Tobey Scharding

This Is Business Ethics

An Introduction

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Take a seat in the boardroom. What will you decide?

Corporations make difficult decisions about the right thing to do every day, but as an organization made up of people with different perspectives and values, how can a business behave ethically? This is Business Ethics offers a dynamic and engaging introduction to the study of corporate morality.

_ Offers real-world practical advice for navigating ethical dilemmas in business, developed and explained through illustrative high-profile case studies like the Ford Pinto case, Enron, Walmart and British Petroleum.
_ Explores how ethical theory informs business policy and practice.
_ Presents unresolved contemporary case studies for consideration, inviting readers to participate in the decision-making and offer their own recommendations.
_ The latest in the This is Philosophy series, This is Business Ethics features supplemental online resources for instructors and students at www.thisisphilosophy.com.

Produktdetails

• This is Philosophy
• Verlag: Wiley & Sons / Wiley-Blackwell
• Artikelnr. des Verlages: 1A119055050
• 1. Auflage
• Seitenzahl: 272
• Erscheinungstermin: 22. Mai 2018
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 231mm x 155mm x 18mm
• Gewicht: 666g
• ISBN-13: 9781119055051
• ISBN-10: 1119055059
• Artikelnr.: 52157818

Autorenporträt

TOBEY SCHARDING is Visiting Assistant Professor at Rutgers Business School and Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania. She specializes in business ethics and -finance ethics, with a focus on issues concerning risk and uncertainty. Her articles have appeared in leading academic journals such as Business Ethics Quarterly, Public Affairs Quarterly, and Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy.

Inhaltsangabe

Preface xii

Part I Problems in Business Ethics 1

1 Ethics: Doing the Right Thing 3

Introduction to Ethics 3

What are ethical questions 3

How to answer ethical questions 4

Introductory Case Studies 5

Sam and the substandard notes 5

Casey and the overly-demanding internship 6

Tatiana and the fair distribution of chores 7

Alex and the too-easy-to-cheat course 8

Evaluating the Case Studies 9

Non-ethical guidelines for thinking about the cases 9

Ethical guidelines for thinking about the cases 11

Limitations of ethical evaluation: the problem of controversy 12

Reference 13

2 Business: Maximizing Profit 14

Theory of the Firm 14

Firm organization 15

Why the firm exists at all 16

Problems for firm organization 17

Business Decision-Making: Shareholders and Cost-Benefit Analysis 17

The Dominant Model 19

Shareholder Theory 22

Cost-benefit analysis 25

Business in Society: Consumers, Employees, and Community 27

References and Further Reading 31

3 Classic Business Ethics Dilemmas: When Doing the Right Thing Does Not Maximize Profits 32

Doing Right by Consumers: The Ford Pinto Case 33

Doing Right by Employees: The Walmart Case 38

Doing Right by the Community: The B.P. Case 40

Doing Right by Shareholders: The Enron Case 42

References and Further Reading 46

Case Cited 46

Part II Tools to Solve Business Ethics Dilemmas 47

4 Ethical Theories 49

The Three Major Ethical Theories 51

Utility-based ethics 52

Kant's duty-based ethics 61

Aristotle's virtue-based ethics 67

Other Bases for Ethics 72

Natural law theory 72

Contract theory 73

Ethics of care 74

Feminist ethics 75

References and Further Reading 76

5 Theories of Corporate Personhood 77

Businesses as Ethical Persons 78

Businesses as Bureaucracies 83

Businesses as Collective Persons 87

References and Further Reading 91

6 Theories of Political Economy 92

Private Property 95

The justification of private property 96

Distributive justice 106

The Division of Labor 112

Smith's productivity-based defense of the division 112

Marx's alienation-based criticism of the division 115

References and Further Reading 118

Part III Contemporary Case Studies 119

7 Business Ethics in Employment 121

Employment at Will: The Bechtel Case 121

Bechtel's corporate identity 122

Facts of the case 122

What happened 124

Historical significance 124

Ethical significance: conditions of employment 125

Executive Compensation: The A.I.G. Case 130

A.I.G.'s corporate identity 131

Facts of the case 131

What happened 133

Historical significance 133

Ethical significance: executive compensation 134

Preventing Discrimination and Achieving Diversity: The Google Case 136

Google's corporate identity 137

Facts of the case 138

What happened 139

Ethical significance: unconscious bias 141

Work-Life Balance: The Amazon Case 143

Amazon's corporate identity 144

Facts of the case 144

What happened 145

Historical significance 146

Ethical significance: work-life balance 146

Referen