BLAW Ch. 2 T/F

ethics can be broadly defined as the study of what is good or right for human beings

The study of business ethics has several central authorities

because there are no universal, clear cut standards to apply to ethical analysis, it is impossible to make meaningful ethical judgements

not everything that is legal is also morally correct

an ethical relativist looks to a central authority, such as the bible, to guide her in ethical decision making

the 2 major forms of utilitarianism are situational and a priori

situational ethics judges a persons ethics and it does so from the perspective of the actor

jeremy bentham was not a proponent of utilitarianism

there are no important criticisms of utilitarianism

a leading proponent of the utilitarian approach to ethics was the 18th century philosopher Immanuel Kant

deontologists are sometimes criticized for rigidity and excessive formalism

intuitionism holds that rational persons possess inherent powers to asses the correctness of actions

in employment relationships, ethical issues arise regarding safety and compensation of workers, privacy and the legitimacy of whistle blowing

harvard philosopher john rawls stressed liberty as the most important obligation owed by a society to its members

To a libertarian it is not unjust for some people to accumulate fortunes while other live in poverty

although corporations are not persons but artificial entitites created by the state it is clear that they can and should be held morally accountable

corporations are generally held to a higher standard of accountability than are public bodies

according to Milton Friedman the social obligation of a corporation is to return as much money as possible to its shareholders

according to adam smith, the capitalistic system is composed of economic motivation, private productive property, free enterprise, free markets, competition, and limited government

most philosopher now agree that people can discover fundamental ethical rules by applying careful a priori reasoning

the theory of distributive justice analyzes society through a \”veil of ignorance\”

what is unjust to a social egalitarian will also be unjust to a libertarian

from a kantian perspective for an action to be moral, it must be possible for it to be made into a universal law and it must respect the autonomy and rationality of all human beings

under a kantian approach ethics a person should not lie to colleagues unless that person supports the right of all colleagues to lie to one another

under a strict utilitarian approach, it is ethical to force an individual to participate in a painful medical experiment if the purpose of the experiment is to develop a cure that will benefit large numbers of people

Kants approach like that of ethical fundamentalists asserts that universal laws stem from the direct pronouncements of god

Bill would like to propose to the board of directions of Midway Corporation that it distribute 5% of its pre tax yearly income to feed the poor. To Milton Friedman and others, Bill’s proposal might be considered unethical, because it violates the purpose for which the corporation was established

according to one argument in favor of corporate social responsibility the more responsibly companies act, the less the government must regulate them

andrew carnegies was a believer in corporate social responsibiltity

situational ethics is essentially the same as ethical relativism

Deontological theories assess good and evil in terms of the consequences of actions rather than by the motives that lead to them

utilitarian notions underlie cost benefit analysis

Business ethics is a subset of ethics, there is no special set of ethical principles that applies only to the business world

ethical relativism holds that when any two individuals or cultures differ regarding the morality of a particular issue or action, they are both correct because morality is relative