Article: Where Business Ethics and Self-Interest Meet; Schools' Responsibility
published on 28.06.1987
by s743120
In the last 25 years, American industries, actually industries all over the world, has suffered a lot by moral wrong conduct and all kinds of other moral issues. The education of business ethics at business school certainly, however, it is not enough and effective without the attention from all other parties, such as family education, elementary school education, companies concern, etc.
In the business environment, ethics seems somehow a bit paradoxical. The purpose of business is to generate profit, which is in conflict with moral conducts. This kind of argument was acceptable decades ago, which is exactly why there are so much moral issues causing loss for society and the company itself. Thus, the topic of business ethics has been brought into light.
In the early stage of capitalism, companies only cared the benefit of shareholders. Then problems started to appear in modern western markets. More and more people found out: the company will suffer in the end if it ignores other stakeholders’ benefit. Just like the definition of morality of functional tradition, it refers a set of rules needed to deal with dual aspects of mankind. Since different stakeholders have their own interests. In most of the case, these interests are in conflict with each other, moral issue appears consequently. Morality has the function to ensure the order, stability and continuity of the business. The financial crisis is a proof to show business cannot develop continuously without regulation. As conclusion, the function of business ethics is to keep balance among diverse interests of different stakeholders, which need the effort from the whole society aside of business school education.
Link to the lecture:
The functional tradition
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