Management Learning Perspectives on Business Ethics

Business Ethics Defined

Some commentators regard ethics and morality as synonymous terms, since they stem from the same word taken from the Greek ethos and Latin mores respectively, meaning ‘custom’. Accordingly, Trevino and Nelson define business ethics as ‘behaviour that is consistent with the principles, norms and standards of business that have been agreed on by society’ (1995: 14).

Such pragmatic definitions have two major shortcomings. First, in emphasizing conformity to custom and practice, they neglect rapidly changing contexts where moral standards for a modern business community are under-determined, as in the developing economies of China or Central and Eastern Europe. Secondly, genuinely open studies of ethics must entail rigorous questioning of all practices and establishments. De George therefore places business ethics within the broader field of philosophical ethics:

Business ethics is therefore a critical and norm-creating subject. Typical writings are not ‘anti-business’, but criticize ethically minimalist approaches based on self-interest, bare legal compliance, and microeconomic logic, ignoring the moral claims of wider stakeholder groups. Fairness, honesty, integrity, respect for employees’ human rights, environmental protection, product safety, and corporate social responsibility are examined as core business principles. The intangibility of such principles, and the complexities of their application, means that business ethics does not deliver final answers or proofs, but rather provokes lively debate.

Even in free-market ‘Meccas’ such as Hong Kong, governments regulate business through legal frameworks and occasionally move or intervene directly. The ethics of government—business relationships are therefore important. If there are webs of special favours and secret donations, and the public finds this out, the tide of outrage can be overwhelming, as recently observed in Japan, South Korea and Italy, where leading politicians and [Page 183]businesspeople have been implicated and humiliated. Electorates have been rather less concerned than business ethicists about bribery and extortion in international business, so that the recent Pergau Dam scandal did little damage to the governments concerned (Britain and Malaysia). The deal involved linking the award of defence contracts with the provision of foreign aid for an environmentally suspect development project.

Scope of this Chapter

In studying business ethics from the perspective of management learning, this chapter will focus on selected process issues related to the learning of business ethics. How did business ethics become part of the business and management curriculum? What are its educational goals? What teaching strategies are employed? What is the impact of business ethics education? What is the hidden curriculum of business ethics, acquired through socialization in educational and business institutions? How might business organizations be made more virtuous? How might apparent cultural differences in business ethics standards and practices be resolved?

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