Further Reading: Business Ethics

Improve your understanding of key concepts covered in Business Ethics fifth edition by exploring these further reading suggestions with commentary from the authors.

 

Paul Boghossian, ‘The Maze of Moral Relativism’, New York Times, 24 July 2011, accessible at http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/the-maze-of-moral-relativism.

For a sharp and clear challenge to relativism, see this article by American philosopher Paul Boghossian.

 

Lawrence M. Hinman, Ethics: A Pluralistic Approach to Moral Theory, 4th edn (Belmont, CA: Thomson Wadsworth, 2008).

This is an informed and practically oriented survey of moral perspectives. William Frankena, Ethics, 2nd edn (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1973).

This classic short introduction to moral philosophy is highly regarded for its clarity.

 

Stephen Cohen, The Nature of Moral Reasoning: The Framework and Activities of Ethical Deliberation, Argument and Decision-making (Melbourne: OUP, 2004).

This is a process-oriented approach to moral reasoning, focusing on what the reasoning is out to achieve and what its mechanics are.

 

 

Paul Rynard, & David P. Shugarman (eds), Cruelty and Deception: The Controversy Over Dirty Hands in Politics (Peterborough, ON: Broadview Press, 2000).

A collection of essays, half of which defend the notion of dirty hands as correct or fruitful, and half of which reject it as incorrect or useless in analysis.

 

Stuart Hampshire (ed.), Public & Private Morality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978).

A collection of essays discussing the notions of public and private morality and the connection between those notions and dirty hands.

 

Michael Walzer 1974, ‘Political action: The problem of dirty hands’, Philosophy & Public Affairs, 2(2), Winter, 1973, pp. 160–80.

An important essay in the area (reprinted in a number of places) arguing for the impossibility of being able to govern well without getting one’s hands dirty. It is important for a leader to be able to do certain things, but it is also important that they not feel immune to adverse moral judgment about those things.

 

 

Stephen Cohen, ‘Who are the stakeholders? What difference does it make?’, Business and Professional Ethics Journal, 15(2), 1996, pp. 3–18.

This is an essay that calls attention to problems with and limitations to the notion of stakeholder.

 

Stephen Cohen, ‘Stakeholders and Consent’, Business and Professional Ethics Journal, 14(1), 1995, pp. 1–14.

This essay argues that the consent of stakeholders is an important notion in making decisions about how to take account of the interests of stakeholders. Simply put, if you want to know what is in the interest of stakeholders, ask them.

 

Richard De George, ‘Concept of the corporation: Shareholder versus stakeholder’, in Business Ethics 6th edn (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall: 2006), pp. 188–91.

A brief account, providing a standard view of the importance of the notion of stakeholder and of stakeholder analysis. It also provides a number of important references to further literature.

 

Norman E. Bowie, & Ronald F. Duska, Business Ethics, 2nd edn (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall: 1990), pp. 32–43, ‘The responsibility of business includes more than profit-making’, and Chapter 4, ‘Moral issues for business managers’. This little, highly readable book calls attention to and explains issues involved in business responsibilities beyond attention to stockholders and maximising profits.

 

 

Milton Friedman, ‘The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits’, New York Times Magazine, 13 September 1970.

This seminal piece, which has given rise to much of the entire area of business ethics, has been reprinted in numerous places including in Beauchamp and Bowie (see next).

 

Tom L. Beauchamp, & Norman E. Bowie (eds), Ethical Theory and Business, 7th edn (and earlier editions) (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2004, pp. 50–4.)

This anthology also contains a chapter of essays on ‘Corporate character and individual responsibility’, which discuss aspects and limits of viewing corporations and corporate responsibility on the model of individual personal responsibility.

 

Colin Grant, ‘Friedman fallacies’, Journal of Business Ethics, 10, 1991, pp. 907–14. Thomas C. Schelling, Choice and Consequence: Perspectives of an Errant Economist (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984).

This is a highly readable discussion of the issues raised by Friedman.

 

 

Richard De George, Business Ethics, 7th edn (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 2010), Chapter 15, ‘Marketing, Truth, and Advertising’. Or, De George, 6th edn (2006), Chapter 13.

Both of these chapters contain a discussion of a number of key issues concerning the ethics of advertising.

 

Harry G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press) 2005.

The essay argues for understanding ‘bullshit’ as different from lying, in the ways discussed in this chapter.

 

Tom L. Beauchamp, & Norman E. Bowie, eds, Ethical Theory and Business, 7th edn (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, Prentice Hall, 2004), Chapter 7, ‘Marketing and the disclosure of information’.

Contains a number of essays, legal cases, and notes on legal cases.

 

 

Stephen Cohen, ‘Arguing about prejudice and discrimination’, The Journal of Value Inquiry, 28, 1994, pp. 391–400.

This is a general discussion about the nature of arguments about prejudice and discrimination. It suggests what characterises the differences among discrimination that is benign, discrimination that is invidious, and discrimination that is, or should be, formally intolerable.

 

Australian Economic Review, 45, Issue 2, 2012: Judith Sloan, ‘How women are faring in the Australian labour market’, pp. 202–3; Elizabeth Broderick, ‘Women in the workforce’, pp. 204–10; Deborah A. Cobb-Clark, ‘That pesky problem of persistent gender bias’, pp. 211–15; & Jenny Gordon, ‘Wages in managed markets: An explanation of the gender wage gap?’, pp. 216–13.

This is a collection of contributions published as a Policy Forum: ‘Women in the Australian Labour Market’.

 

Markus Hahn, & Roger Wilkins, Perceived Job Discrimination in Australia: Its Correlates and Consequences, Working Paper No. 9/13, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, University of Melbourne, 2013, downloadable at www.melbourneinstitute.com/downloads/working_paper_series/wp2013n09.pdf.

This research shows that age is a strong discriminatory factor in obtaining a job while gender related factors are determinants of success in employment.

 

 

While there are numerous books and websites addressing concerns of various particular professions (e.g. ethics of engineering, ethics of midwifery, ethics of accounting etc.), there is very little that addresses the professions generally. In particular, there is very little that is concerned, as we have been in this chapter, with distinguishing the ethical landscape of the professions from the ethical landscape of business. It is for this reason that the material we have listed here is so scant.

 

Stephen Cohen, & Damian Grace, ‘Engineers and social responsibility: An obligation to do good’ in Joe Herkert (ed.), Social, Ethical, and Policy Implications of Engineering: Selected Readings (New York: Wiley-IEEE Press, 1999).

This article argues that the professions have obligations beyond ethical conformism and avoiding harm and have a positive mission to do good.

 

Daryl Koehn, The Ground of Professional Ethics (Oxford and New York: Routledge, 1994; digital version 2005).

Koehn’s book bases professional legitimacy on trust. It does not survey ethics in the professions or take our approach to professional ethics, but it does discuss how trust underpins the moral legitimacy of the professions.

 

 

John Dryzek, Richard Norgaard, & David Schloberg (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Climate Change and Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

This work covers a wide range of discussions about the impact of climate change on politics, economics and society.

 

Bjorn Lomborg, Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist’s Guide to Global Warming (New York: Vintage, 2008).

This work is typical of critiques of action on climate change in arguing that writers like Al Gore overstate their cases, are emotional and place climate concerns ahead of immediate human problems, such as hunger.

 

 

Peter Bowden, ‘Whistleblowing’, in Applied Ethics: Strengthening Ethical Practices, Peter Bowden (ed.)(Prahran, Vic: Tilde Publishing, 2012), pp. 30–46.

Addresses specifically the legislative and industry situations with respect to whistleblowing in Australia.

 

 

Stuart Gilman, Ethics Codes and Codes of Conduct as Tools for Promoting an Ethical and Professional Public Service: Comparative Successes and Lessons (Washington, DC: prepared for the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Network of the World Bank, 2005) accessible at www.oecd.org/mena/governance/35521418.pdf.

Although focused on the public service, this is an excellent discussion of the rationale for codes and their implementation. It is clear, pointed and surveys most of the main questions about codes.

 

Rena A. Gorlin (ed.), Codes of Professional Responsibility: Ethics Standards in Business, Health, and Law, 4th edn (Washington, DC: Bureau of National Affairs, Inc., 1999).

While perhaps a bit dated, this is a compendium of codes from a number of types of businesses and professions. As a practical handbook for assistance in constructing a code for a business or a profession or an entire industry, it can be a very helpful tool.

 

 

Thomas Donaldson, The Ethics of International Business (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989). This is a classic work in international business ethics.

We refer to it in this chapter and its arguments remain relevant today. It is written in a clear and accessible style.

 

John Kline, Ethics for International Business (New York: Routledge, 2010).

This is a case-based text with lots of useful illustrations of ethical problems in transnational business settings.