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6Grounding and Limiting Political Corporate Social Responsibility (PCSR) Using a Neo-Aristotelian Approach in advancePhilosophy Today. forthcoming.This paper offers a neo-Aristotelian approach to PCSR aimed at enabling us to more systematically ascertain which sorts of corporate political activities, if any, might be politically acceptable. Part 1 sketches Aristotle’s account of the “political.” Aristotelian politics have at least four key dimensions. When we speak of PCSR, we should, from this Aristotelian perspective, evaluate how specific behaviors accord with or undermine these four aspects of political life. Part 2 of the paper explor…Read more
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9Some Modest Proposals for Improving Business Ethics from Primarily an Aristotelian PerspectiveJournal of Human Values 30 (1): 38-51. 2024.The long-term health of business ethics is suspect. In particular, there are some troubling trends within the discipline’s methodology that should be closely monitored and, in some cases, countered. Furthermore, business ethicists and management theorists should take some steps to make business ethics more robust and more relevant to actual business practice. Part 1 of this article argues that, while the dominance of the social science approach should be curtailed, relations between normative an…Read more
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5Aesthetics and Business Ethics (edited book)Imprint: Springer. 2014.Ludwig Wittgenstein famously said, "Ethics is aesthetics." It is unclear what such a claim might mean and whether it is true. This book explores contentious issues arising at the interface of ethics and aesthetics. The contributions reflect on the status of aesthetic en ethical judgments, the relation of aesthetic beauty and ethical goodness and art and character development. The book further considers the potential role art could play in ethical analysis and in the classroom and explores in wha…Read more
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Chinese Approach to Business EthicsIn Deborah C. Poff & Alex C. Michalos (eds.), Encyclopedia of Business and Professional Ethics, Springer Verlag. pp. 335-337. 2021.
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16Narrative Business Ethics Versus Narratives Within Business Ethics: Problems and Possibilities From an Aristotelian Virtue Ethics PerspectiveJournal of Business Ethics 189 (4): 763-779. 2024.Applied ethicists’ interest in narratives and narratives ethics has grown steadily. Some thinkers position narratives as supplements to ethics, while others see narratives as new form of ethics comparable to virtue or deontological ethics. In this paper, I analyze some of the main ethical claims being made on behalf of business and literary narratives from the perspective of Aristotelian virtue ethics. I argue that, while narratives can significantly contribute to the development of our characte…Read more
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2Snow Brand Milk Products (C)Journal of Business Ethics Education 7 125-127. 2010.In the C case, the turnaround at SBM has been effected. Most significant is the company’s realization that it exists to serve the consumer and, through that service, the broader society. This brief case outlines the successes Hiwasa pushed SBM management to accomplish and introduces the challenges the company faced in 2009: primarily, continuing to build its corporate social responsibility approach and addressing environmental and social issues.
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7Capitalism & ethicsBusiness Ethics, the Environment and Responsibility 32 (S1): 1-3. 2023.Business Ethics, the Environment &Responsibility, Volume 32, Issue S1, Page 1-3, April 2023.
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14Applying Aristotelian and Confucian Virtue Ethics to Humane Work in the Business ContextHumanistic Management Journal 7 (2): 189-209. 2022.What is humane work? What does such work look like in a business context? This paper articulates two ways of thinking about humane work using an Aristotelian and a Confucian virtue ethics approach. This approach reveals the need to think about (1) work’s connection not merely with autonomy but with self-refinement and self-perfection, with craft, and with the production of genuinely good goods; (2) possible dangers (e.g., the risk of generating envy) of focusing too much on pay issues in connect…Read more
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4The Ethics of Biobusiness, Technology, and Genetic EngineeringBulletin of Science, Technology and Society 20 (1): 10-18. 2000.When we think of ethics in medicine or business, we typically focus on whether the dignity and autonomy of patients and stakeholders are being respected. Ethicists have devoted a great deal of energy to showing how particular practices either foster or damage healthy personal relations. It is my contention that these analyses, while sometimes insightful, do not grapple with the key question: What does it mean to act in an increasingly technological age? Is it legitimate simply to apply some set …Read more
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27A virtue ethics critique of ethical dimensions of behavioral economicsBusiness and Society Review 125 (2): 241-260. 2020.Behavioral economics is the latest trendy form of economics. Increasingly theorists are advocating using behavioral economics to do normative ethics or claiming that the behavioralists’ findings render normative claims otiose. I argue in this paper that we should be extremely wary when it comes to accepting any such normative pronouncements. I argue that behavioral economics: (a) minimizes and/or misunderstands the role that character and architectonic life goals play in accounting for the why o…Read more
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10Toward a New (Old) Theory of Responsibility: Moving Beyond AccountabilitySpringer Verlag. 2019.This book offers a much needed overview of the neglected notion of responsibility. Instead of offering vague talk about “individual responsibility” or “corporate responsibility,” Daryl Koehn examines in detail four accounts of responsibility, taking care to specify what responsibility does and does not mean in each account. She argues for a return to the ancient concept of Socratic dialogical responsibility, a concept that avoids many of the problems inherent in the other accounts. After examini…Read more
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43How Would Confucian Virtue Ethics for Business Differ from Aristotelian Virtue Ethics?Journal of Business Ethics 165 (2): 205-219. 2020.Confucianism is potentially relevant to business ethics and business practice in many ways. Although some scholars have seen Confucian thought as applicable to corporate social responsibility :433–451, 2009) and to corporate governance :30–43, 2013), only a few business ethicists :415–431, 2001b; Journal of Business Ethics 116:703–715, 2013; Romar in Journal of Business Ethics 38:119–131, 2002; Lam in The Analects, Penguin Classics, London, 2003; Chan in Journal of Business Ethics 77:347–360, 20…Read more
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18Re-Thinking Power - Kinds of PowerJames Hillman New York: Doubleday, 1995Business Ethics Quarterly 8 (1): 179-186. 1998.
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16Management Ethics: Integrity at Work, Joseph A. Petrick and John F. QuinnBusiness Ethics Quarterly 9 (4): 713-717. 1999.
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3Spotting Ethical Spin-Offs: A Review of Michael Santoro’s Profits and Principles - Profits and Principles: Global Capitalism and Human Rights in ChinaMichael A. Santoro Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2000 $26.00 (review)Business Ethics Quarterly 13 (2): 257-260. 2003.
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12Snow Brand Milk Products (B)Journal of Business Ethics Education 7 117-124. 2010.The B case jumps ahead several years and outlines the turnaround efforts SBM undertook to address its grave missteps: shifting to a consumer-oriented, integrity-focused management style; providing greater transparency and communication; and establishing a corporate ethics committee and a Snow Brands Code of Conduct. In June 2002, after much consideration and reflection on Snow Brand’s issues (as outlined in the A case), Hiwasa joined its new board as its sole outside director, serving as the imp…Read more
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16Snow Brand Milk Products (A)Journal of Business Ethics Education 7 103-116. 2010.This three-case series examines the dilemma that faced the Japanese company Snow Brand Milk Products (SBM) as it confronted the task of rebuilding and revitalization after a series of scandals, many self-induced, had threatened the company’s future. The A case begins in spring 2002 when leading consumer activist Nobuko Hiwasa was invited to join Snow Brand’s board of directors. The CEO wanted her to assist in SBM’s revitalization efforts, which were beingimplemented in the wake of two recent sca…Read more
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15Do Investors See Value in Ethically Sound CEO Apologies? Investigating Stock Market Reaction to CEO ApologiesJournal of Business Ethics 152 (2): 311-322. 2018.Since the late 1990s, the number of apologies being offered by CEOs of large companies has exploded. Communication and management scholars have analyzed whether and why some of these apologies are more effective or more ethical than others. Most of these analyses, however, have remained at the anecdotal level. Moreover, the practical, economic consequences of apologies have not been examined. Almost no rigorous or systematic empirical work exists that examines whether stakeholders reward firms w…Read more
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Review of Virtue in Business: Conversations with Aristotle by Edwin Hartman (review)Journal of Business Ethics 142 (3): 617-619. 2017.
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5Reframing Economic Ethics: The Philosophical Foundations of Humanistic Management, by Claus Dierksmeier. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. 127 pp. ISBN: 978-3-3193-2299-5 (review)Business Ethics Quarterly 27 (3): 459-462. 2017.
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14What Form of Business Regulation is Workable?Business and Professional Ethics Journal 23 (1): 43-63. 2004.
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32Employee Vice: Some Competing Models A Response to MobergBusiness Ethics Quarterly 8 (1): 147-164. 1998.Abstract:Much of the current discussion of evil within business and professions locates evil within the individual employee. Dennis Moberg (1997) has argued for conceiving of employee viciousness as a lack of self-control. This paper argues, that while some evil behaviors may be well-modelled as instances of low self-control, this model does not fit much of what might qualify as evil (e.g., child-caregivers falsely accusing their fellow employees of ritual child abuse). The paper examines three …Read more
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45The Nature of and Conditions for Online TrustJournal of Business Ethics 43 (1/2). 2003.As use of the Internet has increased, many issues of trust have arisen. Users wonder: will may privacy be protected if I provide information to this Internet vendor? Will my credit card remain secure? Should I trust that this party will deliver the goods? Will the goods be as described? These questions are not merely academic. A recent Boston Consulting Group study revealed that one out of ten consumers have ordered and paid for items online that never were delivered (Williams, 2001). This year …Read more
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Does not mean that he must be ruthless, cruelEthics in the Workplace: Selected Readings in Business Ethics. forthcoming.
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80Business and game-playing: The false analogy (review)Journal of Business Ethics 16 (12-13): 1447-1452. 1997.A number of business writers have argued that business is a game and, like a game, possesses its own special rules for acting. While we do not normally tolerate deceit, bluffing is not merely acceptable but also expected within the game of poker. Similarly, lies of omission, overstatements, puffery and bluffs are morally acceptable within business because it, like a game, has a special ethic which permits these normally immoral practices. Although critics of this reasoning have used deontologica…Read more
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22The Ethics of Quality: Problems and Preconditions (review)Journal of Business Ethics 44 (1). 2003.A number of advocates for TQM contend that firms who embrace TQM will automatically and naturally act in ethically sound ways (Roth, 1993; Pace, 1999; Steeples, 1994). This claim is a strong one. This paper assesses its truth. We consider the many ways in which quality initiatives, if undertaken in good faith, can foster sound ethics. We explore the various ways in which TQM presupposes, and thus cannot engender, ethical behavior. And, finally, we identify some of the ethical blind spots in qual…Read more
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136Rethinking feminist ethics: care, trust and empathyRoutledge. 1998.Rethinking Feminist Ethics bridges the gap between women theorists disenchanted with aspects of traditional theories that insist upon the need for some ethical principles. The book raises the question of whether the female conception of ethics based on care, trust and empathy can provide a realistic alternative to the male ethics based on duty and rule bound conception of ethics developed from Kant, Mill and Rawls. Koehn concludes that it cannot, showing how problems for respect of the individua…Read more
Areas of Specialization
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Philosophy of Action |
Aesthetics |
Applied Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Ancient Greek and Roman Philosophy |
Asian Philosophy |