-
2Poverty and the Politics of CapitalismThe Ruffin Series of the Society for Business Ethics 1 31-35. 1998.1. Here’s a way to think about poverty. People who live in poverty do so because they have few opportunities to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. In fact the gap between rich and poor has increased in recent times due to the more wholesale adoption of capitalist practices around the world. The institutions of business and government conspire to give the poor a Hobson’s choice of minimal wage McJobs or unemployment. Neglect of both urban ghettoes and the rural poor has been systematic, if n…Read more
-
14Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability in Scandinavia: An OverviewJournal of Business Ethics 127 (1): 1-15. 2015.Scandinavia is routinely cited as a global leader in corporate social responsibility and sustainability. In this article, we explore the foundation for this claim while also exploring potential contributing factors. We consider the deep-seated traditions of stakeholder engagement across Scandinavia including the claim that the recent concept of “creating shared value” has Scandinavian origins, institutional and cultural factors that encourage strong CSR and sustainability performances, and the r…Read more
-
12Related Debates in Ethics and Entrepreneurship: Values, Opportunities, and ContingencyJournal of Business Ethics 84 (3): 341-365. 2009.In this paper, we review two seemingly unrelated debates. In business ethics, the argument is about values: are they universal or emergent? In entrepreneurship, it is about opportunities – are they discovered or constructed? In reality, these debates are similar as they both overlook contingency. We draw insight from pragmatism to define contingency as possibility without necessity. We analyze real-life narratives and show how entrepreneurship and ethics emerge from our discussion as parallel st…Read more
-
7Who's who in business ethics: A profile of Richard T. de GeorgeBusiness Ethics, the Environment and Responsibility 5 (1). 1996.For more than thirty years the writings and influence of one man in particular have dominated and directed the field of modern business ethics. We are indebted to two of his fellow‐Americans for this portrait of Richard T. De George. R. Edward Freeman is the Elis and Signe Olsson Professor of Business Administration and Director of the Olsson Center for Ethics at The Darden School, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22906‐6550; and Martin Calkins, SJ, is a Research Assistant in the Olss…Read more
-
3Corporate ResponsibilityIn Hugh LaFollette (ed.), The Oxford handbook of practical ethics, Oxford University Press. pp. 514--536. 2003.
-
13Management Ethics: Placing Ethics at the Core of Good Management, by Domènec Melé. London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2012. ISBN: 978-0230246300 (review)Business Ethics Quarterly 24 (1): 142-143. 2014.
-
9Stakeholder Theory, Fact/Value Dichotomy, and the Normative Core: How Wall Street Stops the Ethics Conversation (review)Journal of Business Ethics 109 (1): 109-116. 2012.A review of the stakeholder literature reveals that the concept of "normative core" can be applied in three main ways: philosophical justification of stakeholder theory, theoretical governing principles of a firm, and managerial beliefs/values influencing the underlying narrative of business. When considering the case of Wall Street, we argue that the managerial application of normative core reveals the imbedded nature of the fact/value dichotomy. Problems arise when the work of the fact/value d…Read more
-
9Special issue on: Gender, business ethics, and corporate social responsibilityBusiness Ethics Quarterly 24 (3): 497-500. 2014.
-
52The Politics of Stakeholder TheoryBusiness Ethics Quarterly 4 (4): 409-421. 1994.The purpose of this paper is to enter the conversation about stakeholder theory with the goal of clarifying certain foundational issues. I want to show, along with Boatright, that there is no stakeholder paradox, and that the principle on which such a paradox is built, the Separation Thesis, is nicely self-serving to business and ethics academics. If we give up such a thesis we find there is no stakeholder theory but that stakeholder theory becomes a genre that is quite rich. It becomes one of m…Read more
-
8Enhancing Stakeholder PracticeBusiness Ethics Quarterly 16 (1): 23-42. 2006.Lack of specificity around stakeholder identity remains a serious obstacle to the further development of stakeholder theory andits adoption in actual practice by business managers. Nowhere is this shortcoming more evident than in stakeholder theory’s treatment of the constituency known as “community.”In this paper we attempt to set forth what we call “the Problem of Community” as indicative of the definitional problems of stakeholdertheory. We then begin the process of gaining greater specificit…Read more
-
7Poor People and the Politics of CapitalismBusiness and Professional Ethics Journal 30 (3-4): 179-194. 2011.The purpose of this paper is to suggest that the current conversation about the relationship between capitalism and the poor assumes a story about business that is shopworn and outmoded. There are assumptions about business, human behavior, and language that are no longer useful in the twenty first century. Business needs to be understood as how we cooperate together to create value and trade. It is fundamentally about creating value for stakeholders. Human beings are not solely self-interested,…Read more
-
16Scandinavian Cooperative Advantage: The Theory and Practice of Stakeholder Engagement in Scandinavia (review)Journal of Business Ethics 127 (1): 1-21. 2015.In this article, we first provide evidence that Scandinavian contributions to stakeholder theory over the past 50 years play a much larger role in its development than is presently acknowledged. These contributions include the first publication and description of the term “stakeholder”, the first stakeholder map, and the development of three fundamental tenets of stakeholder theory: jointness of interests, cooperative strategic posture, and rejection of a narrowly economic view of the firm. We t…Read more
-
9Women's studies and business ethics: toward a new conversation (edited book)Oxford University Press. 1997.This latest book in the Ruffin Series in Business Ethics is the first work to analyze the significance of gender in the ethical management of business organizations. Scholars from the fields of business ethics and women's studies come together in this book to offer fresh new perspectives on business ethics. The contributors examine the value of feminist theory and scholarship for business ethics, and from this examination four overarching themes emerge. The first theme is that corporations are s…Read more
-
11Erratum to: Scandinavian Cooperative Advantage: The Theory and Practice of Stakeholder Engagement in ScandinaviaJournal of Business Ethics 127 (1): 87-87. 2015.In this article, we first provide evidence that Scandinavian contributions to stakeholder theory over the past 50 years play a much larger role in its development than is presently acknowledged. These contributions include the first publication and description of the term “stakeholder”, the first stakeholder map, and the development of three fundamental tenets of stakeholder theory: jointness of interests, cooperative strategic posture, and rejection of a narrowly economic view of the firm. We t…Read more
-
4Ethics and HRMBusiness and Professional Ethics Journal 30 (3-4): 269-292. 2011.The development of an ethical perspective of HRM that is both employee centered and explicitly normative and, as such, distinct from dominant and criticalperspectives of HRM has progressed in recent years. Reliance on the traditional “threesome” of rights/justice theories, deontology and consequentialism, however, has limited debate to micro-level issues and the search for a “solution.” By understanding the employment relationship as a stakeholder relationship, we open the ethical analysis of HR…Read more
-
8Business Ethics at the MillenniumBusiness Ethics Quarterly 10 (1): 169-180. 2000.Business ethics, as a discipline, appears to be at a crossroads. Down one avenue lies more of the same: mostly philosophers takingwhat 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 busin…Read more
-
36Stakeholder Theory: A Libertarian DefenseBusiness Ethics Quarterly 12 (3): 331-349. 2002.Abstract:The purpose of this paper is to suggest that at least one strain of what has come to be called “stakeholder theory” has roots that are deeply libertarian. We begin by explicating both “stakeholder theory” and “libertarian arguments.” We show how there are libertarian arguments for both instrumental and normative stakeholder theory, and we construct a version of capitalism, called “stakeholder capitalism,” that builds on these libertarian ideas. We argue throughout that strong notions of…Read more
-
9Values and Poetic Organizations: Beyond Value Fit Toward Values Through Conversation (review)Journal of Business Ethics 113 (1): 39-49. 2013.In the midst of greed, corruption, the economic crash and the general disillusionment of business, current conceptions of leadership, organizational values, and authenticity are being questioned. In this article, we fill a prior research gap by directly exploring the intersection of these three concepts. We begin by delving into the relationship between individual values and organizational values. This analysis reveals that the “value fit” approach to creating authenticity is limited, and also i…Read more
-
The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Management, Volume IIIn Fritz Allhoff & Anand Vaidya (eds.), Business ethics, Sage Publications. 2005.
-
7Sagoff’s Environmentalism: An Economic and Ethical CritiqueThe Ruffin Series of the Society for Business Ethics 2 101-114. 2000.
-
7Special Issue on Gender, Business Ethics, and Corporate Social ResponsibilityBusiness Ethics Quarterly 23 (4): 640-643. 2013.
-
University of VirginiaRegular Faculty
Charlottesville, Virginia, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Applied Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Areas of Interest
Metaphilosophy |
20th Century Philosophy |