In recent years, a succession of corporate scandals has rocked the international business community. As a result, many companies have invested considerable time, money and effort on the development of ethics management programs. However, in many cases, such programs are nothing more than insurance policies against corporate liability, designed merely to limit the fallout of scandals should they occur. In Business Ethics as Practice, Mollie Painter-Morland urges us to take business ethics seriously by reconsidering the role of ethics management within organizations. She redefines the typical seven-step ethics management program from within – challenging the reader to reconsider what is possible within each aspect of this process. In doing so, she draws on the insights of Aristotle, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Foucault and numerous contemporary organizational theorists and sociologists to create the space for the emergence of a morally responsive corporate ethos.
• Provides a detailed analysis and critique of existing corporate ethics programs • Challenges the reader to reconsider what business is about by revisiting their values • Contains proposals for the reform of practice
Contents
List of tables; Preface; 1. The dissociation of ethics with practice; 2. Reconsidering approaches to moral reasoning; 3. Moral agency reconsidered; 4. Reconsidering values; 5. Leadership and accountability; 6. Reconsidering ethics 'management'; Index.
Reviews
Review of the hardback: '… a stimulating and readable account of how and why we must return to understandings of 'ethics as practice' within the corporation as opposed to the current reliance on 'ethics management practices'.' Jane Collier, v
Review of the hardback: 'Mollie Painter-Morland has managed to do what many others have been unable or unwilling to do - provide an insightful integration and essential interconnection between ethical theory and practice. In so doing her work gives us a more enlightened view of business and the appropriate ethical foundations upon which its legitimacy rests and success depends.' Michael Hoffman, Professor of Business and Professional Ethics, Bentley College
Review of the hardback: 'This book challenges the usual approaches to business ethics … forces us to rethink our well-worn paradigms and business practices through dynamic viable alternatives. This is a very important new contribution to the literature.' Patricia Werhane, Professor of Business Ethics, University of Virginia
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