It appears that in the 30 years that business ethics has been a discipline in its own right a model of business ethics has not been proffered. No one appears to have tried to explain the phenomenon known as 'business ethics' and the ways that we as a society interact with the concept, therefore, the authors have addressed this gap in the literature by proposing a model of business ethics that the authors hope will stimulate debate. The business ethics model (...) consists of three principal components that are interconnected by five sub-components. The introduced model makes a contribution to the creation of a conceptual framework for business ethics. A few tentative conclusions may be drawn from the introduced model of business ethics. The model aspires to be highly dynamic. The ultimate outcome is dependent upon the evolution of time and contexts. It is also dependent upon and provides reference to the behaviours and perceptions of people. The model proposes business ethics to be a continuous and an iterative process. There is no actual end of the process, but a constant reconnection to the initiation of successive process iterations of the business ethics model. The principals and sub-components of the model construct the dynamics of this continuous process. They provide guidance on what and how to explore our common efforts to understand the phenomenon known as business ethics. The model provides opportunities for further research in the field of business ethics. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to investigate to what extent is business and society literature idealistic as it advocates the adoption of high moral norms for business performance. The author discusses the central theses of mainstream themes in this literature—corporate social responsibility, corporate social responsiveness, social issues, corporate social performance, stakeholder management, corporate citizenship, business ethics, sustainable development, and corporate sustainability—and evaluates their descriptive accuracy, normative validity, and instrumental power. Poor description of reality, underdeveloped business logic, and questionable prescriptions (...) are indicative of the idealism of these themes. This study reveals many realistic and achievable propositions, which dilute the concern that business and society literature is idealistic. However, three elements in the field—its (rhetorical) criticism of corporate conduct, the predominantly normative notions of its concepts, and its underdeveloped instrumental ideas—underline its idealistic orientation. (shrink)