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as an Academic Field
Deon Rossouw
business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics BEN-AFRICA BOOK SERIES ~ NUMBER 1 business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics business ethics
Table of contents
Foreword Introduction Chapter One: The scope of business ethics
1. The area of inquiry 2. The purpose of inquiry 2.1. The explanative stream The social scientific current The managerial current The organisational interest current 2.2. The evaluative stream The ethical guidance current The ethical control current The ethical development current 3. Colliding or complementary streams? 3.1. The normative-descriptive collision 3.2. Collision control 3.3. From colliding to complementary approaches 4. Where to from here? ix
1 1 4 4 5 5 6 7 7 8 9 10 11 13 14 16
Chapter Two: Research in busines ethics
1. Ontology 1.1. Economic setting 1.2. Moral agency 1.3. Interaction between economic setting and moral agency 1.4. Guidelines for ontology in research
20 21 21 23 24 26
2. Strategy and methodology 2.1. Embeddedness 2.2. Stage of development 2.3. Ambiguity 2.4. Sensitivity 3. The role of theory in research 4. Conclusion
27 28 29 30 32 33 34
Chapter Three: Teaching business ethics
1. The purpose of teaching 1.1. Cognitive competence 1.2. Behavioural competence 1.3. Managerial competence 2. Retrieving the presuppositions 2.1. Presuppositions of cognitive competence 2.2. Presuppositions of behavioural competence 2.3. Presuppositions of managerial competence 2.4. Irreconcilable presuppositions? 3. Teaching strategies 3.1. Teaching cognitive competence 3.2. Teaching behavioural competence 3.3. Teaching managerial competence 4. Summary
36 36 37 38 40 42 42 45 48 50 55 55 57 59 61
Chapter Four: Interaction within business ethics
1. Interaction amongst business ethicists 1.1. Guidelines for academic interaction 2. Interaction between business ethicists and practitioners 2.1. Alienation between business ethicists and practitioners 2.2. Guidelines for a more amicable relationship
63 63 66 67 69 71
Chapter Five: The institutionalisation of business ethics Conclusion Endnotes Bibliography
74 79
Compared to other established academic fields of study, business ethics is fairly young. In the process of maturing as an academic field it is becoming more self-conscious about its development, identity and purpose. This process of self-reflection in business ethics is evident in various studies that have been undertaken to gauge its current state of development. These studies have mostly been conducted in those parts of the world where the activity started to develop, viz., the USA and Western Europe. Only relatively recently has it also spread to Africa, with two regional surveys having been conducted - on business ethics in South Africa (Rossouw, 1997), and in Eastern Africa (Milanzi, 1997) respectively - as well as one pan-African survey (Barkhuysen, 1999). In these surveys certain problems or neglected areas within the field of business ethics were identified. Against this backdrop this book is focused on the question: "What are the critical areas of intervention for developing business ethics as an academic field in Africa and what considerations should guide their development?" In answering this question the following five areas in need of intervention were identified: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. The scope of business ethics Research on business ethics Teaching of business ethics Interaction between business ethicists Institutionalisation of business ethics
Frameworks and guidelines for developing business ethics as an academic field in each of these five areas were then created. A start was made with a framework for mapping out the scope of this field in terms of both its area of study and the purpose thereof. Similar frameworks were developed for conceptualising the three major areas of activity within
the field, namely research, teaching and interaction. Also, with regard to contentious issues relating to these three areas, guidelines for dealing with them were proposed. Finally, guidelines were offered for institutionalising these activities so that they would become well established on the academic landscape, whilst also fulfilling the purpose of the field of business ethics.
Developing Business Ethics as an Academic Field
In some parts of the world the relatively youthful history of business ethics spans almost three decades, whilst in others it is less than a decade old. Business ethics started its academic life in North America, and its early development was consequently dominated by a North American discourse. The approaches to the study of business ethics, as well as the issues that emerged in North America, made a lasting impact on the landscape of this area of study. Since this period of inception in the 1970's, business ethics has become an established academic field on the rest of the globe (Enderle, 1997). Outside North America it first came of age in Europe and is now also maturing in most regions of the world. Part of this process of maturation is that, as an academic field, business ethics is becoming self-conscious about its development, identity and purpose, in much the same way that children tend to become more reflective about their identity and goals when they reach adolescence. This process of self-reflection in business ethics is evident in various studies that have been undertaken to gauge its current state of development,1 mostly conducted where it began, in the USA and Western Europe. The objective of this study2 is to determine what considerations should guide this process of self-reflection that is crucial for the development of business ethics as an academic field. Objective though such an enterprise might now appear, I have to reveal a subjective dimension thereof. My interest in the development of business ethics as an academic field is that of an African. Based upon my exposure to this field in Africa over the last decade, as well as my learning from the self-reflection that occurred internationally within the field of business ethics, I wish to
develop frameworks and guidelines that can be used in developing business ethics specifically in Africa. The findings of my study might have relevance and application outside Africa, but my motivation and first concern is to see the development of this field of study on the African continent. Two further qualifications are also appropriate at this point. Firstly, when I use the term 'business ethics' in this report I will use it in the narrow sense in which it is restricted to the academic inquiry into this field of study. It should thus be distinguished from the looser sense in which 'business ethics' is sometimes used to refer to any discourse about the ethical dimensions of business. The proposal by De George (1991:42) that the term 'ethics in business' should be reserved for the latter, while 'business ethics' should only be reserved for the former, will be accepted for the purposes of this study. The second qualification relates to the distinction between business ethics as an 'academic field' and business ethics as a 'social practice' (Van Luijk, 1999:364-365). As a social practice the development of business ethics as a social phenomenon is being driven and influenced by various role-players, such as corporate leaders, managers, academics, religious organisations and special interest groups. This broad social movement will only be brought into consideration as far as it impacts directly on the development of business ethics as an academic field. Otherwise it will be deliberately excluded from discussion. The focus of this study is therefore only on business ethics as an academic field within which the main role-players inevitably are academics. It is however important to first clarify what is meant by the concepts 'academic field' and 'development' respectively. In defining the concept 'academic field', it is necessary to establish its distinguishing features, i.e. what characteristics should a phenomenon display before one can rightly call it an academic field? Five characteristics seem to be intimately associated with academic fields, namely: (a) a focus on a specific area that is being studied; (b) the creation of new theoretical knowledge through research; (c) the transfer of existing
knowledge and the development of relevant competencies via teaching to students; (d) interaction amongst those who teach and/or research in a specific field; and (e) the institutionalisation of the above focus and activities. As the purpose of this work is to determine what needs to be done in order to develop a specific academic field, some clarity is also needed about what such development means. The concept 'development' generally revolves around the notion of bringing out of something that is potentially contained within it. This meaning is well captured in the development of a photographic film, where development refers to the bringing out and rendering visible of a latent image. When applied to an academic field, 'development' would then refer to the process of growth within that field that will bring it to a fuller and more mature condition. The process of maturation will have to relate to each of the five aspects of academic fields identified above and will thus entail developing more clarity on the focus or scope of the field. It will imply improving the quality and effectiveness of research, teaching and interaction and, finally, it will mean the institutionalisation of the scope and activities in a field in ways that will promote the visibility and credibility thereof. When the notion of 'developing an academic field' is now applied to the specific field of business ethics, the research agenda is clear. What needs to be done is to provide frameworks and guidelines for developing the following aspects of business ethics as an academic field: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. The scope of business ethics Research Teaching Interaction Institutionalisation
Each of these aspects will now be explored.
Chapter One The scope of business ethics
Crucial to a discussion of the scope of business ethics is clarification of the term 'scope'. It can be used in two different senses when applied to academic fields, firstly as the phenomenon, object or area that is being studied, and secondly as the purpose, goal or objective of such academic study. However, for the sake of this project it was decided not to choose between these two meanings of 'scope', but rather to discuss both, since it was felt both contribute their own particular significance. From the ensuing discussion it will become evident that while the first meaning is fairly uncontroversial in the field of business ethics, the same cannot be said of the second.
1. The area of inquiry
In response to the question as to what area is being studied in business ethics, the simple answer is the ethical aspect of economic activity (De George, 1991:43; Mahoney, 1990:ix). To provide more flesh to this very bare answer, one needs to say more about ethics and economic activity. Starting with the latter, one can first position economic activity in relation to its context. Should one divide society into three main parts, namely the state, civil society and private life, then economic activity is normally situated within the sphere of civil society, where persons voluntarily enter into transactions of economic exchange for goods or services (cf. Kaler, 2000:269). These goods and services can be provided either by a single person, or by the collective action of persons who have formed an organisation for that purpose. In the case of such organisations, the initiative for forming them can either be taken by private individuals or by the state, or it can be taken jointly by private
individuals or private organisations and the state. In narrower conceptions of business ethics, the study of economic activity is restricted to the economic activity of private companies and individuals, while in broader conceptions thereof the economic activities of the state are also included as a legitimate part of the area being studied. It has become commonplace in business ethics to distinguish three different dimensions of economic activity (cf. Enderle, 1996:47; De George, 1987:203-205; Singer, 1997:67-71). Firstly, there is the macrodimension that relates to the economic system, that is the broad policy framework within which economic exchange occurs. This framework is being decided upon at the national level by the political power of the state. When economic activity transcends national boundaries, this system of economic exchange is being agreed upon by the governments involved and/or through international trade agreements. Secondly, there is the meso-dimension of economic activity that refers to the relation between economic organisations and those with whom they interact. Such interactions can be with either the state, other organisations of civil society or private individuals. What matters here is the collective behaviour of the economic organisation towards those outside it. Finally, there is the micro-dimension of economic activity where the emphasis is on the economic actions and decisions within the organisation itself. The macro-, meso- and micro-dimensions thus coincide with the systemic, organisational and intra-organisational dimensions of economic activity. Business ethics studies the ethical aspect of economic activity in all three of these dimensions of economic activity. This ethical aspect is constituted by the impact of economic activity on individuals, society, and the natural environment. Ethics is concerned with studying what is good or right within human interaction. Consequently it revolves around three basic concepts, namely the good, the self and the other. Ethical behaviour is being conceived of as behaviour that not only considers what is good for oneself, but also what is good for others (Rossouw, 1994:2). As such, it contrasts ethical behaviour with selfish
behaviour, but not with self-interested behaviour (cf. Hooker, 1998:35; Werhane, 1999:20). When one is aware that one's behaviour will impact on other persons, but nevertheless is solely concerned with what is good for oneself, whilst failing to consider how it affects others, such action is considered to be selfish and unethical. If, on the contrary, one's behaviour is based upon considerations that seek to serve one's own interest, while simultaneously caring about the interests of others, then one's behaviour can be construed as self-interested while also being ethical. Ethical behaviour thus does not exclude self-interest, but requires that it should be balanced with considerations about what is good for others who are also affected by one's behaviour. In this sense, ethical behaviour is not identical to altruistic behaviour, that requires one to sacrifice one's self-interest for the sake of others. When this understanding of what ethics entails is applied to economic activity, it is evident that what is being studied in business ethics are the impact and implications of economic activity on the interests of all who are affected by it. Given what has been said above about the role of self-interest in ethical behaviour, it also implies that the impact of ethical behaviour on economic activity will be studied as well. To the extent that the latter is true, one can say that not only the ethical impact of economic activity is being studied in business ethics, but also the economic impact of ethicality (see figure 1).
Macro Meso Micro SELF
Figure 1: The area of inquiry
The above description of the area of inquiry of business ethics implies that this inquiry will by nature be a multi-faceted and multi-disciplinary one (cf. De George, 1987:205; Enderle, 1993:142-144; Shaw, 1996:491). It has to look at the consequences of economic activity from the perspectives of a wide variety of stakeholders on the macro-, meso- and micro- levels. It further has to investigate how economic activity impacts on the economic, political, sociological, psychological and other interests of these various stakeholders. This implies that business ethics cannot be restricted to one discipline, but needs contributions from various disciplines in order to attend to the various facets of the inquiry into the ethical dimension of economic activity. Thus it requires a pluralistic and inclusive approach.
2. The purpose of inquiry
In contrast to the first meaning of the scope of business ethics (cf. ch:1.1.), where there is a broad consensus about the area that is being studied, the same cannot be said about the second, that refers to the purpose of inquiry. In response to the question about what purpose inquiry into the field of business ethics should serve, opinions diverge (cf. Kaler, 2000:257). Amidst this divergence of opinion, two broad streams of thinking are discernible, classifiable as the explanative stream and the evaluative stream respectively. Within each of these streams a number of more defined currents can be discerned. In what follows I will provide a map that hopefully will be useful in navigating this terrain of uncertainty.
2.1. The explanative stream
All the currents within the explanative stream have one thing in common and that is that they regard the purpose of inquiry into the field of business ethics as coming to a deepened understanding of the ethical aspect of economic activity. They diverge with regard to the purpose or goal that this deeper understanding should serve. The three most
prominent currents within this explanative stream are the social scientific, the managerial and the organisational interest currents.
The social scientific current
From this perspective, the purpose of inquiry in the field of business ethics is to obtain objective social scientific knowledge of the ethical aspect of economic activity. What really matters in business ethics, from this vantage-point, is that this area should be studied with the rigour associated with scientific study, so that reliable and objective knowledge about this domain of life will be produced (cf. Trevino & Weaver, 1994:120122). It is therefore imperative that reliable and justifiable methodology should be employed so that the results produced by inquiry will be able to withstand the scrutiny of the community of business ethicists. Furthermore, the knowledge produced in this way should deepen our understanding of the ethical aspect of economic activity within the organisational context so that we will be able to discern patterns in personal and organisational ethical behaviour. This in turn will help to explain - and even predict - ethical behaviour in business. The social scientific status of the knowledge produced in business ethics therefore takes precedence over the practical usefulness thereof for practitioners. This sentiment is succinctly captured in the following statement: "To the extent that knowledge is developed and tools produced for solving problems, the field is academically defensible, even if businesses are reluctant to adopt the findings".3
The managerial current
Another line of thinking within this explanative stream shifts the emphasis from objective knowledge to managerial concerns. It argues that the purpose of business ethics can never be mere social scientific knowledge. According to this perspective, business ethics finds its raison d'être in the need of managers to cope with the ethical aspect of their work. Consequently, an approach should be adapted in business ethics
in which priority is given to practice over theory (Enderle, 1996:46). This does not mean that theoretical inquiry should be neglected or abandoned, but that it should serve the needs of managers who have to deal with the ethical aspects of economic activities. The inquiry into business ethics should thus receive its cue from managerial practice (cf. Vallence, 1995:4; Frederick, 2000:163). The needs and problems that managers have to deal with should provide the agenda for theoretical inquiry in business ethics. Also, the solutions offered should reflect an awareness of the pressure on managers to take decisive action within the organisations that they have to run. The measure of the success of business ethics in its academic quest will therefore be whether it can provide the knowledge, tools and guidance that managers are longing for in their managerial practice. If business ethics fails to achieve this, it looses its right to exist and is bound to become irrelevant, even if it has an impressive record of theoretical research. The organisational interest current A third line of thinking sees the purpose of business ethics as aligning ethics with organisational goals. From this perspective it is important to recognise that ethics should not merely be regarded as a constraint on the economic behaviour of organisations, but on the contrary should be seen as a constructive factor in achieving economic success. The essentiality of ethics for organisational co-ordination, as well as the strategic importance thereof for achieving organisational goals, should be demonstrated (cf. Bouckaert, 1994:156; Trevino & Weaver, 1994:122; Binns, 1994:179). The process of inquiry in business ethics should therefore be geared towards unveiling this intricate link between ethics and organisational goals and ultimately the economic performance of organisations. It is argued that unless such a positive link between ethical performance and organisational performance can be established, business ethics is destined to be a temporary flash on the radar screens of organisations that soon will disappear again. What is thus being called for is thorough empirical enquiry that will produce objective and
convincing evidence of the link between ethics and the economic performance of organisations (cf. Hosmer, 2000:237). If this inquiry is not capable of yielding such results, business ethics is unlikely to enter the mainstream of economic discourse and is equally unlikely to be integrated into the organisational goals of businesses (cf. Hoffman & Driscoll, 2000:228).
2.2. The evaluative stream
The defining feature of the evaluative stream is that it wishes to go beyond a mere understanding of the ethical aspect of economic activity, into an ethical evaluation thereof. It wants to determine whether economic activity in its various dimensions can stand the test of ethical scrutiny. All currents within this stream have this feature in common that they want to evaluate and judge the ethicality of economic activity. The various currents within this stream diverge with regard to how one should act upon this ethical evaluation. Once more, three currents can be discerned within this evaluative stream. They are the ethical guidance, the ethical control and the ethical development currents. The ethical guidance current The purpose of ethical inquiry according to the ethical guidance current is to determine the ethical standards that should apply to economic activity and to measure economic activity against this standard. Normative ethical theories are thus used as the yardstick for evaluating economic activity (cf. Mahoney, 1990:ix; Spence, 2000:59; Trevino & Weaver, 1994:120; Collier, 1998:622; Nash, 1994:11). This can happen with regard to the macro-dimension of economic activity, where the ethicality of economic systems and macro-economic policies can be evaluated; the meso-dimension, where the moral obligations of business on an organisational level can be scrutinised; or the micro-dimension, where intra-organisational behaviour is the object of evaluation. On all these levels the basic assumption of the ethical guidance current is that ethics
should never be compromised or co-opted by economic goals or economic interests. On the contrary, ethics should maintain its critical distance from economic activity so that moral failures or fault-lines within economic activity in all its dimensions can be exposed. Ethics should thus retain its traditional role as gadfly and never sacrifice it (Corlett, 1998:100). The critical distance on which this current is premised does not imply that there inevitably will be a relationship of animosity between ethics and economic activity. What it does however deny is that current economic practice or systems can be used as an ethical yardstick for how economic activity needs to be conducted. Only by keeping this critical distance can ethical inquiry provide ethical guidance to the domain of economic activity. The ethical control current The ethical control current differs from the previous current by insisting that judging economic activity according to normative ethical theories is necessary but not sufficient. Its unique contribution to the question on the purpose of business ethics is its insistence that action needs to be taken to correct moral failures within economic activity, or to prevent them from occurring in the first place (Kaler, 2000:266; Preuss, 1999:410; De George, 1994:13). This control on economic activity can be achieved either externally or internally. External control over economic activity is achieved through political means when economic activity is regulated through legislation, regulatory institutions or political pressure (cf. Betz, 1998:701). This control can also be achieved internally by governance structures, procedures and policies within organisations that will minimise ethical failures. The purpose of ethical inquiry is then to expose those areas in need of either external or internal control. Furthermore, it is also seen as the task of business ethics to provide theoretical models and tools required for controlling these areas of moral failure. The basic assumption of this approach to business ethics is thus that economic activity can only be ethically improved by constructing better regulative frameworks within which economic
activity occurs, as well as by improving the structures of ethical control within organisations. The hope for moral improvement is consequently placed on the structural dimensions of economic activity. The ethical development current The final current within the evaluative stream shares the commitment of the previous current to improve the ethical standard of economic activity, but deliberately takes a different route to achieve this objective. It disagrees that structural adjustments in either the economic system or within business organisations are sufficient to achieve the required moral improvement. In this ethical development current, the focus is shifted from structures to the character of the individual involved in economic activity. It is driven by the conviction that the moral development of economic players and the moral vision of leaders are prerequisites for achieving moral improvement in business (Preuss, 1999:409; Binns, 1994:179; McDonald & Donleavy, 1994:839; Pearson, 1995:24-26; Solomon, 1993:5). The objective therefore is to stimulate the moral development of employees and managers and to awaken the moral vision of business leaders. Given this objective, it shares with the ethical guidance current the concern of normatively evaluating economic activity, but it also goes beyond it to exploring how the characters of economic players can be stimulated towards moral development and moral leadership. The purpose of business ethics seen from this perspective is to produce a deeper understanding of the role of moral character in economic activity, as well as identifying ways in which moral character development can be promoted. Consequently the success or failure of business ethics will be judged by whether it finds ways to affect the desired moral development in economic players and whether it is effective in achieving the desired moral development and visionary moral leadership.
Social scientific Managerial Organisational interests Ethical guidance
objective knowledge managerial interests organisational goals ethical judgement economic structures moral agents
Ethical control Ethical development
Figure 2. The purpose of business ethics
3. Colliding or converging streams?
The above description of the two main streams of thinking (see figure 2) on the purpose of business ethics may create the impression that these streams inevitably are on a collision course, destined to cause turbulence that might have disastrous consequences for the further development of this field. Such an impression would not be totally unwarranted and historical evidence of such clashes between proponents of the various streams can also be cited.4 These clashes are referred to as the conflict between descriptive and normative approaches to business ethics. The descriptive approach will coincide with what I have above called the explanative stream, while the normative approach will partly
coincide with what I have termed the evaluative stream. My reason for not using the terms 'descriptive' and 'normative' in my discussion thus far is, first of all, that there are certain descriptive elements implied in the evaluative stream. Furthermore, I also wish to avoid the antagonistic connotations that these concepts have acquired when used as a pair of concepts. Building on this I will also argue below that any approach that claims that these two streams of thinking are by nature antagonistic or mutually exclusive is mistaken. On the contrary, I will argue that they are mutually dependent and that any attempt to undermine their mutual dependency will be detrimental to the development of business ethics as an academic field. Before I turn to that task I will first prepare the ground for that argument by indicating why these two approaches are often framed as being in an antagonistic relationship with each other.
3.1. The normative-descriptive collision
The animosity between descriptive and prescriptive approaches to business ethics hinges on the distinction between facts and values. The descriptive approach to business ethics, according to the stereotype in which it is often cast, takes the domain of facts as its area of study. Based upon a positivistic approach it then provides an objective and valuefree description of the ethical dimensions of economic activity, without passing any normative judgement on its findings. It merely, describes, where possible quantifies, explains and thus provides the basis for, predictions on how human beings can be expected to behave in carefully specified conditions (cf. Trevino & Weaver, 1994:118-120). This approach is favoured by management studies and by social scientists in general (cf. Freeman, 2000:169). In contrast, the normative approach is associated with philosophy and theology. In this approach values are taken as the domain of study. The stereotypical view of this approach portrays it as one where normative judgements are made about the ethical values and ideals that should guide economic activity. It is often portrayed as highly speculative as
it is not interested in 'what is', but only in 'what ought to be'. Contrary to the descriptive approach, that portrays the social reality as a relatively objective reality that can be studied from a distance, the normative approach conceives the social reality as something that can be changed and transformed through autonomous human decisions (cf. Trevino & Weaver, 1994:118-120). Those subscribing to the descriptive approach harbour, in main, two serious doubts about the normative approach. Firstly, they are concerned about the fact that normative judgements are not based on facts, but on what seem to them to be subjective speculations. They are thus concerned about whether the claims of normative ethical theorists could stand up to scientific scrutiny. A second related concern revolves around the practical relevance of these normative judgements. Proponents of the descriptive approach fear that because these judgements are not based on the facts of economic reality, they may be of little relevance and practical use within the real world of economic activity (cf. Robertson, 1993: 589; Victor & Stevens, 1994:146; Trevino & Weaver, 1994a:130-132; Sorell, 1998a:83). Proponents of the normative approach have their own doubts about the contribution of the descriptive approach to business ethics. Their main concern relates to what is often called the 'naturalistic fallacy' (cf. Donaldson, 1994:164-167; Victor & Stevens, 1994:146). This fallacy is based upon the assumption that one can derive an "ought" from an "is". Normative ethicists vehemently deny that this is possible. A description of a current state of affairs, such as descriptive scientists produce, can never be used as a basis to prescribe what ought to be. They are therefore sceptical about the contribution that the descriptive approach can make to business ethics. Normative theorists regard business ethics as first and foremost an ethical endeavour. Descriptive ethics can therefore, at the most, play a subsidiary role in this endeavour (cf. Cowton, 1998b:101; Klein, E.R. 1998). A second reservation about the role of a descriptive
approach to business ethics is that it might uncritically serve the interests of business if it is divorced from normative ethics. The results produced by descriptive ethics can be co-opted by business to serve their own interest, while disregarding the wider social impact of their actions. Seen in this light, ethics becomes just another tool to serve managerial or business interests. Ethics then degenerates into a form of sophistry where ethics talk is being used to cover up and justify selfish concerns of managers and businesses (Robberts, 2000; Kaler, 2000:262-264; Song & Park, 1999; Trevino & Weaver, 1994a:132; Frederick, 1991:57). Against the backdrop of this collision between the descriptive and normative approaches sketched above, the question now arises as to whether it should be accepted as an unfortunate but unassailable feature of business ethics, or whether it is possible to evade it.
3.2. Collision control
One strategy for dealing with the animosity between the descriptive and normative approaches to business ethics can be to dismiss and explain it away as a product of negative stereotypes or caricatures of them. There surely is some merit in such a strategy and it certainly is necessary to undermine such negative stereotypes and caricatures. It is neither true that all descriptive approaches to business ethics are based on narrow positivistic ontologies and quantitative methodologies, nor that all who follow this approach regard their inquiries as valuefree and objective. Equally, there are too many examples of normative theorists who have a sound knowledge of economic activity, and who integrate that knowledge into their normative work, to dismiss all work done within the normative approach as non-scientific and of little practical relevance. Such negative stereotypes that fuel the animosity thus stand in need of correction. They simply do not present a reliable image of proponents of the descriptive and normative approaches respectively.
Correcting these negative stereotypes is however not sufficient to defuse the tension between the descriptive and normative approaches. Even after such corrective action has been taken, some of the above mentioned inadequacies of the descriptive and normative approaches still remain. The descriptive approach, even when informed by a broader ontology and more diverse methodology, still runs the danger of being abused for selfish concerns by managers and businesses - as long as it is divorced from normative considerations. This risk immanent in the descriptive approach poses a serious threat to the development of business ethics as an academic field. As long as business ethics is suspected of being nothing more than an ideological servant of the interests of managers and businesses, it will struggle to win academic respect and legitimacy. Similarly, the normative approach will also have difficulty in entering the mainstream of economic discourse and in being taken seriously by managers, as long as it is isolated from the factual base upon which the descriptive approach is premised. If business ethics does not succeed in breaking into that discourse, and continues to be rejected by managers as irrelevant, it is not likely to survive long as an academic field, as it will seem to be mere esoteric speculation by armchair spectators of economic activity. One can therefore conclude that this rift and isolation between descriptive and normative approaches are unfortunate and that the development of business ethics will benefit from healing them. The daunting question that now becomes unavoidable to address is whether the rift is in fact healable or whether business ethics is destined to be a divided landscape.
3.3. From colliding to complementary approaches
As the dangers of a rift between descriptive and normative approaches to the development of business ethics are fairly obvious, it comes as no surprise that such a division is widely lamented (Frederick, 1991:57; Cowton, 1998b; Robertson, 1993:24). Several solutions have already been proposed for overcoming it. Three kinds of such proposals can be distinguished in the literature.
The first kind of proposal accepts that the distinction between facts and values will remain intact and that one therefore needs to look at ways in which the descriptive approach, with its focus on facts, can interact with the normative approach that focuses on values. What is proposed is a symbiotic interaction between the two approaches, where each retains its distinct focus, ontologies, theoretical principles, and methodologies (cf. Trevino and Weaver, 1994a:132-135). In such a symbiotic relationship, the two distinct approaches can borrow insights from, as well as critique, each other, without the one dominating or dissolving into the other. The prerequisite for such a symbiotic approach is a certain amount of scholarly bilingualism and methodological ambidexterity (Donaldson, 1994:167), in order to make sense of the approach that one is not so well versed in. The second approach also recognises the distinction between facts and values, but proposes an approach that will integrate both (cf. Trevino and Weaver, 1994a:135-140). This requires the development of new theories that will integrate normative and descriptive ethical dimensions of economic activity. Theories such as Rawls' theory of justice, Kohlberg's theory of moral development and some versions of stakeholder theory, are usually regarded as examples of what can be achieved in this regard. The prerequisite for such an integrative approach is the rejection of positivist interpretations of scientific inquiry, as it will render the desired integration of facts and values impossible. The third approach towards overcoming the descriptive-normative rift in business ethics is also premised upon the rejection of a positivist approach to scientific inquiry, but goes beyond that in also insisting on a rejection of the value-fact distinction (Rosenthal & Buchholz, 2000). It argues that the positivist ideal of objective value-free inquiry is unattainable, as all inquiry is based upon and influenced by the values and subjective involvement of the researcher. Scientific inquiry does not require that one should pretend that one is unaffected by values, rather that one should admit one's values and be aware of how they can
influence what one perceives and finds (cf. Werhane, 1994a:177-179). The value-fact distinction is rejected as unnecessary as facts and values are perceived as two dimensions of the same reality. In the same way that facts can be studied, the process of valuing in which all persons are constantly involved can equally be studied. This universal process of valuing is informed by facts, while the outcome of the process of valuing equally impacts on human behaviour and thus on factual states of affairs. Normative statements therefore do not belong to an ontological realm different from so-called factual statements. It is suggested that normative statements should rather be regarded as experimental hypotheses on how human existence can be enriched (Rosenthal & Buchholz, 2000:404). This implies that such hypotheses must be tested against factual evidence to determine their validity.
4. Where to from here?
The above discussion has revealed that a variety of positions can be taken with regard to the question as to what the purpose of business ethics should be. Six different positions were identified and divided into two main streams, namely the explanative stream and the evaluative stream. In the discussion about the tension between normative and descriptive ethics, it became clear that isolating these two streams of thinking from each other would be detrimental to the development of business ethics as an academic field. In concluding this section on the purpose of business ethics, I will provide broad guidelines for navigating this landscape of two streams, divided by a rift between descriptive and normative approaches. Three such guidelines will be suggested. Firstly, any position taken in the debate on the purpose of business ethics that implies isolation between the descriptive and normative approaches should be regarded as harmful to the further development of business ethics as an academic field. For the reasons already discussed above, an exclusively descriptive approach will result in tainting business ethics as the 'ideological servant' of particular vested interests and thus
undermine the academic legitimacy and respectability of the field. Similarly, an exclusively normative approach will taint it as an 'isolated spectator' that has little of relevance and practical use to offer to those involved in economic activity. The first charge, of being an 'ideological servant', is particularly relevant to the managerial and the organisational interest currents within the explanative stream, while the latter charge, of being an 'isolated spectator', is relevant to the ethical guidance current within the evaluative stream. This does not mean that any of these positions needs to be abandoned. Take, for example, the organisational interest current, with its emphasis on aligning ethics with organisational goals. Viewed in isolation from any normative considerations it can be abused to serve narrow organisational interests. It can use ethics simply to bolster the image of managers or reputations of companies, or it can be utilised as a clever tactic to divert attention from other questionable practices they might be involved in. If business ethics is perceived as serving such narrow and selfish interests, it inevitably will result in major scepticism about its legitimacy as an academic field. If, on the other hand, the question of how ethics can contribute to the achievement of organisational goals is balanced with wider normative considerations, then the alignment of ethics with organisational goals becomes legitimate. It is then no longer a case of only considering selfish interests, but rather a situation where own interests are being balanced with those of others. The emphasis on the alignment of ethics and corporate goals against such a normative backdrop then becomes an important purpose of business ethics, as it can make a vital contribution towards integrating it into the mainstream of strategic business thinking. The reduction of the purpose of business ethics to any one of the three positions mentioned above would thus be detrimental to the development of business ethics. They only have a role to play in combination with the other positions identified with regard to the purpose of business ethics. Exclusively normative positions therefore need to be combined with descriptive positions and exclusively descriptive positions need to be combined with normative positions.
Secondly, ontological and methodological flexibility amongst business ethicists will promote the development of business ethics as an academic field. As the above discussion about the animosity between proponents of the descriptive and normative approaches has demonstrated, such conflicts can often be attributed to rigid and restrictive ontologies and methodologies. As ontology and methodology will be discussed in more depth in the next section - on research in business ethics - it only needs to be said at this point that positivist and objectivist ontologies, with their associated quantitative methodologies, reinforce exclusively descriptive approaches to business ethics. This does not imply that they should be rejected in favour of more subjectivist ontologies and their associated qualitative methodologies. What is being called for are more realist ontologies that will be capable of recognising and respecting both the more objective and the more subjective aspects of the ethical dimension of economic activity. Such flexibility has been identified as a prerequisite in all three proposals discussed above, for overcoming the unhealthy division between descriptive and normative approaches in business ethics. Finally, care should be taken not to overstress the fact-value distinction. Although this distinction is undeniably an important and valuable one, there is the danger of over-emphasising it to the extent that it results in uncalled for divisions. The above discussion has demonstrated that it can be used to drive a wedge between descriptive and normative inquiries by portraying the former as a scientific inquiry into ethical facts whilst the latter is seen as unscientific speculation, because it deals with values (and not with facts). Such a division fails to recognise that there are a variety of rational ways in which claims can be justified. Claims about facts will inevitably be justified on other grounds as claims about values, but that does not mean that the one set of justifications is rational whilst the other set is irrational. This only follows when one is committed to a very narrow empiricist notion of rationality. It is thus possible to rationally justify claims about facts as well as claims about values.
Neither does the distinction between fact and value coincide with the distinction between the explanative and evaluative streams in business ethics. At least two of the positions identified within the evaluative stream combine values and facts and thus successfully integrate descriptive and normative dimensions. The ethical control current within the evaluative stream consists of judging moral failures within economic activity, whilst simultaneously also describing and advising on political and internal governance means that can be used to prevent such moral failures. In a similar fashion, the ethical development current also takes a normative stand by attempting to improve ethical behaviour and leadership within an organisation, but in so doing it uses descriptive theories of personal and organisational moral development and leadership. Both these examples demonstrate that there is no need to isolate facts and values from each other. On the contrary, they illustrate how facts and values could and should inform each other. Now that the area and purpose of inquiry within the field of business ethics has been explored, attention will turn to the three most important activities within this field, namely research, teaching and interaction, as well as to the institutionalisation of the field as such.
Chapter Two Research in business ethics
There are at least three reasons why research in the field of business ethics is vital for the further development of the field. Firstly, research should extend the theoretical base of business ethics. Without such an expanding theoretical basis business ethics will remain an infantile academic field incapable of developing systematic knowledge of its area of study. Explanative and evaluative theories need to be produced that will yield a more sophisticated understanding and evaluation of the ethical dimension of economic activity. Secondly, the academic status of business ethics hinges to a large extent on its ability to produce research that can withstand rigorous academic scrutiny. Only research that complies with the highest academic standards will ensure that business ethics finds its rightful place amongst other respected and well-established fields of study. Thirdly, the credibility of business ethics as an academic endeavour depends largely on whether research can provide the intellectual tools for practitioners to understand and manage the ethical dimensions of economic activity. Research needs to provide the evidence that the ethical dimensions of business are important and that something can be done about them (cf. Brigley 1995b:221). Without such a conviction amongst the end-users of business ethics, the current surge in interest is destined to wane. Given these considerations, the question now turns to what should be done to ensure that business ethics research would indeed fulfil these three expectations? A survey of recent literature reveals that there are primarily three aspects of research that are particularly important for determining whether these expectations will materialise. They are the ontology of business ethics research, the appropriateness of research strategies and methodologies and the role of theory in research. Each
of these three aspects will now be explored in order to develop frameworks and guidelines regarding them.
1. Ontology
Ontology refers to views about the nature, constitution and structure of reality or being.5 Ontology thus conveys the convictions or implied assumptions that one makes about reality - i.e. what one presumes reality to be. All research is based upon ontological assumptions and business ethics is no exception to the rule. Also, in business ethics research, certain assumptions about the nature of the reality that is being studied are made – either explicitly or implicitly. These ontological assumptions determine not only what is being researched, but also how research is being designed, conducted and presented. The pitfalls that need to be avoided in business ethics research are onesided (or restrictive) ontologies, which can cause epistemological blind spots that prevent one from seeing certain dimensions of this field of study. This calls for ontologies that will be rich enough to capture the variety of ethical dimensions and aspects associated with economic activity. In business ethics research, ontological assumptions are inevitably made about (a) the economic setting within which ethical behaviour occurs, and (b) the moral agents whose ethical behaviour is being studied within this economic setting. Furthermore, ontological assumptions are being made about (c) the relation between moral agents and the economic setting within which they operate. The ontological considerations relevant to each of these three aspects of business ethics will now be explored.
1.1. Economic setting
Ontological assumptions about the economic setting within which ethical behaviour occurs can range from materialistic to idealistic. A materialistic ontology regards the economic domain as an objective spatio-temporal phenomenon with its own internal regularities and
social laws. Consequently, it is assumed that it can be studied in a similar fashion to other material phenomena (cf. Collier, 1995:8; Crane, 1999:238). Extreme materialist ontologies tend to be closely aligned to empiricist and positivistic approaches to research. They typically will result in a preference for precisely formulated theories and quantitative data and will also show an affinity for behaviourist doctrines.6 The other end of this spectrum is being occupied by idealist ontologies. In contrast to the objective nature of materialist ontologies, there is a distinctly subjective ring to idealist ontologies, emphasising as they do that the economic domain is shaped by human ideas. The reality shaped by these ideas is not a fixed one, but is continually subjected to processes of reinterpretation. There is no fixed meaning to it, as the meaning of this economic setting is always in a process of flux and renegotiation. The only way of understanding this economic setting is consequently through the interpretations that human beings make thereof (cf. Werhane, 1999:51, 65-66). Such idealistic ontologies give preference to hermeneutic research strategies where symbolic communication within the economic domain is being researched through qualitative methodologies (cf. Collier, 1995:8; Crane, 1999:239). Both extreme materialist and idealist ontologies are restrictive. Materialist ontologies tend to neglect the variety of meanings that individuals can ascribe to institutions, processes and behaviour. They also miss the subtleties imbedded in language as the research instruments associated with them depend on singular meanings of terms that cannot accommodate the plurality of meanings embedded in language. Furthermore, their preference for social and behavioural doctrines makes it hard to grasp contingency and autonomy in human behaviour. Likewise, idealist ontologies also restrict business ethics research. Their preoccupation with symbolic communication is at the cost of understanding the empirical and quantitative dimensions of the economic setting within which ethical behaviour is being played out. Their radical openness to new meanings that can be bestowed upon phenomena and
behaviour leads to overlooking of the regularities and patterns that can be discerned within the economic setting, as well as the pressures exerted by this economic setting on individuals to conform to dominant practices. Furthermore, their subjectivist nature undermines the development of systematic theories about its domain of study. The above exposition of the nature of materialist and idealistic ontologies and their respective restrictions makes it imperative to avoid the excesses associated with both of these kinds of ontologies. Instead, a more realist ontology of the economic setting in which ethical behaviour occurs should be able to accommodate both the valid contributions of materialist and idealist ontologies, without restricting research to either of them. It should thus be able to account for both the subjective and objective dimensions in this domain of study. It should be capable of discerning regularities and patterns without loosing sight of contingency and human autonomy. What is required are ontological assumptions that allow for a systematic understanding and mapping of the economic setting within which ethical behaviour occurs, while simultaneously allowing for the openness and unpredictability that is typical of human behaviour. Such an ontology will be rich enough to accommodate a wide range of research strategies and methodologies suitable for investigating both the objective and subjective dimensions of the economic setting of business ethics.
1.2. Moral agency
In the same way that researchers' understandings of the nature of the economic setting in which ethical behaviour occurs influences their approaches to research, so their understandings of the nature of the human actors operating within this setting equally impact on the way in which they approach their research. The major distinction that is relevant to ontological assumptions about human agency is the one between freedom and determinism. Ontology premised upon the freedom of humans will emphasise individual autonomy in ethical behaviour.
The focus of research will thus be on the individual and the preferences and attitudes of the individual. Consequently, research will be preoccupied with personal decision-making. In contrast, an ontology, which starts with the assumption that human agency is determined by factors beyond the control of the individual will emphasise the role of external factors on ethical behaviour. Instead of focusing on individual decision-making, it would rather focus on physical, psychological and social conditions that constrain or facilitate ethical behaviour. Consequently, research based on such a deterministic ontology will show an affinity for gauging the impact of external factors on moral agency. That ontologies based on freedom and determinism, respectively, have both the capacity to reveal and conceal, is not hard to see. Ontology premised upon individual freedom would guide research to reveal the role of autonomy and leadership in ethical matters, but it might conceal the role of contextual constraints on moral agency. Similarly, an ontology based upon determinism will reveal the constraints and enabling conditions for moral behaviour, whilst showing a blind spot for the role of autonomy and ethical leadership. Given the respective restrictions of these two ontologies, it is evident that the ontologies that guide researchers should sail between the excesses of both of these, whilst embracing the respective contributions that they can make towards understanding both the autonomy of individuals in ethical behaviour and the constraints that impact on ethical behaviour.7 Once more ontologies of moral agency are needed that will be rich enough to accommodate both freedom and constraint.
1.3. Interaction between economic setting and moral agency
A further vital part of the ontology of business ethics research relates to the understanding of the nature of the interaction between moral agents and the economic setting within which they perform their moral agency. The dividing line between ontologies in this respect is the
distinction between personal and cultural understandings of that interaction. Cultural ontologies will emphasise the social and institutional context within which moral agency is situated. It will see ethical behaviour as embedded in an organisational and societal context characterised by corporate goals, values and processes. In its extreme forms, it will portray ethical behaviour as a reflex of the cultural context within which it occurs. Such cultural ontologies will promote research on how this cultural setting permeates the ethical behaviour of those involved in it. It will attempt to uncover the impact of, amongst others, corporate culture, various stakeholders, professional affiliations, the external environment and the macro-economic context on ethical behaviour (cf. Brigley, 1995a:22). Personal ontologies, on the contrary, will emphasise the role of individual moral agency in economic settings. The emphasis will be on the beliefs and convictions that sway individuals in their moral decision-making and behaviour. Rather than focusing on cultural and contextual factors that might have an impact on moral behaviour, the focus of research will be on the moral attitudes or values that influence individuals in their decision-making. Such personal ontologies result in research that focuses on the attitudes and moral intentions of individuals in situations that require moral decision making. Once more, both cultural and personal ontologies have the capacity to reveal and to conceal. Cultural ontologies will make researchers aware of the impact of organisations, as well as the wider social culture, on moral behaviour. It can however simultaneously turn a blind eye to those personal dimensions of moral agency that have the capacity to deviate from the general flow of organisational and social culture. Neither will it be particularly apt when dealing with the phenomenon of moral dissidence within organisations. Similarly, personal ontologies can reveal how individuals make their moral decisions, but at the same
time they stand in danger of concealing the impact of cultural influences on the moral behaviour of individuals. In this way there might be a blind spot for the gap that often exists between personal moral convictions and actual moral behaviour in organisational settings (cf. Cowton, 1998a:424; Robertson, 1993:587). This makes it imperative to utilise ontologies that are capable of accommodating both the personal and cultural understandings of moral agency within organisations (cf. Brigley, 1995a:17-19; Collier, 1995:9).
1.4. Guidelines for ontology in research
As ontology determines what researchers see and research, and also how they approach, conduct and report their research, it is imperative that business ethics research should be guided by ontologies rich enough to accommodate all the dimensions of ethical agency in economic settings discussed above (see figure 3). A lack of self-awareness about the ontological assumptions informing and guiding research is obviously one of the factors that impact negatively on the quality of research in this field. A more conscious articulation of the ontology on which research is based will go a long way in remedying this deficiency in business ethics research that is by now well documented. Ontological awareness or sensitivity does not mean that all research should start with an extended discussion of a comprehensive ontology of business ethics. It does however require that researchers should be able to indicate the ontological assumptions that underlie their specific research project. In this way they will signal to the research community what contribution their research wishes to make to the field of business ethics, whilst simultaneously indicating those dimensions of their object of study that they choose not to investigate. Such intellectual honesty and modesty will reduce the risk of research being labelled simplistic or naïve.
Moral agency within economic setting
Cultural Personal
Economic Setting
Moral Agency
Figure 3: Ontology in business ethics research
2. Strategy and methodology
Research is a game of justification.8 Not only do researchers have to justify their findings, but each and every decision in the process of research should equally be justified. This includes the selection of research strategies and methodologies. It is of the utmost importance that the strategy and methodology selected should be appropriate and justifiable for the topic of research. Rigidity with regard to strategy or methodology is destined to undermine the quality of business ethics research. It is therefore imperative that the ontological flexibility discussed above should be complemented with similar flexibility with regard to the selection of research strategy and methodology. Sensitivity to the potential, as well as the handicaps, of research methodologies and strategies is in this respect of vital importance. In this section four considerations that should guide decisions on research strategy and methodology in business ethics will be discussed. They are considerations
about (a) embeddedness, (b) stage of development, (c) ambiguity, and (d) sensitivity in business ethics research.
2.1. Embeddedness
The above discussion on the ontology of business ethics research revealed that research in this field is always encapsulated in a tension between freedom and constraint. Ethics in economic activity is always an embedded ethics – embedded in the institutions, frameworks and organisations of economic activity. With regard to our understanding of the economic setting of business ethics, it was shown that research ontologies should allow for both the objective regularities and patterns that emerge in economic behaviour, and for the contingency caused by human subjectivity. In discussing moral agency it was pointed out that, as moral actors, our autonomy is always constrained by conditions beyond our control. When it came to moral agency within economic settings it was made equally clear that our moral agency is always embedded in a cultural context. Thus, the embeddedness of business ethics is evident. Moral behaviour within the field of business ethics can never be studied in isolation from the economic setting with which, and for the sake of which, it originates. This embeddedness of business ethics has important implications for the selection of research strategies and methodologies. Strategies that ignore the economic context, which both enable and constrain ethical behaviour, are bound to produce superficial and not very useful knowledge. What is needed are strategies and methodologies that will be capable of studying ethical behaviour in such a way that not only the freedom of actors (subjectivity and personal autonomy) are being understood, but also the impact thereupon of the economic setting (objective and cultural). This ontological consideration indicates what kind of research strategies and methodologies will not suffice in business ethics. Quantitative
research, for example, that relies on self-report survey methodologies, might be very useful in determining the moral attitudes and intentions of individuals, but it is not particularly helpful in understanding how they actually would behave within the economic setting.9 A number of factors within the organisational context, such as corporate culture, role-governed responsibilities, stakeholder pressure and the like, can impact on and even short-circuit these ethical intentions. This makes it imperative to opt for strategies and methodologies that will enable researchers also to study actual moral behaviour and not merely intended behaviour. In order to achieve this, phenomenological research strategies conducted within naturalistic settings are required. A variety of more qualitative research methodologies can be utilised in this regard, such as case studies, narratives, observation, personal in-depth interviews and focus groups. Also, documentary analysis of company reports and communications can be used to uncover how ethical behaviour is institutionalised within the organisational setting (cf. Brigley, 1995a:22 and 1995b:222). Thus, in order to give due credit to the cultural embeddedness of ethical behaviour in business, not only a variety of research strategies is required, but also a variety of research methodologies.
2.2. Stage of development
Young fields of study typically suffer certain growth pains that more mature fields have already outgrown. Amongst these count an insufficient theoretical basis and confusion about the meaning of key concepts. The requirements for what counts as appropriate research within such young fields is also often not yet settled. That business ethics is still such a young field of study, especially on a world-wide scale, is beyond dispute. Its stage of development is an important factor that must be reckoned with in the design of research. As a young field of study, a lot of effort needs to be put into generating new theories and expanding on those that already exist (cf. Crane,
1999:239). Research should therefore be exploratory in order to uncover new dimensions of this field that can aid the process of theory-building. In such an early stage, hypothesis-generating research is mostly more desirable and more appropriate than hypothesis-testing research. Such exploratory research is mostly of a qualitative nature and thrives on qualitative rather than quantitative methodologies. The priority that is currently given to quantitative hypothesis-testing research in business ethics is therefore not serving the developmental requirements of the field. This claim is further substantiated by the widely heard complaint that, despite the quantity of research activity in the field, the theoretical basis of the field is expanding neither satisfactorily nor at a satisfactory rate.
2.3. Ambiguity
The ambiguity of key terms in business ethics also has implications for decisions about research strategy and methodology. This ambiguity stems from two sources, the first of which has to do with the stage of development of the field. As a young and developing field there is still insufficient consensus on the meaning of key terms in its community of researchers. This is something that one can expect to be remedied in time. There is, however, another source of ambiguity that time most probably will not remedy, and that has to do with the very nature of ethics (cf. McDonald & Donleavy, 1995:845). The content of key ethical concepts is destined to remain ambiguous, because concepts like good, ethical, right and wrong do not refer to factual states of affairs, but depend on value judgements that people make. Two persons can look at the same occurrence (fact) but end up with totally opposing judgements (value) of the goodness or rightness of what has occurred. The typical moral dilemmas of our time all testify to this reality. If one accepts MacIntyre's (1981) diagnosis of 'moral dissensus', namely that these differences in value judgements can be related to differences in the ultimate values to which individuals adhere, it is evident that time will not cure this ambiguity associated with ethical judgement. There is no
need to regard this as disconcerting. It is par for the course of ethics – and also par for the course of business ethics. Aristotle already recognised this when he said that we should not expect to speak with "the same degree of precision in all our discussions …for it is the mark of the trained mind never to expect more precision in the treatment of any subject than the nature of that subject permits" (1976:65). Some subjects, like business ethics, simply do no allow the same precision as others, but that does not imply that we cannot talk in reason about them. This ambiguity associated with ethics should be accounted for in research strategy and methodology. What is highly problematical is research that pretends that such ambiguity does not exist. When such typically ambiguous key concepts are operationalised in research instruments that do not allow respondents the opportunity to bring their own understandings of these concepts into play, the research results most probably will not be very revealing. Such a conceptual straightjacket (Crane, 1999:241) is likely to tell us more about the pre-judgements of the researchers than about those being researched. What is needed to accommodate these concerns about ambiguity in business ethics research are methodologies that will allow respondents the opportunity to coconstruct the meaning of such ambiguous terms (cf. Brigley, 1995a:19). Open-ended questions, personal interviews, focus groups and other methodologies that allow respondents to interact with the researcher, are much more suited for this purpose than close-ended questions, where the only possibility for interaction with the researcher is a tick in a box. This ambiguity in business ethics research also points to the importance of analysing the communication that occurs within organisations, because the subtle differences in meaning are conveyed in linguistic form. Analysis of communication (formal or informal, documented or undocumented) as for example content analysis, can be a useful research instrument for uncovering the meanings that moral agents within organisations attach to key terms relating to ethical behaviour.
2.4. Sensitivity
A final consideration that should inform research design has to do with the sensitivity of this area of inquiry (cf. Cowton & Crisp, 1998:101). Ethical issues are sensitive issues because they reflect on the quality of our being and they can also have detrimental consequences for us. To be praised as an ethical person (honest, having integrity, caring) is something that most people would value, while being labelled unethical (dishonest, unscrupulous, cruel) is something to be avoided. Being implicated in unethical behaviour can also be detrimental to one's professional career, or can even cost one one's job. It is therefore not surprising that business ethics research is being haunted by the phenomenon of social desirability response bias as well as by a high rate of non-response. Social desirability response bias refers to the phenomenon that respondents do not report their actual moral behaviour, but rather how they would like others (including the researcher) to perceive them. Non-response (or refusal to participate in research) is a general phenomenon in research, but it tends to be unacceptably high in business ethics research.10 It is exactly the sensitive nature of ethics alluded to above that is suspected of being the cause of this high rate of non-response. Research design in business ethics needs to find ways of dealing with and minimising these problems associated with sensitivity. Merely assuring respondents that their anonymity will be ensured is not enough. More creative ways of dealing with them should be designed. These measures can be both of a qualitative and quantitative nature. Qualitative measures for overcoming social desirability response bias involve the use of interpretative research methodologies, such as in-depth interviews and focus group interviews (cf. Vyakarnam, 1995:28), that will award researchers the opportunity of probing deeper into the initial reactions of respondents. Naturalistic observation and case studies might also be useful in this regard. In quantitative research, randomised response
techniques can be used to overcome this form of bias (Robertson, 1993:591). Another approach that might be useful is to use secondary data and secondary research, where the initial objective was not intended to research ethical issues. By 'eavesdropping'11 on these data, access can be gained to information that was not initially intended to serve as ethics research. Thus, it is safe to assume that social desirability response bias would not have affected the original data to the same extent. In general, given this sensitive nature of business ethics research, triangulation of methodologies should be the rule rather that the exception (cf. Crane, 1999:242). The methods suggested above could also go a long way in overcoming non-response, as the main cause of non-response in business ethics research is also suspected to be the sensitivity issue. Whenever high levels of non-response occur, the non-response should not merely be reported but it should itself become a topic of inquiry (cf. Cowton, 1998a:423; Randall & Gibson, 1990:465). The justification of research strategy and methodology with respect to the above four considerations can promote the quality of research activity in the field of business ethics. It can also contribute towards the reliability and justifiability of research findings in this field of study.
3. The role of theory in research
The relationship between theory and research practice is ideally presented as one where existing theory informs new research and where new research expands on existing theory. The relationship is thus regarded as a mutually enriching and mutually stimulating one. That this ideal has not yet been realised in business ethics research is widely lamented (cf. Crane, 1999:239; Nicholson, 1994:581; Robertson, 1993:589; Randall & Gibson, 1990:461). Research design often neglects to consult existing theory, and research findings are seldom used to extend or build on
existing theories. Both these matters are of vital importance for the development of business ethics as an academic field. One of the prerequisites for the development of an academic field is that its theoretical base should grow in width and depth. The way in which it happens is through research. That does not however mean that any research activity will result in the expansion of the theoretical base of a field of study. It is possible to have a large quantity of research, without it contributing to or improving the quality of the theoretical base of the field.12 In order for research to be able to contribute to the theoretical base of the field, new research must deliberately take its point of departure in the existing theoretical base. By doing that, new research is anchored in what has been achieved thus far and consequently will have a view of what needs to be done in order to improve on what is currently available. Research done in this way has the character of an ongoing discourse within a community of inquirers.13 To do research is thus to co-search or to re-search, along with the other searchers, for knowledge within that particular field. If this communal discursive nature of research is being ignored, then researchers run the risk of reinventing the wheel over and over again. What is thus required from business ethics researchers is to deliberately anchor their research in existing theory and also to reflect deliberately on the implications of their findings for the theories from which their research originates. Only in this way can there be hope for the expansion of the theoretical base of the field of business ethics. Finding a mutually stimulating relationship between theory and research practice is therefore vitally important, not only for expanding the theoretical base of the field of business ethics, but also for improving the quality of research and the academic stature thereof.
4. Conclusion
For business ethics to develop as an academic field, individual researchers need to consider and reflect on the appropriateness of the ontological
assumptions, strategies and methodologies of their research, as well as on the role of theory in it. They must be self-conscious about these issues. But it is not only on the level of individual researchers that there should be self-consciousness about research. The research needs to be extended to the community of researchers, where ongoing reflection on trends and developments in research within this field should be kindled and kept alive. Meta-research, i.e. research on and analysis of the research that has already been done in the field of business ethics, can be a powerful stimulant to keep this process of reflection amongst researchers alive.
Chapter Three Teaching business ethics
Given the tender age of business ethics as an academic field, the amount already written on teaching within it is remarkable. There is even a journal, Teaching Business Ethics, devoted solely to this subject. The quantity of scholarly writing about the teaching of business ethics, however, has not produced consensus about what the purpose of teaching should be. Different schools of thought have emerged in response to the question of what purpose teaching business ethics should serve. In this chapter, three different positions taken with regard to the purpose of teaching business ethics will be identified. Then the presuppositions on which these positions are premised will be retrieved. Finally attention will turn to the implications that these different positions and their corresponding presuppositions have for the teaching of business ethics.
1. The purpose of teaching
The discussion on the purpose of teaching business ethics resolves around the question "what do you want to achieve by teaching business ethics?" The answer to this question will not only affect what is being taught, but also how it is being taught. It will also serve as a standard against which courses in business ethics will be evaluated for their effectiveness. If business ethics courses cannot fulfil the purpose they purport to serve, it will eventually reflect negatively on their credibility, as well as on the credibility of the field of business ethics as such (cf. Paine, 1991:67). A survey of literature on the teaching of business ethics revealed that three basic positions with regard to the purpose of teaching business ethics can be distinguished. I will refer to these three positions as (a) the cognitive competence position, (b) the behavioural competence position and (c) the managerial competence position.14 Each of these three positions will now be discussed.
1.1. Cognitive competence
The purpose of teaching business ethics according to the cognitive competence position is to acquire the intellectual knowledge and skills to make proper judgements about the ethical dimension of economic activity. The emphasis is thus on acquiring those cognitive competencies that will enable one to identify, analyse, judge and evaluate ethical matters in business (cf. Shaw, 1996:493). Consequently, the emphasis in teaching will be on theoretical constructs and cognitive skills that will enable one to perform these cognitive tasks properly. In order to gain this competence, the following cognitive competencies are regarded as essential: (a) Moral awareness: developing an awareness of the ethical dimensions of business. This entails an understanding of the moral obligations and responsibilities associated with economic activity, as well as an awareness of the most common moral issues and dilemmas that one is likely to encounter therein (cf. Rabouin, 1997:249). (b) Moral understanding: acquiring the intellectual tools to get a handle on ethical matters in business. These intellectual tools include theories, frameworks, models and concepts that provide one with the ability to articulate the moral dimensions of business (Mahoney, 1990:67; McDonald & Donleavy, 1995:841; Hosmer, 1998:10). They provide the vocabulary for moral discourse. (c) Moral reasoning: cultivating the ability to compare, weigh and evaluate different ethical perspectives. It implies the intellectual independence to make an own assessment of ethical matters (with the aid of the intellectual tools mentioned above) and to take a reasoned stance on them. Moral reasoning skills thus provide the ability to participate in critical moral discourse (cf. Paine, 1991:78). (d) Moral decision-making: understanding the processes and problems associated with making moral decisions. This entails understanding the nature of ethical disputes and decision-making and also acquaintance with approaches, procedures and techniques that can be used in moral decision-making.
(e) Moral tolerance: developing the ability to endure moral ambiguity and to tolerate moral perspectives that differ from one's own perspective (Mahin, 1998:74). This ability not only depends on one's knowledge about the nature of ethics, but also requires the development of that cognitive virtue or trait of mind that enables one to continue with the search for moral clarity, despite ambiguity and seemingly incommensurable moral conflicts. When the acquisition of cognitive competence is regarded as the purpose of teaching business ethics, students will be expected to demonstrate that they have achieved sufficient levels of competence with regard to these cognitive competencies listed above. This might entail assessing their knowledge about the theoretical constructs that they have been introduced to and/or demanding of them to demonstrate that they can apply their acquired knowledge by analysing and evaluating specific cases and scenarios that might arise in business.
1.2. Behavioural competence
Seen from the behavioural competence position, the purpose of teaching business ethics is to develop the capacity of students to behave morally in a business setting. In contrast to the cognitive competence position, adherents of this approach argue that cognitive competence to deal with ethical issues in business will not necessarily translate into a willingness to behave morally as well. It is possible to score very highly on cognitive competence and yet be a poor ethical performer in business (cf. Coles, 1995:68). What is needed to build the capacity for behavioural competence is attention to the affective, volitional and imaginative dimensions of ethics (cf. Whetstone, 1998:188). The emphasis in teaching business ethics, with this behavioural purpose in mind, inevitably shifts the focus from moral cognition to moral character. In order to build this capacity for moral behaviour in business, the development of the following competencies in students are regarded as essential:
(a) Moral sensitivity: caring about the impact of business actions on those affected by it. This involves the capacity not only to know who are affected by one's business actions, but also to care about those affected by them. It thus entails at least a commitment to minimise the negative impact of one's behaviour on others. Central to this ability of moral sensitivity is the capacity to put oneself in the position of those who are affected by one's business behaviour (cf. Shaw, 1996:498). (b) Moral courage: determination to improve the morality of business behaviour. The development of moral courage is vital for moral behaviour as it is possible to know what is right and to be sensitive towards others, but still not to act on that conviction and feeling. Moral courage thus entails the resolve to act on moral convictions, even when it is not comfortable or self-serving to do so (cf. Piper et al., 1993:49; McDonald & Donleavy, 1995:841-842; Rabouin, 1997:255; Maclagan, 1998:24; Mahoney, 1999). (c) Moral imagination: envisaging moral alternatives and others' moral experiences. This requires the ability to move beyond the immediate and the obvious. It includes the ability to look at the same situation from a variety of perspectives, and also to imagine situations that are radically different from the present one. Moral imagination is thus the creative element in moral behaviour that empowers one to morally transform situations for the better (cf. Anderson, 1997:287288; Werhane, 1999:89-108). When behavioural competence is regarded as the objective of teaching business ethics, personal moral development becomes the yardstick of success.15 Teaching will thus be structured in such a manner that students will be provided with opportunities for personal reflection and growth. In contrast to the cognitive competence approach, the emphasis is not merely on the demonstration of intellectual ability, but also on characterforming experiences that involve the volitional and affective dimensions of students.
1.3. Managerial competence
The purpose of teaching business ethics from the managerial competence position is to enable managers or policy-makers to extend their managerial competence to the ethical dimension of economic activity. The competence provided by both the cognitive and behavioural approaches discussed above is insufficient to deal with ethics in organisational settings. What is missing from both approaches is a specific focus on the organisation as a system of interpersonal interaction and the skills needed to effectively deal with morality in such a systemic set-up. Neither the best cognitive competence in ethics, nor the best moral behavioural intentions can serve as a substitute for the competence to deal in an effective managerial way with ethics in organisations, as a different kind of competence is required. What is required is the competence to deal with ethics in a systemic and organisational fashion. When business ethics is being taught from the managerial competence perspective, the development of the following competencies becomes a priority: (a) Systemic morality: an understanding of the moral constraints and opportunities that organisations harbour. Organisations can, on the one hand, make moral behaviour much more difficult than personal moral behaviour. Factors such as conflicting interests, the pressure of the bottom line and organisational culture can all place substantial constraints on ethical behaviour. On the other hand, there are also factors such as group pressure, organisational culture and reward systems that can be harnessed to promote ethical behaviour (cf. Fudge & Schlachter, 1999:296). The competence that is thus required is the ability to discern the systemic implications for moral behaviour (cf. Nielsen, 1998:585). (b) Moral efficiency: the ability to translate ethical concerns and considerations into organisational practice. Managers need both political and behavioural knowledge and skills to ensure that ethics
is integrated into the fibre of business and not treated as a mere add-on to 'business as usual' (Nielsen, 1998:585). They thus have to learn to apply their existing knowledge of management to ethical matters (McDonald & Donleavy, 1995:842; Stiles et al., 1993:246), but they also have to learn those managerial skills that are particularly relevant to managing ethics in organisations. (c) Instrumental morality: the ability to turn morality into a strategic asset for business. At times ethical behaviour can undeniably be costly for businesses, when it means that they have to forsake immediate gain for ethical considerations. It is however equally true that that ethical behaviour can also be to the benefit of business16. This ability to turn ethics into a strategic advantage for business can never be the sole purpose of business ethics teaching, but it can also never be denied if ethical behaviour is to become ingrained in business activity. (d) Moral leadership: the ability to provide moral vision and support to subordinates. Students should be made aware of their role as mentors and models within the organisational context. As such they should be brought to realise that their moral vision and behaviour matter, as they will either constrain or promote moral behaviour within the organisational context. They thus need to be made selfconscious about the moral responsibility that they inevitably will bear (cf. Piper et al., 1993:119). When managerial competence is regarded as the objective of teaching in business ethics, students will be expected to demonstrate that they can deal with ethical issues from an organisational perspective. They will be expected to demonstrate this ability with regard to real or imagined cases that they are likely to encounter in business. Opportunities will be provided to students where they can simulate managerial behaviour. Thus the focus will be much more on those managerial abilities and knowledge they will need in order to manage and coordinate collective moral behaviour in organisations.
2. Retrieving the presuppositions
Behind these three different positions taken with regard to the purpose of teaching business ethics lurk three very different notions of what ethical behaviour entails. The different competencies that each of these positions emphasise can be linked to these three different notions of how we arrive at ethical behaviour. In order to see whether and to what extent these three positions are compatible we will have to delve deeper beneath their surfaces to uncover their respective ontologies of ethical behaviour. The presuppositions on which they are premised respectively will now be discussed in the same order as above.
2.1. Presuppositions of cognitive competence
From the emphasis that is placed on intellectual understanding and cognitive skills in the cognitive competence approach, it should be clear that there is an anticipation that moral behaviour is intimately linked to intellectual rigour. The expectation is that theoretical understanding coupled with logical argumentation will result in moral behaviour. Although this mindset can be traced back to the early Greek philosophers, it became particularly powerful and influential with the rise of the modern era. It is not hard to see that this approach to determining what is ethical is largely modelled on the new scientific paradigm that emerged in the modern era. Typical of the new standard of rationality that emerged with the modern era was the conviction that the rational autonomous individual is the sole judge of truth. This autonomous individual was portrayed as a being capable of rational control. Rational control enabled this modern individual to transcend his or her subjectivity and to judge matters in an objective and distanced manner. This new portrayal of the rational autonomous person was complemented with a scientific methodology that fitted like a glove. In order to produce
scientific knowledge (which has now become synonymous with truth) one needed to proceed in a particular way. That way consisted of discovering universal truths (or scientific laws) that could then be applied in a rational deductive way to explain and predict behaviour. Needless to say, the discovery of these universal laws depended upon the objective investigations of the modern rational objective person. The core elements of this new scientific paradigm were thus universal laws and the application thereof through logical reasoning. The combination of this new image of the modern person, coupled with this new scientific paradigm, posed a serious challenge to truth claims that could not pass the judgement of the autonomous rational individual or that did not comply with the new scientific standard of truth. One of the casualties of this new challenge was moral truth claims. Because these moral truth claims were premised upon teleological convictions about the destiny of mankind, they could not pass the judgement of the modern individual, nor the scientific standard that went hand-in-hand with it. It was this crisis of ethics at the dawn of modernity that gave rise to a new approach to ethics that would formally comply with both the requirements of the modern individual and modern science. The new approach to ethics consisted of first finding a moral norm (or universal law) that would be universally valid. True to the modern trend, this law could only be discovered through the rational investigation and reflection of the modern individual. Once discovered it could then be applied in an objective and logically deductive way to particular instances. It was believed that such application of a universal principle would then be able to predict what was morally right. The two dominant moral theories that emerged in that period were both exemplary of this new approach. They were Kant's deontological theory and Mill's utilitarian theory. Both of these theories provided a universal law (Kant's categorical imperative) or a universal principle
(Mill's greatest happiness principle). These universal guidelines were in both cases formulated on the basis of what was claimed by their creators to be a rational objective investigation. Their adherents were then expected to apply these universal guidelines in an objective and rational way through logical deduction, in order to arrive at the morally right action. Both these men had no doubt that other persons would be capable of applying their theories in this way, as they were convinced that all autonomous rational individuals were potentially capable of deciding on their moral behaviour in this manner. The legacy of this approach to morality is evident in the cognitive competence approach. The emphasis that is placed on theoretical knowledge and principles, logical reasoning, and decision-making, all testifies to it. Also, the personal nature of moral decision-making, where individuals are seen as responsible for making their own autonomous decisions in a rational and objective way by applying moral theories to specific moral issues, is reminiscent of this approach. Furthermore, this approach to morality also portrays morality as rule-following behaviour. Accordingly, the only thing that is needed to come to a moral decision when faced with a moral choice is to apply a legitimate moral rule to that specific situation and then deduce the appropriate moral response from that moral rule. This approach to morality, although admittedly presented in extreme form here, is often the approach taken in applied ethics. It is also the approach that philosophers who are involved in teaching business ethics allegedly favour, as they tend to present business ethics as a form of applied ethics. The only way in which the cognitive competence position differs from the modern ethical tradition of ethics as rule-following behaviour is in its insistence on the ability of students to practice moral tolerance. Although this virtue was not initially part of the modern ethical tradition, it was cultivated by this very tradition, as the different variants of ethics
as rule-following were often contradicting one another and, thus, incommensurability between rival moral theories became one of the features of moral discourse within this tradition. In order to cope with the rivalry that was produced by this approach to ethics, the virtue of moral tolerance became imperative. In summary, it can thus be stated that in response to the question about how we arrive at ethical behaviour, the presupposition of the cognitive competence position is that individuals arrive at it by making autonomous, rational and objective judgements based on moral theories.
2.2. Presuppositions of behavioural competence
The emphasis that we find on empathy, imagination and courage in the behavioural competence position already signals a strong departure from ethics as rule-following behaviour, as perceived by the cognitive competence position. Instead, it leads us in the direction of ethics as character formation. The presupposition on which it is based is that moral behaviour follows from intra-personal changes that occur within the individual. In that sense it is agent-centred, compared to the actcentred approach that we found in the cognitive competence approach (cf. Paine, 1991:77; Cragg, 1997:237). In this agent-centred approach, the presupposition on which the actcentred approach is premised is regarded as insufficient in itself. The contention is that something needs to happen prior to the point of moral judgement on which the act-centred approach is focussing. In order for a person to enter into a process of moral judgement or moral discourse, something must first occur within that person to awaken his or her moral sensibility. Persons first need to become morally sensitive and morally formed before they will be inclined to make moral decisions and act upon those decisions. Without such internal transformation or moral development, persons will be apathetic towards moral behaviour.
This conviction can equally be traced back to the early Greek philosophers, where the virtue ethics tradition originated. This tradition was displaced by the rise of modern act-centred ethics, until it recently made a forceful return via the revaluation of the Aristotelian virtue ethics tradition in the work of Alasdair MacIntyre (1985). The combination of this revitalised virtue-ethics especially, with the findings of contemporary developmental psychology on moral development, gave a major boost to the behavioural competence approach. Central to the virtue tradition in ethics is the conviction that moral character can only be formed in social interaction with other moral actors. Such social settings, or what MacIntyre calls 'practices', form the context in which virtues are cultivated. In their interactions within other persons in such practices, where all involved are bound by a common goal (telos) and where they find themselves participating within the history and tradition of these practices, persons develop or habituate certain characteristics (cf. Collier, 1998:628-631). These characteristics that are formed through one's participation in practices are referred to as virtues. It is exactly these virtues that enable one to realise the goals of the specific practices in which one participates. Or, to put it in MacIntyre's own words: "A virtue is an acquired human quality the possession and exercise of which tends to enable us to achieve those goods which are internal to practices and the lack of which effectively prevents us from achieving any such goods" (1985:191). What is of special importance in MacIntyre's notion of virtues is that virtuous behaviour is not the outcome of individual intellectual deliberation, but is the outcome of participation in a social practice. It is exactly on this point where the virtue approach to ethics ties in with the findings of developmental psychology. The empirical research into moral development that was initiated by Piaget, and then developed further by Kohlberg, also testified to the fact that moral development is dependent upon social interaction and reciprocity between persons. Despite the differences between first Kohlberg and Piaget, and later on
also between Gilligan and Kohlberg, the fact that moral awareness and responsibility is being born and cultivated in reciprocal interactions remained undisputed. This does not mean that cognitive ability has no role to play in ethics. On the contrary, it is emphasised by both Piaget and Kohlberg that moral development is dependent upon cognitive development. What they did deny, however, was that cognitive development alone is sufficient for moral development to occur. Cognitive development needs to be supplemented by social experiences that cause one to become sensitive to the impact that one has upon others, as well as with situations that cause one to experience empathy for others. This insight has since received further support from experimental work done in this field. Rest, for example, found that moral development is not triggered by exposure to universal moral principles, but by being confronted with particular and specific incidents that create cognitive dissonance about previously held beliefs. It is this kind of cognitive discomfort that stimulates the moral imagination that is most likely to result in moral development and enhanced moral sensitivity (cf. Werhane, 1999:44; Rabouin, 1997:225). These insights are also reflected in contemporary philosophical thinking about ethics, where thinkers like Nussbaum and Levinas emphasise that ethical behaviour requires being radically open to the appeal that others make upon us, and taking in what there is around us with feeling and imagination, so that nothing is lost upon us (Anderson, 1997:287; Furrow, 1995:67-101, 139-160). The legacy of this combination of virtue theory and developmental psychology can be clearly seen in the behavioural competence approach to teaching business ethics. The emphasis placed on moral sensitivity, moral imagination and moral courage in this approach, all testifies that behavioural competence is regarded as resulting from more than mere cognitive insight. The emphasis is rather on experiences and understanding that can have a lasting impact on the intra-personal development or character formation of students.
In summary, it can be stated that in response to the question about how we arrive at ethical behaviour, the presupposition of the behavioural competence position is that individuals arrive at it through the transformation of their characters that will then incline them to act with moral sensitivity towards others.
2.3. Presuppositions of managerial competence
The managerial competence position is negatively premised upon the presupposition that neither cognitive competence nor behavioural competence is sufficient for influencing ethical behaviour in the organisational context of business. Not even a combination of cognitive and behavioural competence will suffice. On the contrary, an emphasis on personal and interpersonal ethics as one encounters in the actcentred and agent-centred approaches respectively, can turn out to be counter-productive in the organisational setting of business. Rather than contributing to ethical behaviour in business, it can result in alienating ethics from business as business ethics presented in such a personal or interpersonal mode can be regarded as alien and irrelevant to business. Positively, the managerial competence position on teaching business ethics is firstly premised upon a presupposition about the nature of moral agency within organisations. This presupposition is that moral behaviour in organisations entails more than personal moral decisionmaking and more than personal intentions to behave morally. Ethical behaviour in organisational settings is, according to this presupposition, influenced by various factors that relate to the existence of the organisations. These factors include amongst others the goals, rules, processes, cultures and structures of organisations, as well as the influences and pressures exerted upon the organisation by the external environment and various internal and external stakeholders. This does not mean that these factors totally dominate the moral behaviour of actors within organisations. Were that the case, it would of course have
made no sense to talk about managerial competence with regard to ethics. Although these factors do not totally dominate the moral behaviour of members of organisations, they nevertheless can and do exert a marked influence on the behaviour of those who work in organisations. As such, this organisational setting can either be constructive in promoting ethical behaviour amongst its members, or alternatively, and sometimes simultaneously, can also be morally destructive in promoting the neglect of moral behaviour or even in encouraging immoral behaviour. Thus, this first presupposition draws attention to moral agency in the organisational context as being influenced simultaneously by personal moral values, organisational factors and role-governed responsibilities. The second presupposition that supports the management competency position relates to the role of management in organisations. It is presupposed that organisational behaviour can be studied, understood, predicted and consequently managed (Trevino & Weaver, 1994:120-122). Given that managers have a sufficient understanding of the processes and people that they have to manage, they are thus in a position to influence organisational behaviour, both on the individual and collective level. This can be achieved through interventions where they apply their knowledge and utilise techniques and processes, as well as material and symbolic resources, to achieve the desired change in organisational behaviour. By linking these two presuppositions, the management competency position advocates that moral behaviour in business is significantly influenced by the way in which managers use their managerial ability to influence moral behaviour in the organisational setting. Moral cognitive competency, and/or moral behavioural competency, is not enough to enable managers to perform this role. They need to learn how to perform it as managers of the ethical dimension of economic activity. Part of this process of learning involves their becoming acquainted with theories that will assist them in analysing the ethical dimensions and implications
of business. What are needed in this regard are not necessarily normative theories, but descriptive theories that will enable them to explain and predict moral behaviour in business. They need to understand under what conditions moral behaviour will flourish or decline in business. Furthermore, they need to understand how ethics relates to the goals of the organisation and how it can be integrated in the processes and structures of the organisation in order to become an integral part of organisational performance. In short, then, the response of the managerial competence position to the question about how we arrive at ethical behaviour is that it depends on our ability to understand morality within its organisational context and to use managerial expertise to influence ethical behaviour within this organisational setting.
2.4. Irreconcilable presuppositions?
By presenting each of the above positions and their accompanying presuppositions in the extreme, the impression can easily be created that these three positions are irreconcilable. The clashes that so often erupt between philosophers and social scientists (or between the adherents of so called normative and descriptive approaches to business ethics) might further strengthen this impression (cf. ch:1.3.)17. In this section, however, I want to argue that these three positions need not be seen as rival or irreconcilable. On the contrary, I want to argue that such a view is detrimental to the development of business ethics as an academic field. I will now indicate why each of these positions is in need of support from the other two. Starting with the cognitive competence position again, this approach can be invaluable in order to come to a deeper understanding of personal moral decision-making. It can also provide an overview of the landscape of normative commitments that persons possibly could adopt. It can provide one with the vocabulary to articulate ethical matters and also
to become conversant and critical in business ethical discourse (cf. Fudge & Schlachter, 1999:300). But it cannot bridge the gap between ethical decisions and ethical behaviour. There is, and always will remain, a distance between the conclusion of a logical argument about business ethics and the resolution to act upon that conclusion (cf. Jackson, 1994:171-172; Binns, 1994:177; Coles, 1995:A68; Nielsen, 1998:583). It is for this reason that one can simultaneously be an excellent cognitive performer with regard to business ethics whilst being very poor at ethical behaviour in business, and why the cognitive competence position needs to be supported by the behavioural competence position. Another reason why it needs the support of the agent-centred approach is that it is not clear why persons will be interested in acquiring cognitive competence when their characters have not been transformed to the extent that they regard moral behaviour and moral decision-making as important. Equally, the cognitive competence position is in need of the support of the managerial competence position in order to be regarded as relevant by business. The fact that the cognitive competence position is mainly geared towards autonomous individual moral judgement results in a blind spot for the organisational factors that also have a significant impact on moral behaviour within business. To ignore these organisational influences on ethical behaviour can easily amount to rendering business ethics irrelevant and make it appear naïve. Furthermore, it can offer very little by way of advice on how managers or policy-makers have to deal with moral matters once they have reached a conclusion on the rightness or wrongness of a specific action. The one escape route for evading such a complementary approach to business ethics, where the different positions have to co-operate, is to opt for teaching it merely as a form of applied ethics within Philosophy. In that case philosophers could not be faulted for remaining purely within the confines of the cognitive competence approach (cf. Shaw, 1996:493). Two caveats should however be noted. The first is that they
then should not complain when their courses are regarded as irrelevant by business practitioners and policy-makers. The second is that contemporary developments within the field of Philosophy itself make it harder to ignore the behavioural dimensions in ethics, as was indicated in the earlier discussion on the contributions of philosophers such as MacIntyre, Nussbaum and Levinas to the behavioural competence position. All these philosophers undermine the notion of ethical decisionmaking as a purely cognitive or epistemological exercise. Secondly, when it comes to the behavioural competence position, its agent-centred approach makes an important contribution to the field of business ethics by insisting that moral behaviour is dependent upon intra-personal transformation. Its emphasis on the role of non-cognitive factors, such as emotions and the will, is also a much-needed corrective. Furthermore, it provides a basis for moral actions by trying to ensure that students will be positively inclined towards moral behaviour. Through all of these it makes a concrete contribution towards the expectation that courses in business ethics should indeed improve business behaviour and not merely make persons more knowledgeable about business ethics (cf. Jackson, 1994:171; Whetstone, 1998:180; Cummins, 1999:28; McDonald & Donleavy, 1995:839; Rabouin, 1997:248). Despite this contribution that the teaching of business ethics from the behavioural competence position can make, it falls short on two aspects where it needs the support of the other two positions. The first shortfall relates to the fact that even the most morally developed person will still face moral dilemmas from time to time, where different moral perspectives will have to be analysed and where tough decisions will have to be taken (cf. Paine, 1991:71; Werhane, 1994b:100). A purely behavioural competence approach will be inadequate to prepare students for these situations and therefore needs to be complemented by the cognitive competence position, as it is particularly good at analysing such dilemmas. It could also offer advice on decision-making in these situations. The second shortfall relates to the fact that moral development alone is not sufficient for managing ethics within organisational settings.
It is quite possible to be morally sensitive, whilst still being incompetent in managing ethical matters in organisations (cf. Piper, et al., 1993:2629). It is on this point where a combination with the managerial competence position is essential. Finally, when we turn to the managerial competence position, it is clear that it makes an important contribution in an area that is neglected by the other two approaches. It transcends the personal and interpersonal approaches to morality associated with the first two positions, and it provides insight into moral behaviour in organisational settings. It also introduces the notion of managerial competence with regard to the ethical dimension of economic activity. For this purpose it brings descriptive theories into play that can explain and predict moral behaviour in organisations that in turn creates possibilities for managerial interventions to influence organisational moral behaviour. Furthermore, it also provides guidance on the alignment of organisational objectives and moral values, thus making the integration of ethics into organisational behaviour more viable. Valuable and relevant though this approach may be, it still remains dependent upon the other two approaches. With regard to the cognitive competence position, it firstly needs its contribution regarding moral vocabulary and fluency in moral discourse in order to articulate moral concerns in business and to make a case for its integration into organisational behaviour (cf. Jackson, 1994:172173). Secondly, the combination of the managerial competency and the cognitive competency positions is vital for retaining the credibility of business ethics, both within and outside the academic community. The cognitive competency approach, with its strong emphasis on moral evaluation and judgement, is needed to safeguard the managerial competency approach from using morality purely for the sake of promoting managerial or organisational interests (cf. De George, 1991:49, 55-56; Frederick, 1991:57). When managerial expertise regarding ethics is, for example, merely used to promote the image of organisations without caring about the
impact of organisations on various internal and external stakeholders, it inevitably will result in scepticism about the ethics talk of organisations. Retaining that critical element provided by the cognitive competence approach is therefore vital to prevent business ethics from being eroded by cynicism. Besides this, the managerial competence approach also needs the support of the behavioural competence approach. Managers are most unlikely to integrate managerial competence with moral competence in business if they are morally insensitive (even when they might be morally knowledgeable). Thus the development of their moral character and courage is a precondition for them being inclined to integrate morality in their managerial vision and task (cf. Piper et al., 1993:119; Nielsen, 1996:4 and 1998:581-583). Furthermore, their moral commitment and courage will also have to be well developed, as they will need it when they encounter morally obstructive organisational goals, practices and politics. The above discussion implies that if a course on business ethics is intended to prepare students to cope and deal with the ethical dimension of economic activity, then a combination of the above three positions would best serve that purpose (see figure 4). It is only when business ethics is presented as a form of applied ethics that it can opt out of such an integration of the three positions, but then it inevitably has to accept that it will be of limited value to business practitioners and social policymakers.
Purpose of Teaching
Cognitive competence (CC) Behavioural competence (BC) Managerial competence (MC)
• Moral vocabulary • Personal moral decisions • Critical moral discourse • Intra-personal development • Non-cognitive factors • Moral commitment • Organisational morality • Managerial perspective • Aligning organisational goals and morality
Weakness (Support)
• Moral development (BC) • Organisational relevance (MC) • Moral dilemmas (CC) • Organisational moral behaviour (MC) • Critical dimension (CC) • Moral development of managers (BC)
Figure 4: Teaching business ethics
3. Teaching strategies
Each of the three positions outlined above has its own pedagogical requirements. Teaching strategies that might be appropriate and useful for attaining one set of competencies might be inappropriate and counterproductive for achieving another set of competencies. The selection of appropriate teaching strategies is therefore vital for cultivating the desired competencies. It is to such considerations regarding each of the three positions discussed above that I will now attend.
3.1. Teaching cognitive competence
When cognitive competence is the objective of teaching business ethics, teaching will revolve around learning experiences that will build the capacity for personal moral judgement. Students will consequently be exposed to learning experiences that will enable them to justify what and why actions are right or wrong. In order to develop this kind of cognitive competence, teaching will involve four kinds of learning experiences. The first kind of learning experience that teachers will have to cater for are ones where existing knowledge relevant to the study of business ethics could be conveyed to students. This will involve acquainting students with ethical concepts, ethical theories and tools of analysis, such as models, frameworks and procedures of analysis, that can be used in making sense of moral matters. This will provide students with the vocabulary, knowledge and tools that they will need to become conversant in business ethics discourse. This knowledge transfer can occur with the aid of techniques such as lecturing and selfstudy. The second kind of learning experience that teachers will have to provide their students with, is the opportunity to apply their acquired knowledge to ethical situations and issues in business. They should learn how the acquired concepts, theories and tools can help them in gaining a better
understanding of ethical matters in business and also how they can assist them in making their own moral judgements about these matters. For this purpose ethics case studies (Shaw 1996:494), disputes, views or dilemmas relating to ethics in business can be used by teachers to provide students the opportunity to apply the above mentioned concepts, theories and tools of analysis. By providing this experience to students, they will simultaneously become aware of moral dimensions and implications inherent in such business situations. Closely tied to and already implied in the previous learning experience is the development of students' competence in critical thinking and reflection. This competency can be developed through learning experiences that make students aware of and self-critical about their own thinking. They should discover what the criteria are to which moral argumentation and positioning should comply and they should internalise those criteria so that their own thinking about moral matters will reflect them. Techniques such as Socratic questioning, group discussions and debate, combined with case and dispute analyses, can be usefully employed by teachers to provide for this learning experience. Interaction between students and teachers, and also amongst students, that provide opportunities for critiquing and evaluating moral arguments, are essential for learning these moral reasoning skills. The acquisition of these reasoning skills will enable students to make their own reasoned contributions to moral discourse. Finally, teachers will need to provide students with learning experiences where they can cultivate the virtue of intellectual tolerance for views that differ from their own. This virtue can best be acquired in group activities, such as discussions and debates, where students can discover for themselves that there are valid moral perspectives other than the ones they adhere to (cf. Piper et al., 1993:53). The habituation of this virtue will enable students to cope with the ambiguity associated with moral discourse. It will thus enable them to remain engaged in moral discourse instead of terminating it prematurely.
3.2. Teaching behavioural competence
When the objective of teaching is to enhance the capacity of students to behave morally in business, different teaching strategies are required. Some of the techniques that might have worked well to enhance cognitive competence will now be less productive, or even counter-productive. A strong emphasis, for example on moral disputes and dispute analysis as one often finds in the cognitive competence approach, might well undermine behavioural competence, because it might create the impression that there is no resolution to ethical dilemmas (cf. Sommers, 1993:3-5; Whetstone, 1998:180; Nielsen, 1998:584). Instead of contributing to the commitment of students to invest in their own moral development, it can have the opposite effect of turning them into moral relativists. Teaching for behavioural competence will converge with teaching for cognitive competence in the sense that there is also certain existing knowledge that has to be conveyed to students. The knowledge that students have to acquire relates to moral development and the habituation of moral virtues. Conveying this knowledge to students can be achieved in the same ways as suggested above. Where teaching for behavioural competence diverges from the above approach is with regard to the creation of learning experiences that will enhance moral development. As indicated earlier, moral development occurs in social settings. It is therefore important to utilise the class as such as a social setting. By doing this, the class serves as a moral community where members of the class can learn from one another and where discoveries regarding reciprocity can be made (cf. Piper et al., 1993:59; Rabouin, 1997:257). This, however, implies a very different approach to teaching, viz., one where the teacher does not primarily convey knowledge to students, but rather creates learning experiences that will be conducive to the development of those characteristics, such as moral sensitivity, courage and imagination, that are required for moral behaviour. In doing this the teacher will play more of a facilitator-role.
Students' capacity for moral sensitivity can be enhanced through learning experiences that will provide them with insight into the feelings and experiences of others. They need to realise what the impact of either moral or immoral behaviour could be on those who are on the receiving end of such behaviour. Such learning experiences will enhance their capacity to be sensitive to the impact of their own behaviour on others. A variety of techniques can be used to achieve this. Prominent amongst these techniques are the use of role-play (cf. Rice, 1994; Binns, 1994:178) and literature (Adams, et al., 1998:1327-1328) in teaching. Through roleplay students can gain insight in how various parties experience situations. They can also gain insight into and empathy for the feelings of pain or joy experienced in such situations. The use of literature, such as novels (Coles, 1989:204-205; Sommers, 1993), plays (cf. Garaventa, 1998:535-537) or films (Berger & Pratt, 1998) can also open up vistas of how behaviour can impact either destructively or constructively upon others. These kinds of learning experiences can create the cognitive dissonance that is a prerequisite for moral development (cf. Rabouin, 1997:255). To promote the development of moral courage, learning experiences that will strengthen the will to behave morally need to be created. This will entail both insight into the obstacles to moral behaviour one can expect to experience, and familiarity with persons who have overcome such obstacles and made a moral difference. Biographies, stories, and cases that highlight either or both of these aspects can be used in teaching to facilitate the development of moral courage. Exposure to persons who have acted with moral courage and vision in business can also serve as a learning experience by inviting them to speak to students in class (cf. Paine, 1991:81). The techniques discussed above will also go a long way in sparking the moral imagination of students. Role-play, for example, is a very useful technique for stimulating students to picture for themselves the feelings and experiences that others might encounter. Novels, plays and films
can equally be very useful. Furthermore, creating future scenarios can be used as a technique to encourage students to experiment with situations that are morally different from the ones they are accustomed to. As the objective of teaching for behavioural competence is to promote personal moral development, teaching aids that will assist in keeping the focus on personal moral development will be useful. In this respect student journals, in which students are encouraged to keep notes on their own experiences during the course and in which they are also encouraged to reflect on their experiences, will further enhance the possibility of personal moral development.
3.3. Teaching managerial competence
When teaching for managerial competence, learning experiences will revolve around both morality in the organisational context and the capacity of students to influence collective moral behaviour within that context. Whilst the first is once again premised upon a theoretical understanding of organisational moral behaviour, the latter involves the acquisition of managerial or regulatory skills. The first kind of learning experience that teachers need to provide with regard to managerial competence is the opportunity for students to gain an understanding of organisational moral behaviour and the management thereof. Furthermore, they also need to understand how morality ties in with organisational goals. Students need to acquaint themselves with those organisational and management theories that will enable them to get a theoretical grasp on organisational morality. They will also need to learn about models, frameworks and procedures of analysis that can enable them to analyse morality within such organisational settings. As this is once more a case of conveying existing knowledge to students, the methods mentioned thus far for conveying knowledge apply again.
The second kind of learning experience that teachers need to provide is to guide students in discovering the complexity of moral decisionmaking and behaviour in the business context. For this purpose they need to simulate experiences for students that will reflect the moral complexities that they can expect to deal with, either as managers in business organisations (cf. Paine, 1991:82; Piper et al., 1993:122), or in their role as policy makers on economic activity. A number of strategies can be used to achieve this. The use of case studies has a proven track record in this regard as it simulates the typical situations that students are likely to encounter (cf. Kitson & Campbell, 1996:21). It is however imperative that the case studies should be relevant to the context in which students find themselves. For this reason case studies developed in other parts of the world should not be used indiscriminately, as if there are no differences with regard to values, legal and political frameworks and financial constraints. Home-grown case studies have a better chance of being relevant to the situations students are likely to deal with.18 Vignettes can also be used to simulate experiences for students, but their brevity renders them less useful in presenting students with the organisational complexities in which ethical matters are normally embedded.19 Students can also be encouraged to bring their own experiences into play in the classroom, as graduate students especially already might have had personal experiences in organisations that can be used to reveal the complexities of organisational moral behaviour (cf. Adams et al., 1998:1327-1328). The third kind of learning experience is the need for teachers to provide students with opportunities to experiment in making moral decisions, and also to plan for the implementation thereof (cf. Piper et al., 1993:57). Given that students already have a proper understanding of the complexities surrounding moral behaviour in organisations, they need to devise managerial or policy interventions that will be capable of navigating this organisational landscape. These proposed interventions should be tested for their viability in the light of what has already been learned with regard to organisational and management theory. A
combination of managerial or policy responses to situations encountered in case studies with class discussions of such responses can be useful. Games designed for this purpose can also be used (Higginson & Moore, 1994). Shadow-consulting, where students have to advise companies or policy-makers on how to deal with moral situations, is another way of creating a learning experience in which students have to demonstrate their ability to manage organisational morality. Finally, teachers should cater for learning experiences that could stimulate visionary moral leadership in students. Although it could be argued that such learning experiences are not needed, as they depend on prior personal moral development, it is equally true that moral development on its own does not prepare one to translate personal moral standards into organisational moral visions. It is for this reason that learning experiences should be created that will provide those with strong moral commitments the opportunity to reflect on how moral values could become ingrained in organisational practices and behaviour. This could be achieved by exposing students to role models of organisational moral leadership (cf. Piper et al., 1993:120). This can be done by inviting such role models to class or by introducing students to them through biographies, stories, videos, films, etc. Also, scenario-exercises can be used to prompt students into articulating their moral visions.
4. Summary
The above discussion on teaching business ethics demonstrated that each of the positions distinguished with regard to the objective of teaching it is accompanied by both a set of presuppositions and a set of pedagogical demands. As was also argued above, these positions do not exclude one another, but stand in need of support from one another. This implies that the pedagogical requirements of each of these positions should not be separated in practice, in the way they have been separated here for the sake of this discussion. In practice, the learning experiences referred to above should be blended to a much greater extent. How this
blend will look will be determined by the emphases that teachers deem fit to place on cognitive, behavioural and managerial competence respectively in their course compilations.
Chapter Four Interaction within business ethics
The extent and quality of interaction within the field of business ethics is another crucial factor affecting the development of this field. Lack of interaction will stifle the development of business ethics, while vigorous interaction will stimulate and enhance it. The interaction at stake here is interaction amongst business ethicists, as well as interaction between them and business practitioners. In this section considerations that are important for these two forms of interaction respectively will be explored, and guidelines relevant to each will be proposed.
1. Interaction amongst business ethicists
The need for interaction amongst business ethicists is not something peculiar to business ethics, but rather something it shares in common with all other academic fields. There are however additional considerations for interaction amongst business ethicists that are peculiar to this field. Both these kinds of considerations will be unpacked here, starting with the former. Academic inquiry, generally speaking, displays the character of a dialogue within a community of inquirers. Scientists and theorists advance knowledge within their fields of speciality by circulating their findings and ideas amongst their colleagues. The purpose of circulating it is to see whether their findings and ideas can find substantial support amongst colleagues. There does not need to be a comprehensive consensus within such a community about proposed ideas or findings, but at least some cluster of agreement within the community must be evident. Scientists or theorists can claim that they have advanced the knowledge within their field if their ideas or findings have found such support. Knowledge
is thus the outcome of a process of interaction within a community of inquirers (cf. De George, 1991:44). It is not hard to see why such interaction is conducive to the development of knowledge. The interaction within scientific communities ensures that individual members of those communities take note of what their colleagues have found and achieved and build thereupon (cf. Collier, 1995:7). If this does not happen, they can waste their time on inquiries or infertile approaches that other members of that community have already explored. The interaction further ensures that new claims are scrutinised, debated and tested for their acceptability. This process stimulates the refinement and further development of such claims. Furthermore, in this process of academic inquiry as an ongoing communal dialogue, the obvious gaps in existing knowledge within a field - and thus the challenges facing a field - emerge. This in turn results in defining and prioritising the agenda of future inquiry. All of this testifies positively to the necessity of interaction for the development of the knowledge base of any academic field, and negatively to the detrimental effect thereupon of isolation and a lack of interaction. This general need for interaction within all academic fields applies of necessity to the field of business ethics as well. Besides this general consideration about the nature of knowledge development, there are also two further reasons why interaction is vitally important within the field of business ethics. These reasons revolve around the multi-disciplinary nature of the field and its history of internal division. In discussing the scope of business ethics earlier in this report, the multi-faceted nature of both its area and purpose of inquiry emerged. This scope cannot be covered by any single existing discipline. On the contrary, it requires the co-operation of a wide variety of academic disciplines to perform this kind of inquiry. Business ethics therefore has always displayed a multi-disciplinary character. Multi-disciplinary
inquiry does not by necessity require that members of the various disciplines involved in it interact with one another, as each discipline can make its contributions independent of those of other disciplines. It is only inter-disciplinary inquiry that by its very nature presupposes interaction across disciplines. Having said that interaction across disciplines is not a precondition for multi-disciplinary inquiry, does not amount to saying that interaction between disciplines is not important. The recognition of a multiplicity of perspectives in business ethics is simultaneously a recognition of the limitations of any single disciplinary perspective. Within a field that recognises its multi-disciplinary nature, any singular perspective implies that other facets of the object of inquiry have been omitted. Therefore, although there is nothing wrong with a mono-disciplinary perspective, it will remain incomplete and not on par with perspectives on the same object of inquiry in which multiple disciplinary perspectives have been uncovered, linked and integrated. When business ethics is practised in such a way that it succeeds in combining and even integrating various disciplinary perspectives, it yields not only more comprehensive understandings of its object of inquiry, but also a deeper understanding thereof. This in turn results in more rounded contributions that bolster the credibility of the field of as a whole, as it undermines the naivety that is often associated with singular perspectives. For the latter to occur, interaction amongst members of different disciplines is a prerequisite. Besides the benefit arising from such interaction, it is also an important source of creativity, as it is common knowledge that creativity is enhanced by combining diverse perspectives. A final consideration concerning the need for interaction in business ethics relates to its history of internal division. The earlier discussion on the purpose of business ethics demonstrated how the tension between descriptive and normative approaches has detrimentally affected the development of this field. I argued in that section that such a division is not only unhealthy but also undesirable, and then went on to indicate
that these two approaches should instead complement each other. The animosity between the two approaches is to a large extent caused and fuelled by the lack of interaction between adherents of the two approaches. Besides the proposals offered earlier for overcoming this impasse, frequent and persistent interactions between those who are more descriptively inclined and those who are more normatively inclined is imperative for breaking down the negative stereotypes they often hold of each other (cf. Kaplan, 1998:54). It is also in such interactions that appreciation for the contribution of the other side can be cultivated, and where the scholarly bilingualism and methodological ambidexterity of both sides can be enhanced. Interaction between academics across the descriptive-normative divide will not only prevent more time and energy being wasted on infertile infighting, but will also prevent business ethics from degenerating into either servile instrumentalism or barren idealism – both of which are detrimental to the development and academic legitimacy of the field (cf. Enderle, 1993:142-144; 1996:47).
1.1. Guidelines for academic interaction
While the above discussion was meant to uncover the need for interaction amongst business ethicists, it simultaneously also revealed the considerations that should guide interaction within this field. Three such guidelines for interaction can be distilled from the above discussion. Firstly, interaction is required amongst academics both within and across disciplines. This interaction should deliberately be structured not only to expose business ethicists to their counterparts in other disciplines, but also to promote exposure across the normative-descriptive divide. The notion of academic inquiry as an ongoing communal dialogue (Collier, 1997:169) should play a guiding role in promoting academic interaction. Secondly, interaction should be frequent and ongoing. Important though initial contacts between academics might be, priority should be given
to efforts that will maintain this contact over time. Given the alienation that exists between descriptively-inclined and normatively-inclined academics, only persistent interaction will be able to de-alienate this relationship and build trust amongst them. The cost reduction and ease of communication made possible by electronic communication should be ruthlessly exploited for this purpose. Finally, and in the face of everything that has been said about the need for interaction amongst business ethicists, it is imperative that interaction should be critical and rigorous (cf. Crisp, 1998:22). This critical dimension is not only required to advance the development of knowledge within this field, but is also needed to prevent it from collapsing into instrumental servility or irrelevant idealism. The tender age of business ethics as an academic field is often reflected in national communities of business ethicists consisting of relatively small numbers. In such small academic communities, where academics involved know each other well and share a common commitment to stimulate and promote academic activity in this field, unhealthy incestuous relations should be guarded against (cf. Bain, 1995:16). The best antidote for this is critical and rigorous interaction. Also, interaction across national borders and participation in the global discourse on business ethics will assist avoiding this danger (cf. Collier, 1995:25; Hoffman & Driscoll, 2000:229).
2. Interaction between business ethicists and practitioners
The rationale for interaction between business ethicists and business practitioners is anchored in the quest of business ethics as an academic field to influence business practice. A number of the positions taken with regard to the purpose of business ethics,20 as well as on the purpose of teaching business ethics,21 testify to this quest of either being relevant to business practitioners or improving business practice. Delivering on this score implies that business ethicists should provide knowledge and
education that are relevant to those who either influence business activities from inside organisations (such as managers or directors) or from the outside ( as special interest groups or political policy-makers). This can hardly be achieved when business ethicists are isolated from those who exert this influence. On the contrary, business ethicists can only succeed in doing so by being informed about the problems and challenges facing those making these decisions. Equally, business ethicists need to test the viability and relevance of the strategies they are proposing with them. Despite this obvious need for a mutually enriching interaction between business ethicists and practitioners, literature on business ethics abounds with lamentations about the lack thereof (LeBlanc & Hebb, 1999:11; Klein, S., 1998: 45; Sorell, 1998a:83 & 1998b:17; Whetstone, 1998:178; Collier, 1995:6 & 1998:621; Wicks, 1995:614; Nicholson, 1994:593; Robertson, 1993:589;). This concern about a lack of interaction is however complicated by a second concern related to the interaction between academic and practical business ethics. This is about a too close and cosy relation between academic business ethics and the practical needs of business practitioners. Fears are expressed that if business ethics is geared too much towards the needs and wants of business practitioners it can fall into the trap of being co-opted by business (Kaler, 2000:262; Wicks, 1995:612). Should this occur, business ethics would become subservient to the narrow interests of managers, whilst neglecting wider social concerns or the interests of non-managerial stakeholders. This results in a situation where a lack of proximity, as well as a fear of too much proximity, simultaneously plagues the relation between business ethicists and practitioners. Attending to both these considerations is vital for the development of business ethics as an academic field. If one of the purposes of business ethics is defined as improving business practice or behaviour, then a lack of this desired impact caused by alienation between business ethicists and practitioners will inevitably undermine the credibility of the whole academic business
ethics endeavour. If, on the other hand, business ethics looses its critical edge and uncritically serves narrow managerial or ideological interests, it will equally suffer a lack of academic respectability and rigour. To navigate these troubled waters, a better understanding of the possible causes of alienation between business ethicists and practitioners will next be undertaken. Some pointers that might help business ethicists to sail between these two hazards that threaten its development will then follow.
2.1. Alienation between business ethicists and practitioners
Alienation between academic business ethics and business practise can be caused by a number of factors. It would not be fair to place all the blame for the alienation on the shoulders of the academic community, as there are factors within the business community that also fuel it. The focus in the following discussion will however be only on the role of business ethicists in creating and overcoming this alienation, as the purpose of this report is to determine what they could do themselves to stimulate the development of their field. Their role in the alienation will be discussed in terms of both the form and the content of what they have on offer for practitioners. Academic disciplines operate as communities, as was earlier demonstrated (cf.ch:4.1.). As in all other types of communities a fair amount of socialisation occurs within academic communities. This socialisation is reflected not only in ontological, epistemological and methodological convictions and preferences of members of academic disciplines, but also in their respective vocabularies. Within academic communities specialised terminology is used for the sake of more precise articulation of knowledge claims. This specialised vocabulary or academic jargon serves a constructive purpose within such academic communities, but often is not conducive to effective communication with persons outside them. In the case of academic business ethics, this style of communication is different from the style of communication that business practitioners
are used to. Unfamiliarity with such academic jargon can hinder communication between business ethicists and business practitioners (cf. Wicks, 1995:611). Therefore academic communication with business practitioners can be undermined, not so much by the content thereof as by its style of presentation. In other cases the alienation can be caused by the content of academic research and teaching itself. The lack of relevance of academic content for business practitioners may either result from agendas that academics pursue that are not primarily aimed at practitioners, or it may be a result of the theoretical inadequacy of what they offer to practitioners. If the topic of research or teaching is only of relevance to the business ethicist, and has no bearing on the problems that practitioners or policymakers have to deal with, they are likely to discard it as irrelevant (cf. Nicholson, 1994:593). Given the pressure on academics to publish, for example, it is possible that concerns about the viability of a research project - and the cost and time efficiency thereof - might become the primary concerns for academic researchers. The relevance of the research for practitioners then becomes an insignificant consideration. In situations like these it is not surprising that practitioners discard academic contributions born out of such considerations as irrelevant. The alienation might also be caused by the inadequacy of the theoretical contributions offered by business ethicists to business practitioners. What business ethicists can offer practitioners are theoretical contributions that provide them with the intellectual tools for getting a hold on ethical matters that otherwise elude their understanding. Such theoretical contributions serve as heuristic devises that help practitioners to deal with elusive matters in constructive ways. It provides maps and models that enable them to chart the territory they have to navigate and give them grips and handles on the matters that they have to deal with (cf. Collier, 1997:168). Seen from this perspective, the alienation might be caused by theoretical contributions that fail to achieve this and that are therefore discarded as useless by practitioners. The problem
is therefore not in the theoretical nature of the contributions of business ethicists, because theoretical contributions are exactly what is expected from them as academics.22 The problem is rather with the inadequacy of the theoretical contributions that they provide, as they do not succeed sufficiently in capturing and illuminating the ethical aspect of economic activity.
2.2. Guidelines for a more amicable relationship
As it has already been argued that alienation between business ethicists and practitioners is detrimental to the development of business ethics as an academic field, the question concerning the de-alienation of this relation now becomes prominent. Some pointers towards a more amicable interaction between them will now be identified. A first pointer on this route concerns the form in which contributions of business ethicists are presented to business practitioners or policy makers. To overcome the alienation caused by academic jargon and technical academic terminology, it is important to present academic content intended for practitioners in language and terminology that are accessible to them. This might entail the translation of academic content into more user-friendly forms. 23 Inevitably, this implies duplication of work, as one might have to prepare different presentations for academic and business audiences respectively, but given the importance of interaction between business ethicists and practitioners for the development of business ethics, it is not a high price to pay. Secondly, regular interaction between business ethicists and business practitioners is vital for building trust and understanding between them. In order to ensure that such interaction is maintained over time, it is desirable to move beyond merely building private networks between practitioners and business ethicists. To achieve this, more stable forums of interaction can play an important part. In this regard institutions devoted to the promotion of business ethics (Spence, 1998:1042), as well
as organisations with both academic and practitioner members, have an important role to play. Whichever form it takes, this interaction should be not only about informing practitioners and policy-makers about academic findings, but also about learning from them and becoming better acquainted with their situations, needs, dilemmas and opportunities (cf. Bowie, 2000:19; Solomon, 1993:7). Such acquaintance will require time and legwork (Sorell, 1998b:18-19), but it bears the promise of opening new possibilities for teaching and research, and for various forms of collaboration that can stimulate academic activity and consequently the further development of the field of business ethics. A third pointer on this route towards more amicable interaction lies in producing theories and theoretical devices that business practitioners will find both illuminating and useful. The way out of alienation is not to be sought in being less theoretical. Ironically the solution lies in directly the opposite direction, of producing more appropriate theoretical insights and devices that business practitioners will find indispensable for coming to terms with the ethical dimension of their task (cf. Collier, 1995:7 & 1997:168). It is a hallmark of good theory that it is grounded in a sound grasp of reality, and for that reason it is also useful in the planning of interventions in the reality that it encapsulates (Kitson & Campbell, 1996:21). Producing theories of that calibre and complementing them with theoretical models, frameworks and other heuristic devises that enable practitioners to come to grips with the ethical dimension of economic activity, will facilitate the desired interaction. The final pointer on this route is a rather sobering one. It revolves around limitations relating to the interaction between business ethicists and practitioners. Important though a mutually enriching relation between them might be, it is equally important to realise that there always will and should be a critical distance between them. It is therefore appropriate to close this discussion by pointing to some instances where it is not likely that such interaction will emerge. First of all, one needs to accept that some business practitioners are not theoretically inclined
and therefore are unlikely candidates for such a productive exchange between business ethicists and business practitioners. Secondly, there are instances where the findings of business ethicists might run counter to the immediate needs and vested interests of business practitioners (cf. Kaler, 2000:265). In such cases it would be naïve to expect that this will result in an amicable interaction between business ethicists and business practitioners. On the contrary, interaction can become confrontational and business ethicists might rather opt for collaborating with another group of practitioners, namely makers of social policy who influence business activity through political regulation. Finally, it is also important that the agendas of business ethicists should not be totally dominated by the practical concerns of practitioners. As academics, they should retain the freedom to venture into uncharted territory that is not at present perceived as important by practitioners. Without such freedom they will sacrifice the visionary spirit that always needs to be integral to academic inquiry.
Chapter Five The institutionalisation of business ethics
The concept 'institutionalisation', when applied to academic fields, refers to the shape given to academic activity within a specific field in order for it to fulfil its purpose. It is thus about contouring and giving form to academic fields in such a way that they become a prominent and permanent feature on the landscape of academic activity. For wellestablished academic disciplines, institutionalisation is normally not a big issue, as they are already well institutionalised. It is however exactly their institutionalisation that bestows upon them the status of wellestablished disciplines. For younger academic fields, institutionalisation is an important issue as their survival and further development hinges upon it. The institutionalisation of business ethics as an academic field is complicated by a number of its typical features that have emerged during the preceding discussions in this book. Firstly, its inherent multidisciplinary nature fragments academic activity within this field and scatters it across a wide variety of existing disciplines, each with its own well-established forms of institutionalisation. This implies that its institutionalisation cannot be achieved within a single academic discipline, but must be achieved both within and across various disciplines. This is a taxing task as these existing disciplines, within which business ethics is practised as a sub-field, each stamp their own mark on the way in which business ethics is being done. Consequently there are a variety of competing forces at play in such a cross-disciplinary institutionalisation effort. Secondly, the normative-descriptive duality that is a further inherent feature of business ethics equally complicates its institutionalisation.
The short history of business ethics has already amply demonstrated the divisive forces that this duality can unleash (cf. ch.1:3.1.). The challenge that this duality poses is to avoid forms of institutionalisation that will favour the one side of the duality over the other. Retaining both the normative and descriptive dimensions of inquiry is vital for the development and credibility of business ethics, as has already been argued (cf. ch.1:3.2.). Thirdly, institutionalisation is also complicated by the duality concerning the purpose of business ethics. In the earlier discussion on its purpose (cf.ch:1.2.) it emerged that certain currents within business ethics are geared towards expanding theoretical knowledge about the ethical dimension of economic activity, whilst others are geared towards influencing business practice. This duality of purpose is reflected in the theory-practice alienation within the field of business ethics that was discussed in the previous section. Once more the difficulty facing institutionalisation within this field is to shape academic activity in such a way that both theoretical and practical achievements can be pursued without the one dominating the other. These complications point towards the complexity of the institutionalisation of business ethics. A strict and uniform kind of institutionalisation is ruled out by the above complications. On the contrary, the only realistic form of institutionalisation is one that reckons with the multi-disciplinary and pluralistic nature of this field. Within such a situation of complexity two options regarding institutionalisation are available. The one option is to explore how it can be achieved within each of the disciplines within which business ethics is being studied. In that case one would then look at the institutionalisation thereof within management studies, business schools, philosophy departments, human resource management departments, etc. Such an undertaking will be hard to achieve by any single scholar as it requires a detailed and intimate understanding of each of the many disciplines where
ethical dimensions of economic activity are being studied. The other option is to formulate general and generic guidelines for institutionalisation that apply to business ethics both as it is being done within and across existing disciplinary boundaries. This latter strategy will be pursued here. For business ethics to become institutionalised as a well-established field of academic inquiry, three things are required. Firstly it needs to be visible on the academic landscape, secondly it needs to be heard by its intended audiences, and thirdly it needs to be recognised as a respectable academic endeavour. In short, activity within this field must be shaped in ways that will enhance its visibility, voice and status. Broad guidelines concerning each of these three aspects of its institutionalisation follow. The visibility of business ethics on the academic landscape can be enhanced by presenting modules, courses, or other forms of educational programmes, that explicitly carry the name 'business ethics'. Also, the creation of academic positions, such as endowed chairs, or the commissioning of existing staff to be explicitly responsible for business ethics, will promote its visibility. Furthermore, the formation of organisational structures, such as academic centres, institutes, networks and societies, will ensure that it is perceived as a prominent and permanent feature on the academic landscape. Special events, such as conferences, public lectures, and awards, can contribute towards improving its visibility. All the above forms of institutionalisation can occur either within or across existing disciplines. Institutionalisation of this kind across disciplines is especially important to ensure that its multi-disciplinary and pluralistic nature is not neglected. Besides being visible in ways described above, it is equally important that business ethics should make itself heard. The fact that business ethics is an academic field that is geared both towards the expansion
of theoretical knowledge and towards influencing business practice, has important implications for its audibility. In its endeavour to expand knowledge about the ethical dimension of economic activity, its voice should be regularly heard within the academic community, in order for its claims to be scrutinised and contested there. To institutionalise the internal academic voice of business ethics, customary ways of academic voicing, such as conferences, books, journals and web-sites, can be utilised. Achieving its other purpose of influencing business practice, however, requires other forms of voicing. In this case its voice must be made audible to either business practitioners, or policy makers and social institutions that can influence business behaviour. This will require the institution of forums where academics and these various stakeholders can meet. Additionally, it will demand communicating to them through channels that are accessible to them, such as the media, publications and web-sites suitable for that purpose. Finally, for business ethics to become a well-established academic field, it needs to be respected both within the academic community and by those non-academic stakeholders who can influence the ethical behaviour of business. Such status can be achieved in one of two ways. It can either be earned or it can be ascribed (cf. Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 1997:102). To earn this status within the academic community, it is imperative that teaching and research in business ethics should comply with the demands of intellectual and methodological rigour, respectability and innovation, that generally apply to academic activity. Excellence in research and teaching thus paves the way towards earned status within the academic community. It is also only on this basis that it is likely to achieve ascribed status within the academic community. This occurs when senior or influential members of the academic community recognise and recommend it as a worthwhile academic pursuit (cf. Piper et al., 1993:132). Thus, to ensure that internal status is bestowed upon it, it is imperative to institute academic quality control measures, such as rigorous peer and student evaluation, wherever business ethics is being practised.
To earn a similar status amongst its non-academic stakeholders, business ethics will also have to earn a reputation of making an indispensable contribution towards either managing or influencing business activity. This respect will only be earned if the theoretical contribution that business ethics makes is recognised by these non-academic stakeholders as relevant and appropriate - and for that reason useful to them. For this to occur, business ethicists not only have to produce contributions that are deemed as such, but they should also communicate them appropriately to these stakeholders. In return for this, business ethics as an academic field also needs to be ascribed status by these stakeholders. This can either happen indirectly or directly. It happens indirectly every time prominent business or social figures emphasise the need for, or their commitment to, ethical economic activity (cf. Hoffman & Driscoll, 2000:229). In its direct form it occurs when these very same people attest publicly to the value of business ethics as academic endeavour, or advocate its further development and expansion. Besides such symbolic support for business ethics, material investment in the development of the field, such as sponsoring chairs of business ethics or research projects, further enhances the ascribed status of business ethics as an academic field.
This book produced frameworks and guidelines for developing business ethics as an academic field. It started with a framework for mapping out the scope of this field in terms of both its area of study and the purpose thereof. In the discussion of its purpose emerged the normativedescriptive rift which characterises this field, and consequently guidelines for dealing with it were developed. Against this backdrop similar frameworks were developed for conceptualising the three major areas of activity within this field, namely research, teaching and interaction. Also with regard to contentious issues relating to these three areas, guidelines for dealing with such issues were proposed. Finally, guidelines were offered for institutionalising these activities so that they become well-established on the academic landscape, whilst also fulfilling the purpose of this field. These frameworks and guidelines were developed by reviewing, analysing and reflecting upon existing international literature on business ethics. As this book is intended to both stimulate and contribute towards the African discourse on the development of business ethics as an academic field, the question finally needs to be posed about the relevance of these findings for Africa. The contribution that this study intends to make towards the said African discourse can be undermined if it can be shown that the approach followed, and sources consulted, are irrelevant to Africa. The considerations that informed the frameworks and guidelines developed in this report are considerations that come with the territory of business ethics. They are thus considerations that will arise wherever the ethical dimension of economic activity is being studied. The very nature of ethical inquiry and the uniqueness of this area of inquiry inevitably will run into considerations about the purpose of inquiry, multi-disciplinarity, descriptive-normative tensions, sensitivity-issues in research, expectation gaps between what academics provide and
practitioners want, etc. It simply comes with the territory. Research done thus far in Africa (cf. Barkhuysen, 1999; Barkhuysen & Rossouw, 2000; Rossouw, 1997 & 2000b; Milanzi, 1997) confirms this. It revealed that the field of business ethics in Africa is riddled with uncertainties about the area of inquiry, as well as the purpose thereof, normative-descriptive tensions, confusion about the purpose of teaching business ethics, expectation-gaps between academics and business practitioners, lack of interaction within the field and the like. It can thus be assumed with a fair amount of confidence that the considerations that informed the frameworks and guidelines offered in this report are also relevant to Africa. As a budding field, business ethics in Africa can only benefit from learning how these considerations that come with the territory of studying the ethical dimension of economic activity have played out in the international discourse on business ethics. Conversely, ignoring this international discourse would be short-sighted and could unduly restrain the development of this field in Africa. What it cannot learn from the international discourse on business ethics is what the issues are that it should pursue in research and education, and what shape interaction and institutionalisation should take. The report deliberately steered clear of this, as African business ethicists need to determine this on their own, and in their own internal African discourse on business ethics. The frameworks and guidelines developed in this report will hopefully assist us Africans in doing exactly that.
1. See De George's "The status of business ethics: past and future" (1987), Mahoney's "Teaching business ethics in the UK, Europe and the USA" (1990), Freeman's "Business ethics: the state of the art" (1991), Shaw's "Business ethics today: a survey" (1996), Enderle's "World-wide survey on business ethics in the 1990's" (1997) and Cummins' "The teaching of business ethics" (1999). 2. This study has been made possible through a Commonwealth Fellowship, which I spent at the Judge Institute of Management Studies at the University of Cambridge in 2000. The purpose of Commonwealth fellowships is to enable non-UK members of the Commonwealth to do research in the UK that will be beneficial to their home countries.
Chapter one
3. Although this statement by De George captures the spirit of the social scientific approach, his view on the purpose of business ethics goes beyond it and emphasises the normative dimension of the field as well. 4. Clear signs of animosity between adherents of descriptive and normative approaches is evident in Klein (1998), Whetstone (1998), McDonald & Donleavey (1995) and Jackson (1994).
Chapter two
5. Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy 1995:489. 6. An analysis by Crane (1999) indicated that quantitative research rooted in the positivist tradition is dominating research in business ethics. According to that study 81% of empirical studies relied on survey data.
7. See Enderle (1996:40) on the difference between European and USA approaches to freedom and constraint in business ethics. 8. See Botes' (2000:180-187) exposition of the role of justification in micro and macro-arguments in research. 9. Bain (1995:13-15) argues that the popularity of self-report survey methodologies has more to do with the pressure to publish than with the appropriateness or usefulness thereof. According to his analysis of published research in business ethics it is easier to get published if your research is empirical rather than theoretical, or quantitative rather than qualitative. Also see Cowton (1998:424), Crane (1999:237) and Robertson (1993:587) on the gap that might exist between ethical attitudes and actual ethical behaviour. 10. Randall and Gibson (1990:464) argue that given the sensitive nature of business ethics research a response rate of around 70% is required for findings to be generalisable. 11. Cowton (1998:427) uses this term to indicate that in secondary research it is as if one enters into a discourse between others without them being aware of one's presence. 12. This is exactly what is being lamented in the field of business ethics by Crane (1999:239), Robertson (1993:589) and Randall & Gibson (1990:461). 13. See Collier (1997) on research-as-dialogue in the German speaking world and her doubts on whether it could work well outside that context.
Chapter three
14. These three positions correlate with the streams and currents identified in the earlier discussion on the purpose of business ethics as an academic field (cf. 1.2.). The cognitive competency position coincides with the ethical guidance current, while the behavioural competence position coincides with the ethical development current. The managerial competence position encapsulates the objectives expressed in the managerial, organisational interest and ethical
control currents. The only current that is not being catered for in these positions is the social scientific current, as its objective is mainly a research orientated one. See Sharon Parks' argument (in Piper et al., 1993) about the evidence provided by current research that moral development occurs in adult life and definitely through the formal education phase. In this respect, also see Werhane 1999:44. See Chryssides and Kaler's (1993:28-31) discussion on the compatibility of morality and corporate interests. Also see Cragg (1997:233) in this regard. For a typical example of such a clash see McDonald & Donleavy 1995 and Klein's (1998) reaction to it. Also see Trevino & Weaver's (1994) article: Business ETHICS/BUSINESS ethics: one field or two?. Sorell (1998a:88-89) argues in this regard that the wide-spread use of US case studies can easily lead to a neglect of contextual differences such as different legal and political frameworks within which business has to operate in other parts of the world. US case studies and textbooks, with their strong focus on big corporations, also tend to neglect the ethical dilemmas faced by smaller businesses. Also Cowton & Dunfee (1995:334), Stiles et al., (1993:246) and Sorell and Hendry (1994:6) emphasise the importance of the contextual relevance of case studies and textbooks. Bain (1994) explores the advantages and disadvantages of using vignettes in teaching business ethics. The major disadvantage of vignettes is their lack of contextual information that can easily derail the discussion as students tend to debate what the missing factual information might have been, instead of focusing on the ethical issues at hand.
Chapter four
20. See the managerial and organisational interest currents within the explanative stream as well as the ethical control and ethical development currents within the evaluative stream.
21. See the behavioural and managerial competence positions. 22. Should business practitioners expect anything other than theoretical contributions from them, the problem lies with inappropriate expectations on the side of such practitioners. It is only when academics opt for performing the role of consultant as well that business practitioners and policy-makers can expect them to also offer practical advice. 23. Business ethics organisations with a dual membership of academics and practitioners are a good vehicle for communicating in an accessible way. Alternatively, research findings can be adapted for publications in more popular business publications (cf. Robertson 1993:594; Collier 1995:11).
Business ethics is a fairly new field of academic study. Despite its tender age, a lot has already been produced in this field in terms of courses on business ethics, academic articles and books. In this book Deon Rossouw reviews the development of the field of business ethics critically. He identifies a number of significant areas that need to be addressed in order to ensure its further development. They relate to the scope of the field, teaching, research, interaction amongst business ethicists and the institutionalisation of business ethics as an academic field. Recommendations are proposed for how issues within these areas should be engaged. This book will be of interest to people already working in the field and who have an interest in its development. It will also serve as a solid point of entry into business ethics for those who consider venturing into this new and dynamic field. Deon Rossouw has published widely on business ethics, including this, his fourth book on the field. He is the founding president of BEN-Africa.
B E N - Af r i c a
The Business Ethics Network of Africa
ISBN: 0-620-32015-X Published by: BEN-Africa PO Box 91772 Auckland Park 2006 South Africa $10.00 US
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