Despite the expansion of the regulatory state, we continue to witness widespread unethical practices across society. This paper addresses these challenges of ethical failure, misalignment, and dissonance by developing a conceptual framework that provides an explicit basis for understanding virtuousness and the common good directed toward the goal of eudaimonia or human flourishing. While much of the literature on virtuousness has focused on the organization, this paper uses a more comprehensive understanding that also incorporates the agent and the economy examined (...) through their relational order. The common good provides direction for guiding behavior of all the various stakeholders and the context for understanding virtuousness, while it is through virtuousness that the common good is effectively realized. Virtuousness and the common good are therefore in effect ‘two sides of the same coin.’ This paper develops a virtuousness–common good conceptual framework which explores the basis for harmonizing the goals of the individual, organization, and the economy. (shrink)

Virtue ethics is generally recognized as one of the three major schools of ethics, but is often waylaid by utilitarianism and deontology in business and management literature. EBSCO and ABI databases were used to look for articles in the Journal of Citation Reports publications between 1980 and 2011 containing the keywords ‘virtue ethics’, ‘virtue theory’, or ‘virtuousness’ in the abstract and ‘business’ or ‘management’ in the text. The search was refined to draw lists of the most prolific authors, the most (...) cited authors, the most cited articles, and the journals with the most virtue ethics publications. This information allows one to chart how virtue ethics articles have evolved through the decades and to establish ‘schools’ or clusters of authors as well as clusters of themes. The results of this quantitative analysis of authors, ‘schools’, themes, and publications provide a foundation for the future study of virtue ethics in business and management, identifying its achievements and potentials. (shrink)

Abstract:In recent years, many business ethicists have raised problems with the “ethics pays” credo. Despite these problems, many continue to hold it. I argue that support for the credo leads business ethicists away from a potentially fruitful approach found in Hume’s moral philosophy. I begin by demonstrating that attempts to support the credo fail because proponents are trying to provide an answer to the “Why be moral?” question that is based on rational self-interest. Then, I show that Hume’s sentiments-based moral (...) theory provides an alternative to the credo that points toward a more fruitful approach to business ethics. Along the way, I examine a recent social contract alternative to the credo that, despite many appealing features, is less effective than is the Humean alternative. Finally, I develop a Humean approach to business ethics and demonstrate why it is a desirable alternative that business ethicists should explore. (shrink)

Critics point to four issues as presenting barriers to the use of virtue in the context of business. They focus on the relationship between management and practice, the potential for virtuous behaviour in a competitive environment, the ability to develop a reflexive critique of management that can be acted on, and the differentiation between work and wider social roles and people's propensity to take responsibility for them. In this paper we propose a solution to criticisms levelled at the use of (...) virtue within Business Ethics. We examine the critiques of management in the context of Virtue Ethics and the application of these to business. In arguing for a role for business in being virtuous and promoting virtue we accept that the concept of management that is based on the type of liberalism founded on personal preference and benefit is deeply problematic and that management that is driven solely by profit is not compatible with the development of practice based virtue. However, we argue that to exclude those activities in which management is involved as a result would be wrong and dangerous. Instead we see the great advantage of a Virtue Ethic is that it conjures up an alternative vision to the dominant practice, and such an alternative vision is urgently needed in business today. (shrink)

In recent years, organisational theorists have been interested in the tensions faced by healthcare organisations. In this paper, these tensions are examined using the virtue approach to ethics of Alasdair MacIntyre. It is argued that although MacIntyre's framework shares many concerns with organisational studies, it supplements the analysis with a focus on moral content and evaluation. By providing moral evaluation of the stories told in organisations, an ethical analysis compels action on a basis that organisational studies does not. Nevertheless, it (...) is the analysis of stories in organisation studies that provides the tools for taking action. The analysis presented here provides an example of how ethics and organisational studies can be brought together to provide a stronger analysis of organisational phenomena. Indeed, it provides support for Nielsen's position that organisational theory and ethics are co‐dependent and suggests that greater attention should be paid to ethical concepts in the study of organisational phenomena. (shrink)

Abstract:A marketplace of morality (MOM) is a place where individuals act under the influence of their moral desires. A MOM produces an output representing the aggregate acted-upon moral preferences of its participants. Individual behavior is influenced by POPs, or passions of propriety. People implement POP preferences when they buy stock, purchase goods and services, choose jobs and so on. Firms respond by social cause marketing and other devices which encourage customers to align their social preferences with those represented by the (...) firm. The outputs of MOM constitute an important reference point for understanding business morality. Even so, the normative status of MOM outputs must be subject to principles of universal morality. A principle of greater preponderance is offered as a means for determining when a MOM output is ethically legitimate.A theory of moral choice, based upon the concept of a MOM, may have potential for providing a unifying framework integrating moral preferences, reasoning, behaviors and organizational contexts with broader political and economic concepts. (shrink)

Examination of the application of virtue ethics to business has only recently started to grapple with the measurement of virtue frameworks in a practical context. This paper furthers this agenda by measuring the impact of virtue at the level of the organisation and examining the extent to which organisational virtue impacts on moral attentiveness and the perceived role of ethics and social responsibility in creating organisational effectiveness. It is argued that people who operate in more virtuous organisational contexts will be (...) expected to be more attentive to ethical issues and in turn perceive a greater role for ethics and social responsibility in business. Analysis of results based on a sample of 137 HR professionals shows that where people report that their organisation provides meaningful work, they are more likely to display reflective MA and the belief that ethics and social responsibility are compatible with business objectives, suggesting that organisations who are interested in promoting an ethical culture should focus on their work structures and practices. More generally, OV is shown to have a more complex relationship with PRESOR than hypothesised pointing towards a more nuanced view of OV. The paper examines the implications of the results for organisations and research. (shrink)

. The use of narrative to communicate and convey particular points of view in society has increasingly become the focus of academic attention in recent years. In particular, MacIntyre. (1985, 1988, 1990, 1999) has paid attention to the role of narrative in the conflict between different traditions when developing his virtue approach to ethics. Whilst there has been continued debate about the application of virtue approaches, some arguing that it is incompatible with business, I disagree and have already argued for (...) a form of virtue that will focus business on society’s needs rather than better business itself. Here I continue to develop the argument in two ways. First, I will explore the predominant business narrative and offer some comment on the ‘virtues’ that it promotes. However, rather than accepting this narrative, I want to challenge it with a narrative from the environmental tradition. I consider how adopting the virtues promoted by an environmental narrative it would shape business practices and challenge current business conventions. As a second step, I will focus on how we can change managers’ perceptions of business to reflect these environmentally based virtues. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to explain the differences between neo-Aristotelian virtue and positive organizational virtuousness from the virtue ethics perspective. Most studies use virtues and virtuousness interchangeably. A few others try to explain their differences from the positive organizational science perspective. Although closely related, we believe that these two notions are not identical. If we understand neo-Aristotelian virtue correctly, then it cannot be judged exclusively on what is externally verifiable, as is the case with virtuousness. For these reasons, (...) we attempt our own differentiation, highlighting the gains and losses realized in the migration from neo-Aristotelian virtue to positive organizational virtuousness, and establishing guideposts to meaningfully combine the strengths of both concepts. (shrink)

Abstract:Recent developments in personality research point to an alchemy of character composed of five elements: extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. This paper surveys this research for its implications to the study of the virtues in organizational ethics. After subjecting each of these five character traits to several tests as to what constitutes a virtue, the empirical evidence supports an organizational virtue of agreeableness and an organizational virtue of conscientiousness. Although the empirical evidence falls short, an argument is (...) mobilized on behalf of an additional organizational virtue of openness to experience. (shrink)

There has been increasing interest in the relevance of virtue approaches to ethics over the past 15 years. However, debate surrounding the virtue approach in the business, management and organisational studies literature has lacked progress. First, this literature focuses on a narrow range of philosophers, and, second, it has failed to analyse properly the consequences of virtue theory for action in practical settings other than in abstract terms. In order to begin addressing these issues, this paper compares what two virtue (...) frameworks—one focused on virtue in the context of community and the other on individuals as virtuous agents—lead to when evaluating the actions of parties to the 2002–2004 UK Fire Service dispute. The analysis argues that the virtue frameworks proposed by MacIntyre and Slote offer different but complimentary evaluations. Both not only point to potential problems with industrial disputes, but also recognise the legitimacy of action that is based in good motivations and carried out with regard for the virtues. It seems that fire fighters and their immediate supervisors, on the whole, met the conditions of virtue, but that it is open to question if the leaders of the Fire Brigades Union and the Government did the same. The analysis goes on to suggest which modes of negotiation would be acceptable under the virtue frameworks, and the implications for those involved in industrial dispute. (shrink)

Abstract:A marketplace of morality (MOM) is a place where individuals act under the influence of their moral desires. A MOM produces an output representing the aggregate acted-upon moral preferences of its participants. Individual behavior is influenced by POPs, or passions of propriety. People implement POP preferences when they buy stock, purchase goods and services, choose jobs and so on. Firms respond by social cause marketing and other devices which encourage customers to align their social preferences with those represented by the (...) firm. The outputs of MOM constitute an important reference point for understanding business morality. Even so, the normative status of MOM outputs must be subject to principles of universal morality. A principle of greater preponderance is offered as a means for determining when a MOM output is ethically legitimate.A theory of moral choice, based upon the concept of a MOM, may have potential for providing a unifying framework integrating moral preferences, reasoning, behaviors and organizational contexts with broader political and economic concepts. (shrink)

Abstract:Recent developments in personality research point to an alchemy of character composed of five elements: extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. This paper surveys this research for its implications to the study of the virtues in organizational ethics. After subjecting each of these five character traits to several tests as to what constitutes a virtue, the empirical evidence supports an organizational virtue of agreeableness and an organizational virtue of conscientiousness. Although the empirical evidence falls short, an argument is (...) mobilized on behalf of an additional organizational virtue of openness to experience. (shrink)