I identify and resolve an internal tension in Critical Contextual Empiricism (CCE) – the normative account of science developed by Helen Longino. CCE includes two seemingly conflicting principles: on one hand, the cognitive goals of epistemic communities should be open to critical discussion (the openness of goals to criticism principle, OGC); on the other hand, criticism must be aligned with the cognitive goals of that community to count as “relevant” and thus require a response (the goal-relativity of response-requiring criticism principle, (...) GRC). The co-existence of OGC and GRC enables one to draw both approving and condemning judgments about a situation in which an epistemic community ignores criticism against its goals. This tension results from conflating two contexts of argumentation that require different regulative standards. In the first-level scientific discussion, GRC is a reasonable principle but OGC is not; in the meta-level discussion about science, the reverse holds. In meta-level discussion, the relevance of criticism can be established by appealing to goals of science that are more general than the goals of a specific epistemic community. To illustrate my revision of CCE, I discuss why feminist economists’ criticism of the narrowness of the goals pursued in mainstream economics is relevant criticism. (shrink)

The books’ goal is to answer the question: Do the weaknesses of value-free economics imply the need for a paradigm shift? The author synthesizes criticisms from different perspectives (descriptive and methodological). Special attention is paid to choices over time, because in this area value-free economics has the most problems. In that context, the enriched concept of multiple self is proposed and investigated. However, it is not enough to present the criticisms towards value-free economics. For scientists, a bad paradigm is better (...) than no paradigm. Therefore, the author considers whether value-based economics with normative approaches such as economics of happiness, capability approach, libertarian paternalism, and the concept of multiple self can be the alternative paradigm for value-free economics. This book is essential reading to everyone interested in the current state of economics as a discipline. (shrink)

The concept of well-being is increasingly gaining acceptance as an object of science, and many different types of well-being measures have been developed. A debate has emerged about which measures are able to capture well-being successfully. An important underlying problem is that there is no unified conceptual framework about the nature of well-being—a hotly debated topic of philosophical discussion. I argue that while there is little agreement about the nature of well-being in philosophy, there is an important agreement on some (...) important principles relevant for its measurement. I argue that well-being science has good reasons to accommodate these principles, but currently fails to do so. (shrink)

In recent years, it has become commonplace among the Global Burden of Disease study authors to regard the disability-adjusted life year primarily as a descriptive health metric. During the first phase of the GBD, it was widely acknowledged that the DALY had built-in evaluative assumptions. However, from the publication of the 2010 GBD and onwards, two central evaluative practices—time discounting and age-weighting—have been omitted from the DALY model. After this substantial revision, the emerging view now appears to be that the (...) DALY is primarily a descriptive measure. Our aim in this article is to argue that the DALY, despite changes, remains largely evaluative. Our analysis focuses on the understanding of the DALY by comparing the DALY as a measure of disease burden in the two most significant phases of GBD publications, from their beginning to the most recent releases. We identify numerous assumptions underlying the DALY and group them as descriptive or evaluative. We conclude that while the DALY model arguably has become more descriptive, it remains, by necessity, largely evaluative. (shrink)

Abstract In this paper, I pursue the question whether extending democratic rights to work is good in the broadest possible sense of that term: good for workers, firms, market economies, and democratic states. The argument makes two assumptions in a broadly consequentialist framework. First, the configuration of any relationship among persons in which there is less rather than more coercion makes individuals better off. Second, extending democratic rights to work will entail costs and benefits to both the power and authority (...) of employers and meaningful work for employees. These costs and benefits cannot be determined in advance because they are largely empirical, but there are still good reasons for expanding worker participation all-things-considered. First, I examine the parallel case for extending democratic rights to the workplace based on several similarities between politics and work organization. In addition, I consider the objections from voluntariness and efficiency. Although both objections raise interesting problems I believe that a properly formulated conception of democratic workplaces can answer them. In the final section, I sketch a minimal conception of these rights at the level of the firm that does not require a large-scale transformation of the market economy. (shrink)

The gap between economic rationality, as embedded in utility maximization, and ethical rationality, identified with a set of rules that prescribe the right course of action, has been a challenging issue for economists, philosophers, and business ethicists. Despite the difference and the noncompetition between a scientific economic approach of economics and business ethics, and a behavioral and philosophical one, we highlight the importance of the Aristotelian concept of prudence or phronesis applied to business activity. Phronesis allows for a conceptualization of (...) rationality that can be simultaneously applied to economics and ethics. It also allows conceiving the intrinsically ethical nature of economic rationality. This relationship requires an appropriate education and the intervention of the state. (shrink)

The author identifies the major micro-, meso-, and macro-level financial risk shifting factors that contributed to the Great Global Recession and how the absence of a compelling moral vision of responsible financial risk management perpetuated the economic crisis and undermined the recovery by blind reliance upon insufficiently accountable bailouts. The author offers a new theoretical model of Sustainable Stakeholder Capitalism by exercising moral imagination which inclusively and moderately balances four multi-level factors: types of capitalism, moral theories, human nature drives, and (...) credit risk profiles. Finally, the author recommends micro-, meso-, and macro-level practical reforms to prevent a recurrence of the current economic freefall, to re-create systemic global financial institution integrity, and to promote responsible risk management for sustainable global prosperity for current and future generations. (shrink)

Despite the conclusions from the contemporary philosophy of science, many economists cherish the ideal of positive science. Therefore, value-free economics is still the central paradigm in economics. The first aim of the paper is to investigate economics' axiomatic assumptions from an epistemological perspective. The critical analysis of the literature shows that the positive-normative dichotomy is exaggerated. Moreover, value-free economics is based on normative foundations that have a negative impact on individuals and society. The paper's second aim is to show that (...) economics' normativity is not a problem because the discussion concerning values is possible and unavoidable. In this context, Weber and other methodologists are investigated. The conclusion of the paper is that science can thrive without strict methodological rules thanks to institutional mechanisms. Therefore, economists could learn from artists who accept the world without absolute rules. This perspective opens the possibility for methodological pluralism and normative approaches. (shrink)

Systems of urban transportation are largely shaped through planning practices. In transport economics, the benefits of infrastructure investments consist mainly of travel time savings calculated using monetary values of time. The economic interpretation of the value of travel time has significantly shaped our urban environment and transportation schemes. However, there is often an underlying assumption of transferability between time and money, which arguably does not sufficiently take into account the specific features of time. In this paper, we analyze the various (...) properties of time as an economic resource using findings in behavioral economics and psychology. Due to limitations in the standard model, it is proposed that an alternative model value should be investigated in which time rather than money is the primary carrier of and the basic features of such a model are outlined. An improved understanding the nature of time as a source of utility puts us in a better position to determine what aspects of time matter. Additionally, the analysis can be applied to further develop modeling where value of time plays a significant role; such as new models for the planning of urban transport. (shrink)

The main aim of this paper is to act as a corrective to the comparatively deafening silence of egalitarian political philosophy’s response to the Great Recession. The paper thus provides an accessible analysis of a new strand of empirical research into the causes of the crisis. This new literature, which has largely gone unnoticed by the broader philosophical community, maintains that the main driver of financial instability is income and wealth inequality coupled with income stagnation at the bottom of the (...) income distribution. Building on this empirical research, the paper puts forward six connections between egalitarian political philosophy broadly construed, and the findings of the new literature it surveys. These connections are understood as operating in two directions: that is, they both provide reasons for egalitarians to play a larger role in debates concerning the moral aspects of financial instability, and also offer valuable insights to egalitarians to reorient their position concerning central facets of their arguments. (shrink)

Contract-based approaches have been a focus of attention in business ethics. As one of the grand traditions in political philosophy, contractarianism is founded on the notion that we will never resolve deep moral disagreement. Classical philosophers like Hobbes and Locke, or recent ones like Rawls and Gaus, seek to solve ethical conflicts on the level of social rules and procedures. Recent authors in business ethics have sought to utilize contract-based approaches for their field and to apply it to concrete business (...) dilemmas. However, the application of contractarianism to management contexts can cause difficulties. Our article discusses this conceptual problem of contractarian business ethics and presents the idea of order ethics as an alternative. Order ethics, as we argue, can make a difference by conceptually bridging the gap between contractarianism and business ethics. (shrink)

The article analyzes and criticizes the political use of hive psychology proposed by Jonathan Haidt who appeals to the “nudges” of libertarian paternalism. The article introduces paternalism and discusses the nudge theory, and on the basis of that discussion examines the political use of hive psychology and holds that (i) nudges do not respect people as autonomous beings, and that (ii) hive politics are dangerous. Instead, a cosmopolitan perspective would be well worth pursuing.

As behavioural economics reveals, human decision-making deviates from neoclassical assumptions about human behaviour and people (often) fail to make the ‘right’ welfare-enhancing choice. The purpose of Sunstein and Thaler’s concept of ‘nudge’ is to improve individual welfare. To provide normative justification, they argue that the only relevant normative criterion is whether the individual is ‘better off as judged by themselves’, so that the direction in which people are to be nudged is defined by their own preferences. In light of behavioural (...) findings, however, people’s choices do not provide a sound basis for eliciting preferences and thus for assessing welfare. In this paper, I aim to challenge Sunstein and Thaler’s normative view, arguing that it is unreasonable to rely on conventional welfare economics, particularly considering the given context. Sunstein and Thaler depend on an approach of ‘preference purification’ which assumes informed, latent, and true preferences: As a result they face crucial methodological, epistemological, and practical objections, and cannot show how their approach enhances individual welfare. By building on the concepts of R. Sugden and C. Schubert, I develop an alternative normative framework for behavioural public policy, based on a contractualist perspective in which people may consent to collective choice rules in order to align future behaviour with values, to achieve particular goals or to preserve personal integrity. Individual consent and citizens’ participation and deliberation are crucial to this approach. This contractualist approach may provide a normative justification for behavioural public policy, and help to reconcile behavioural and normative economics. (shrink)

New technologies not only contribute greatly to society and the economy; they also involve fundamental societal shifts, challenging our values and ideas about ourselves and the world. With a view to aligning technological change and innovation with ethical values, the concept of responsible innovation advocates the inclusion of a variety of stakeholders, in particular from society. In shifting moral responsibility towards the producers of innovations, responsible innovation rejects the standard normative economic view that the ethical evaluation of innovations is a (...) matter of individual consumers’ market-based choices. However, in this article we argue that responsible innovation should not abandon all normative consideration of the individual outright, to which end we present an alternative normative economic approach based on preference learning. We show how this approach can provide an enhanced understanding of responsible innovation by clarifying the redistribution of moral responsibility and casting individuals in the normative role of co-innovators, rather than mere consumers. We argue that responsible innovation should enable individuals to form preferences and evaluate innovations, so as to align innovation with ethical demands. Finally, we show how our proposed approach can be put into practice in so-called laboratories in real-world contexts, using methods from the field of design. In short, drawing on normative economics, this article aims to establish a new understanding of responsible innovation that is conceptually sound and can form the basis for novel innovation practices. (shrink)

The tenuous claims of cost-benefit analysis to guide policy so as to promote welfare turn on measuring welfare by preference satisfaction and taking willingness-to-pay to indicate preferences. Yet it is obvious that people's preferences are not always self-interested and that false beliefs may lead people to prefer what is worse for them even when people are self-interested. So welfare is not preference satisfaction, and hence it appears that cost-benefit analysis and welfare economics in general rely on a mistaken theory of (...) well-being. This essay explores the difficulties, criticizes standard defences of welfare economics, and then offers a new partial defence that maintains that welfare economics is independent of any philosophical theory of well-being. Welfare economics requires nothing more than anevidentialconnection between preference and welfare: in circumstances in which people are concerned with their own interests and reasonably good judges of what will serve their interests, their preferences will be reliable indicators of what is good for them. (shrink)

The health gradient among those who are by historical standards both remarkably healthy and well-off is of considerable moral importance with respect to benevolence, justice and the theory of welfare. Indeed it may help us to realize that for most people the good life lies in close and intricate social ties with others which can flourish only when inequalities are limited. The health gradient suggests that there is a story to be told in which egalitarian justice, solidarity, health and well-being (...) go hand-in-hand. (shrink)

Abstract: This paper examines Mark Blaug's position on the normative character of Paretian welfare economics: in general, and specifically with respect to his debate with Pieter Hennipman over this question during the 1990s. The paper also clarifies some of the confusions that emerged within the context of this debate, and closes by providing some additional arguments supporting Blaug's position that he himself did not provide.

This paper examines methodological issues raised by revealed preference theory in economics: particularly contemporary revealed preference theory. The paper has three goals. First, to make the case that revealed preference theory is a broad research program in choice theory—not a single theory—and understanding this diversity is essential to any methodological analysis of the program. Second, to explore some of the existing criticisms of revealed preference theory in a way that emphasizes how the effectiveness of the critique depends on the particular (...) version of revealed preference under consideration. Finally, three additional criticisms are presented that are aimed specifically at contemporary revealed preference theory. (shrink)

This paper argues that corporate governance reformers in Anglo-American jurisdictions should consider a different approach in their quest for better corporate governance. Traditionally, corporate governance reform has taken a structural approach, tightening the rules around the number of independent directors required on boards and committees and fine-tuning the definition of independence. However, such an approach has failed to achieve effective corporate governance. Moreover, this approach is informed by the arguably discredited assumption that individuals are rational self-interest utility maximizers. This conceptual (...) paper questions why corporate governance scholars and regulators remain uncritical of this assumption and suggests an approach to reform inspired by a different view of human nature. Indeed, incorporating an actor-based approach to reform into existing structures may better achieve effective corporate governance while addressing an unjustified adherence to this flawed assumption. (shrink)

1. Social scientific models of sustainable development show that, for the goal of sustainability, the aggregate level of capital must remain intact. With respect to these models, there is no greate...

Many economists, it is said, “are inclined to deny that moral philosophy has anything to do with economics” . In this paper I challenge such inclinations bydrawing an analogy between economic interventions and humansubjects research. It is undeniable that investigators engaged in thelatter should adhere to specific ethical principles. I argue that analogousfeatures of economic interventions should lead us to recognise thatsimilar ethical concerns actually arise in both activities, and thusthat economic interventions should also be conducted in accordancewith ethical principles. (...) By exploring the analogy further I formulatesome ethical guidelines for economic practice, which in turn imply thatethical responsibilities will extend to all members of the economicsprofession. (shrink)

Consumers and producers aim to maximize their welfare through economic transactions. Their welfare is determined by choices and preferences. Therefore, understanding social and economic welfare projected by conventional and Islamic economics requires exploring their underlying paradigms and axioms for preference formation, choices, and welfare maximization. Even though conventional economics assumes that preferences are given, it actually considers that they are driven by self-interest. It does not discuss preference formation along determining moral axioms. Rather, it starts from revealed preferences to understand (...) choices of consumers and producers. Thus, preference formation is like a black box. This paper is an attempt to unlock this black box by exploring preference formation along its underlying moral axioms for good life. The paper discusses Islamic moral ideals within the Islamic worldview along the implications of those axioms for consumers, employees, and employers. The paper also explores the gap between those ideals and Muslim reality. It suggests how to empirically test the relationship between moral axioms and ethical behaviors of consumers, employers, and employees. It concludes that internalizing moral axioms would serve as an ethical compass necessary to establish formal and informal institutions for efficient and ethical business organizations. (shrink)

The paper explores Islamic morality within labor market realities. It presents Islamic moral axioms that are expected to guide employer–employee relationships. It provides an extensive review of Islamic moral ideals related to fairness in the labor market. Based on survey data from 319 individuals in the Saudi labor market, it tests three hypotheses related to religiosity, secular aspirations, and perception and practice of fairness in the labor market. Using multinomial logistic regression, the findings from several models clearly support all three (...) hypotheses. They show that employers, owners and senior managers were more likely to consider market reality as their reference for describing fairness. Ideally speaking, the regression results confirm that being religious contributes positively to the sense of fairness even in a secular context. However, they also reveal that secular aspirations override religious ideals when it comes to market realities. In other words, when people place great importance on worldly outcomes, religious ideals have almost no impact on their labor market practices even if they ideally support fair practices. The study concludes that religious morality does matter with regard to fairness in employer–employee relationships only if it is not superseded by secular aspirations. Those who have a high-level of religiosity consider themselves to be fairer. However, if they embrace secular aspirations, they are less likely to practice their moral ideals in the labor market. (shrink)

This is a comprehensive anthology of works concerning the nature of economics as a science, including classic texts and essays exploring specific branches and schools of economics. Apart from the classics, most of the selections in the third edition are new, as are the introduction and bibliography. No other anthology spans the whole field and offers a comprehensive introduction to questions about economic methodology.

The focus of this chapter is public policy and consequentialism, especially issues that arise in connection with the environment – i.e. the natural world, including non-human animals. We integrate some of the existing literature on environmental economics, welfare economics, and policy with the literature on environmental values and philosophy. The emphasis on environmental policy is motivated by the fact that it is arguably the most philosophically interesting and challenging application of consequentialism to policy, as it includes all the challenges of (...) valuing the distribution of human wealth and power, and has the further challenge of putting these consequences on the same scale as consequences for human health, non-human animals, and nature. We suggest that standard methods of (economic) policy analysis provide a good approximation of correct welfarist analysis, except that they must be supplemented with methods for valuing animal wellbeing and tradeoffs with human wellbeing. We then provide the needed methods. (shrink)

Transparency and openness are broadly endorsed in energy and environmental modelling and analysis, but too little attention is given to the transparency of value-laden assumptions. Current practices for transparency focus on making model source code and data available, documenting key equations and parameter values, and ensuring replicability of results. We argue that, even when followed, these guidelines are insufficient for achieving deep transparency, in the sense that results often remain driven by implicit value-laden assumptions that are opaque to other modellers (...) and researchers, and that may not be understood by wider audiences to be controversial. This paper identifies additional best practices for achieving transparency by highlighting issues where disagreement over value judgements will persist for the foreseeable future. Recommendations for deepening transparency are developed by learning from successes and ongoing challenges represented in three case studies. We provide recommendations to accelerate the adoption of additional best practices for deepening transparency of energy and environmental modelling in policy-relevant domains, increasing stakeholder participation with non-modellers, and encouraging interdisciplinary dialogue. (shrink)

Gender greatly impacts access to opportunities, potential, and success in corporate leadership roles. We begin with a general presentation of why such discussion is necessary for basic considerations of justice and fairness in gender equality and how the issues we raise must impact any ethical perspective on gender in the corporate workplace. We continue with a breakdown of the central categories affecting the success of women in corporate leadership roles. The first of these includes gender-influenced behavioral factors, such as the (...) requirements and expectations of gendered verbal and nonverbal communication styles as well as appearance. We move on to address the impact of family on corporate leadership opportunities and success, discussing the asymmetrical evaluation of an individual’s potential, authority, and competence based on gender stereotypes of familial obligations and expectations. Finally, we address how gender impacts access to networking and sponsorship opportunities and the long-term effects of systematic limitations on women’s inclusion in the upper echelons of corporate leadership. We conclude with a summary of the questions and issues raised by our discussion and direct individuals to consider how different ethical systems and moral requirements might influence their interpretations of gender and leadership in the corporate workplace. (shrink)

According to some philosophers and social scientists, mainstream economic theories currently play an unprecedented role in shaping human societies. This phenomenon can be linked to the dissemination of methodological individualism, where common goods are interpreted as reducible to aggregates of individuals' well-being. Nonetheless, some emergent difficulties of economics in coping with global institutional issues have encouraged some authors to revise that paradigm. In the last three decades, there has been a parallel growing philosophical interest in investigating social sciences' epistemological and (...) ontological foundations. Unfortunately, these two research trends have often not communicated systematically enough to understand the specific ontology of collective aims. It is still unclear whether some irreducible social goods exist and how the answer to this question can set up a consistent understanding of cooperative actions. This dissertation addresses this issue, drawing on philosophical investigations about collective intentionality. It claims that a coherent ontological taxonomy of irreducible and reducible social goods is theoretically viable and can reframe prevailing approaches to collective action dilemmas influenced by the traditional economic categorisation of goods. The research begins by analysing how the influential theory of public goods has paved the way for some social and moral impasses. Furthermore, some theoretical proposals suggesting the existence of relational goods and common-pool resources are scrutinised. Hence, a refutation of the ontological reduction of all social goods to individual ones is developed, arguing that a specific form of cooperation, grounded in we-intentions and we-reasoning, shows the plausibility of the existence of some kinds of irreducible collective goods. Expanding on that view, a refinement of this categorisation of social goods is put forward by underlying the function of some relational entities, such as trust and shared sensemaking processes, in making cooperation robust in uncertain environments. Finally, by applying the taxonomy to collective action gridlocks regarding climate change, digital information, and public education, the consistency of this hypothesis is tested, showing that a pluralistic ontological account of social goods might improve the moral understanding of current social dilemmas. (shrink)

This thesis in philosophy consists of an introduction and five papers on three themes related to transport: valuations of time, the metric of transport justice, and future mobility solutions. The first paper analyses the properties of time as an economic resource taking into account literature on behaviour concerning time. The intent is to add to the understanding of the underlying assumption of transferability between time and money in the context of transportation. The second paper is on the metric of transport (...) justice. If we are concerned with distributive justice in the context of transportation, what type of good is being distributed? So far, most of the transport literature on transport justice takes accessibility to be the most appropriate metric. However, I argue that many operationalisations of accessibility are insufficient as metrics of justice. They are both too narrow and exclude relevant burdens of transportation. Additionally, accessibility can be achieved by other, non-travel-based means. I end by formulating tentative criteria for an alternative metric of transport justice. The third paper considers temporal justice in the context of transportation. Building on an argument against the claim of substitutability between time and money, I argue that temporal perspectives have been overlooked in the literature on transport justice. In part, this might be due to accessibility being the established metric of justice. Most common measures of accessibility do not capture temporal constraints and might consequently not capture temporal inequalities. Based on the case of gender differences in travel patterns and behaviour, I argue that an alternative account of the appropriate metric of transport justice is needed to capture temporal constraints and reflect gender inequalities sufficiently. The fourth paper argues that the diversity of possible mobility solutions based on self-driving vehicles has been somewhat overlooked in the current literature on the value of travel time. Thus, the complexity of valuing travel time for self-driving vehicles has not been fully addressed. The paper consists of a morphological analysis of the parameters that might impact the value of travel time for self-driving vehicles and a deeper analysis of five plausible self-driving vehicle mobility concepts. It is claimed that not all such concepts can be easily mapped into transport modes. It might be more appropriate to differentiate the value of travel based on travel characteristics. The fifth paper is a literature review of work on attitudes toward automation technology, specifically self-driving vehicles. In particular, I examine the narratives and values related to gender. Generally, women tend to be more sceptical of the prospect of automated vehicles. The review found that this tendency is often explained by women being more risk-averse and less tech-savvy. Moreover, the policy recommendations in the examined literature based focus on educational efforts. Such perspectives can downplay or neglect valid reasons why women are less enthusiastic. Moreover, needs related to women's specific travel patterns might not be considered in the design and planning process. In conclusion, more awareness in needed of the gender differences, needs and expectations to ensure that future transport solutions are designed with everyone in mind. (shrink)

This licentiate thesis consists of an introduction and three papers discussing various aspects of time as a commodity and the practice of valuing travel time. The first paper is an analysis of the properties of time as an economic resource taking into account literature on behavior with regard to time. The intent is to provide better understanding of the underlying assumption of transferability between time and money in the context of transportation. The second paper builds on the analysis in the (...) first paper combined with the findings of a study of commuters travel experiences during disruptions in the train traffic on the Øresund strait between Sweden and Denmark. It contrasts the theoretical account of value of travel time with the experiences reported by commuters and argues that the view of travel time as strictly a disutility can be limiting from a planning perspective. Instead, it is argued that an alternative approach can be to make travel time ‘plannable’, meaning viewing travel time as time travellers can plan to spend in a certain way at a certain time. The third paper argues that the diversity of possible mobility solutions based on self-driving vehicles has been somewhat overlooked in the current literature on value of travel time. Thus, the complexity of valuing travel time for self-driving vehicles has not been fully addressed. The paper consists of a morphological analysis of the parameters that might impact value of travel time for self-driving vehicles and a deeper analysis of five plausible self-driving vehicle mobility concepts. It is claimed that not all such concepts can be easily mapped into transport modes and that it might be more appropriate to differentiate value of travel based on travel characteristics. (shrink)

One of the more obscure arguments for Rawls’ difference principle dubbed ‘the Pareto argument for inequality’ has been criticised by G. A. Cohen (1995, 2008) as being inconsistent. In this paper, we examine and clarify the Pareto argument in detail and argue (1) that justification for the Pareto principles derives from rational selfinterest and thus the Pareto principles ought to be understood as conditions of individual rationality, (2) that the Pareto argument is not inconsistent, contra Cohen, and (3) that the (...) kind of bargaining model required to arrive at the particular unequal distribution that the difference principle picks out is a model that is not based on bargaining according to one’s threat advantage. (shrink)

Nowadays most of the big companies pride themselves on their social responsibility. When visiting the websites of IBM, Cisco, ING, Philips, BP, etc., one will easily find a tab called ‘corporate social responsibility’, or ‘sustainability’.1 Here, companies describe how they contribute to the community and balance their impact on the environment. Why do they do that? There is a long tradition of moral considerations for commerce. In the early days of capitalism, the goal of the business was solely to make (...) profits. This changed when business was challenged by social movements and legislation. Nowadays, business is not only responsive to external pressure, but is rather proactive in its social responsibility. Companies keep extending their responsible agenda, often going beyond legislation. It appears that companies have adopted their ethical dimension. Corporate Social Responsibility seems to have found a way to make capitalism work for societies, with businesses driving social betterment. (shrink)