education in business schools and provides a compelling example of Iceland, where unethical behavior of its business elite and the total disregard for commonly accepted ethical rules of conducting business led to unsustainable expansion of the financial industry and its subsequent collapse in the fall of 2008. The authors examine whether ethics education or more precisely, the lack thereof, played any role in this financial collapse, and whether business schools should contribute to molding moral characters of their students, who will ultimately become the next generation of business leaders. Here are a few important highlights of what has been found. First, a consensus seems to have been reached that business schools have an important role in developing the moral character of their students, something they haven’t practiced sufficiently according to managers. Second, business schools ought to take a more direct part in a society’s discourse on business ethics and perhaps be in the forefront of these discussions. Third, there is a clear need for not only asking business schools to contribute to molding the moral character of students but to reshaping that of practicing managers through re-training and continuous education.

The Foundation of (Business) Ethics' Evolution

2019 ◽  
pp. 26-37
Author(s):  
Ben Tran
Keyword(s):  
Business Ethics ◽  
Business Education ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Higher Educational Institutions ◽  
Higher Educational ◽  
Ethics Courses

Business schools are at a crossroads, and it is time to seriously rethink or redesign business education. The purpose of this chapter is to cover the foundation of (business) ethics and the meaning of business ethics. In so doing, this chapter will cover the topic of accreditation in higher educational institutions, and the teaching of business ethics courses in higher educational institutions.

Rethinking Ethics Education in Business Schools in the Post-Financial Crisis Epoch

2013 ◽  
pp. 624-638
Author(s):  
Vlad Vaiman ◽  
Throstur Olaf Sigurjonsson
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Business Ethics ◽  
Ethics Education ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Moral Character ◽  
Business Leaders ◽  
Direct Part ◽  
Financial Industry ◽  
Continuous Education ◽  
Business Elite

This chapter deals with a multitude of perspectives on ethics education in business schools and provides a compelling example of Iceland, where unethical behavior of its business elite and the total disregard for commonly accepted ethical rules of conducting business led to unsustainable expansion of the financial industry and its subsequent collapse in the fall of 2008. The authors examine whether ethics education or more precisely, the lack thereof, played any role in this financial collapse, and whether business schools should contribute to molding moral characters of their students, who will ultimately become the next generation of business leaders. Here are a few important highlights of what has been found. First, a consensus seems to have been reached that business schools have an important role in developing the moral character of their students, something they haven’t practiced sufficiently according to managers. Second, business schools ought to take a more direct part in a society’s discourse on business ethics and perhaps be in the forefront of these discussions. Third, there is a clear need for not only asking business schools to contribute to molding the moral character of students but to reshaping that of practicing managers through re-training and continuous education.

Business Ethics at the Millennium

2000 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 169-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Edward Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Business Ethics ◽  
Ethical Theory ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Social Impacts ◽  
Business And Society ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
The Social

Abstract:Business ethics, as a discipline, appears to be at a crossroads. Down one avenue lies more of the same: mostly philosophers taking what they know of ethics and ethical theory and applying it to business. There is a long tradition of scholars working in the area known as “business and society” or “social issues in management.” Most of these scholars are trained as social scientists and teach in business schools. Their raison d’etre has been admirable: trying to get executives and students of business to understand the social impacts of business and to see business in broad, societal terms.

Labored Relations: Corporate Citizenship, Labor Unions, and Freedom of Association

2012 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 473-500 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cedric E. Dawkins
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Business Ethics ◽  
Labor Unions ◽  
Labor Relations ◽  
Corporate Citizenship ◽  
Labor Rights ◽  
Freedom Of Association ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Way

ABSTRACT:Globalization has brought increased attention to the notion that labor rights such as freedom of association—the right of workers to organize a union—are fundamental human rights. However, the vigorous opposition to freedom of association by US firms is largely ignored in the business ethics literature and exacerbated by compensatory corporate citizenship rating mechanisms that tend to mask labor rights deficiencies. I argue that because freedom of association is a hypernorm, instrumental to fully realizing basic human rights, labor rights and human rights are largely inseparable. Thus, respect for labor rights is a non-substitutable requisite of corporate citizenship. I conclude by providing examples of corporate labor relations strategies that respect freedom of association and business firms that are leading the way.

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