A political and philosophical manifesto considers the ramifications of a world in which Western society is divided from other cultures, evaluating the limited capacity of differentiating societies as compared to the power of a united world.

This text explores the ethical significance of identity, including our gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, religion and sexuality, for our obligations to others and to ourselves.

Transnational corporations have become actors with significant political power and authority which should entail responsibility and liability, specifically direct liability for complicity in human rights violations. Holding TNCs liable for human rights violations is complicated by the discontinuity between the fragmented legal/political structure of the TNC and its integrated strategic reality and the international state system which privileges sovereignty and non-intervention over the protection of individual rights. However, the post-Westphalian transition—the emergence of multiple authorities, increasing ambiguity of borders and jurisdiction (...) and blurring of the line between the public and private spheres—should facilitate imposing direct responsibility on transnational firms. Mechanisms for imposing direct responsibility on TNCs are considered including voluntary agreements and international law. However, I conclude that a hybrid public-private regime which relies on non-hierarchical compliance mechanisms is likely to be both more effective and consistent with the structure of the emerging transnational order. (shrink)

At the beginning of the 21st century the conditio humana cannot be understood nationally or locally but only globally. This constitutes a revolution in the social sciences. The `sociological imagination' (C. Wright Mills) so far has basically been a nation state imagination. The main problem is how to redefine the sociological frame of reference in the horizon of a cosmopolitan imagination. For the purpose of empirical research I distinguish between three concepts: interconnectedness (David Held et al.), liquid modernity (Zygmunt Bauman) (...) and cosmopolitization from within. The latter is a kind of class analysis after class analysis, which takes on board globalization internalized. For the purposes of social analysis, therefore, it is necessary to distinguish systematically between the national manifestation on the one hand and cosmopolitan reality of `global flows', currents of information, symbols, money, risks, people, social inequalities, on the other. This internal involuntary and often unseen cosmopolitanization from below of the national sphere of experience is occurring, however, with the power of economic globalization. So what does inner `cosmopolitanization' mean? The key concepts and questions of a way of life, such as nourishment, production, identity, fear, memory, pleasure, fate, power and politics, can no longer be located and understood nationally, but only globally whether in the shape of globally shared collective futures, capital flows, impending ecological or economic catastrophes, global foodstuff chains, transnational power games, or the `Esperanto' of pop music. In this article I look at transformation in the understanding of space-time, of identity, of the production paradigms, as well as at the resulting consequences for key sociological concepts like class and power and, within this frame, point to certain dilemmas of cosmopolitanism. (shrink)

In this article I provide a critical perspective on governing the global corporation. While the papers in the 2009 special issue of Business Ethics Quarterly explore the political role of corporations I argue that they lack a sophisticated analysis of power acrossinstitutional and actor networks. The argument that corporate engagement with deliberative democracy can enhance the legitimacy of corporations does not take into account the effects of institutional, material and discursive forms of power that determine legitimacycriteria. As a result corporate (...) versions of citizenship mediate versions of social responsibility and morality, which are reflected in the institutional and political economic norms that are produced by this power/knowledge. In order to overcome the limits of corporate social responsibility there is a need to develop more democratic forms of global governance of corporations. A radical revisioning of democratic governance would also need to overcome the limits posed by sovereignty and would require new forms of multi-actor and multi-level translocal governance arrangements in an attempt to create forms of power that are more compatible with the principles of economic democracy. (shrink)

In this article I have two primary goals. First, I present two recent views on the distinction between knowledge-that and knowledge-how (Stanley and Williamson, The Journal of Philosophy 98(8):411–444, 2001; Hetherington, Epistemology futures, 2006). I contend that neither of these provides conclusive arguments against the distinction. Second, I discuss studies from neuroscience and experimental psychology that relate to this distinction. Having examined these studies, I then defend a third view that explains certain relevant data from these studies by positing the (...) double dissociation of knowledge-that and knowledge-how and that is also able to do explanatory work elsewhere. (shrink)

Approaches to business ethics can be roughly divided into two streams: ‹codes of behavior’ and ‹forms of subjectification’, with code-oriented approaches clearly dominating the field. Through an elaboration of poststructuralist approaches to moral philosophy, this paper questions the emphasis on codes of behaviour and, thus, the conceptions of the moral and responsible subject that are inherent in rule-based approaches. As a consequence of this critique, the concept of a practice-based ‹ethics of responsiveness’ in which ethics is never final but rather (...) always ‹to come’, is investigated. In such an approach the ethical self is understood as being continuously constituted within power/knowledge relations. Following this line, we ask how one can become a responsible subject while also acknowledging certain limits of full responsibility. We thereby explore responsibility as a considered but unconditional openness in response to the other. (shrink)

Higher education makes an importantcontribution to citizenship. In the UnitedStates, the required portion of the ``liberalarts education'' in colleges and universitiescan be reformed so as to equip students for thechallenges of global citizenship. The paperadvocates focusing on three abilities: theSocratic ability to critize one's owntraditions and to carry on an argument on termsof mutual respect for reason; (2) the abilityto think as a citizen of the whole world, notjust some local region or group; and (3) the``narrative imagination,'' the ability to (...) imaginewhat it would be like to be in the position ofsomeone very different from oneself. The paperdiscusses the role of the ``liberal arts''curriculum in U.S. education and asks howEuropean universities, with their differentstructure, might promote these three abilities. (shrink)

This paper examines ethics in organizations in relation to the subjectivity of managers. Drawing on the work of Michel Foucault we seek to theorize ethics in terms of the meaning of being a manager who is an active ethical subject. Such a manager is so in relation to the organizational structures and norms that govern the conduct of ethics. Our approach locates ethics in the relation between individual morality and organizationally prescribed principles assumed to guide personal action. In this way (...) we see ethics as a practice that is powerfully intertwined in an individual’s freedom to make choices about what to do and who to be, and the organizational context in which those choices are situated, framed and governed. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:The literatures of business ethics and international business have generally had little influence on each other. Nevertheless, the decline in the power of nation states, the emergence of non-governmental organizations, the proliferation of self-regulatory bodies, and the changing responsibilities, roles, and structure of multinational corporations make constructive engagement between these two disciplines imperative. This changing institutional landscape creates many areas of common concern. In this article, we describe the changing institutional context of global business and suggest ways in which both (...) business ethics and international business may inform each other more fruitfully. (shrink)

This collection, first published in 1993, presents some of Spivak’s most engaging essays on works of literature such as Salman Rushdie's controversial Satanic Verses, and twentieth century thinkers such as Jacques Derrida and Karl Marx.

ABSTRACT:In 2010,Business Ethics Quarterlypublished ten articles that considered the potential contributions to business ethics research arising from recent scholarship in a variety of philosophical and social scientific fields (strategic management, political philosophy, restorative justice, international business, legal studies, ethical theory, ethical leadership studies, organization theory, marketing, and corporate governance and finance). Here we offer short responses to those articles by members ofBusiness Ethics Quarterly’s editorial board and editorial team.

In light of recent attempts to determine the political role and status of corporations I discuss the normative implications of considering multinational corporations (MNCs) as political actors. I posit that corporations do indeed have a new political role in a connected world, in particular with respect to matters of human rights, social and environmental justice. We thus find a growing need for ethical and political knowledge to inform and guide the emerging political co-responsibility of MNCs. I draw on the rich (...) literature in cosmopolitanism to seek such guidance and discuss some of the implications that a cosmopolitan perspective implies. (shrink)

This article aims to respond to recent calls for more material accounts of cosmopolitanism by considering the way the cosmopolitan sensibilities of flexibility, adaptability, tolerance and openness to difference are literally embodied by a specific group of mobile subjects. Drawing on a study of round-the-world travellers and the 'body stories' they publish in their online travelogues, this article explores the various ways travellers embody cosmopolitanism through the concept of 'fit'. Fit refers both to the physical condition required for long-haul travel (...) and to the ability to blend in and adapt to a variety of geographical and cultural environments. By focusing on the way cosmopolitanism is literally embodied, the empirical account offered here draws attention to the notion that cosmopolitanism is not just an abstract, materially iterated orientation to the world as a whole. (shrink)

In contrast to most literature on cosmopolitanism, which focuses on its elite forms, this article analyzes how ordinary people bridge racial boundaries in everyday life. It is based on interviews with 150 non-college-educated white and black workers in the United States and white and North African workers in France. The comparison of the four groups shows how differences in cultural repertoires across national context and structural location shape distinct anti-racist rhetorics. Market-based arguments are salient among American workers, while arguments based (...) on solidarity and egalitarianism are used by French, but not by American, workers. Minority workers in both countries employ a more extensive toolkit of anti-racist rhetoric as compared to whites. The interviewed men privilege evidence grounded in everyday experience, and their claims of human equality are articulated in terms of universal human nature and, in the case of blacks and North Africans, universal morality. Workers' conceptual frameworks have little in common with multiculturalism that occupies a central place in the literature on cosmopolitanism. We argue that for the discussion and practice of cosmopolitanism to move forward we should shift our attention to the study of multiple ordinary cosmopolitanisms. (shrink)

This fascinating book explores the interface between global processes, identity formation and the production of culture. Examining ideas ranging from world systems theory to postmodernism, Jonathan Friedman investigates the relations between the global and the local, to show how cultural fragmentation and modernist homogenization are equally constitutive trends of global reality. With examples taken from a rich variety of theoretical sources, ethnographic accounts of historical eras, the analysis ranges across the cultural formations of ancient Greece, contemporary processes of Hawaiian cultural (...) identification and Congolese beauty cults. Throughout, the author examines the interdependency of world market and local cultural. (shrink)

Debates about cosmopolitanism in the spheres of political philosophy, sociology and postcolonial criticism have on the whole ignored specific histories of the cosmopolitan imagination and its vernacular expressions in everyday life. This article draws on aspects of the urban and often feminized worlds of entertainment, commerce, the arts and the emotions in metropolitan England during the first decades of the 20th century, in which an interest in abroad and cultural ‘others’ increasingly signalled an engagement with the new, in order to (...) argue for a notion of cosmopolitan modernity. This should be understood not just as a reflexive stance of openness, but also as a dialogic formation – a counterculture – part of a psychic and often gendered revolt against the conservatism and xenophobia of the parental culture. (shrink)

What can we learn about management ethics from other cultures and societies? In this textbook, cross-cultural management theory is applied and made relevant to management ethics. To help the reader understand different approaches that global businesses can take to operate successfully and ethically, there are chapters focusing on specific countries and regions. As well as giving the wider geographical, political and cultural contexts, the book includes numerous examples in every chapter to help the reader critique universal assumptions of what is (...) ethical. By taking a closer look at the way we view other cultures and their values, the author challenges us to rethink commonly held assumptions and approaches in cross-cultural management, and to apply a more critical approach. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:In 2010,Business Ethics Quarterlypublished ten articles that considered the potential contributions to business ethics research arising from recent scholarship in a variety of philosophical and social scientific fields (strategic management, political philosophy, restorative justice, international business, legal studies, ethical theory, ethical leadership studies, organization theory, marketing, and corporate governance and finance). Here we offer short responses to those articles by members ofBusiness Ethics Quarterly’s editorial board and editorial team.

This paper reviews and develops the ethical analysis of human resource management (HRM). Initially, the ethical perspective of HRM is differentiated from the "mainstrea" and critical perspectives of HRM. To date, the ethical analysis of HRM has taken one of two forms: the application Kantian and utilitarian ethical theories to the gestalt of HRM, and the application of theories of justice and fairness to specific HRM practices. This paper is concerned with the former, the ethical analysis of HRM in its (...) entirety. It shows that numerous theoretical shortcomings exist, least of which is the disregard of stakeholder theory. These deficiencies are explored and, as such, the analysis is advanced. It is argued that such ethical analysis is outside the scope of the modern corporation. A third way in which ethics may be applied to HRM is suggested. Ethical concerns are used as a basis to develop minimum standards against which HRM, in its various guises and practice, may be evaluated. Yet, even when judged by these standards, HRM is seriously lacking. This begs the question, not of whether HRM is ethical, but of whether HRM can be ethical. (shrink)

v. 1. Classical contributions to cosmopolitanism -- v. 2. Key contemporary analyses of cosmopolitanism -- v. 3. Cosmopolitans and cosmopolitanisms -- v. 4. Contested cosmopolitanisms.

ABSTRACT:In 2010,Business Ethics Quarterlypublished ten articles that considered the potential contributions to business ethics research arising from recent scholarship in a variety of philosophical and social scientific fields (strategic management, political philosophy, restorative justice, international business, legal studies, ethical theory, ethical leadership studies, organization theory, marketing, and corporate governance and finance). Here we offer short responses to those articles by members ofBusiness Ethics Quarterly’s editorial board and editorial team.

This article addresses the issue of future cosmopolitanism, building on a minimal reconstruction of what cosmopolitanism has been in the past. It will elucidate the notion of ‘political’ cosmopolitanism in its relation to a certain methodological option which is designated by the shorthand term ‘judgment’. Cosmopolitanism is not a new idea but a new version of it is constituted by ‘political’ cosmopolitanism, bound up with a judgmentbased, as opposed to principle-based, understanding of normativity.

Aesthetic cosmopolitanism is conceptualized here as a cultural condition in which late modern ethno-national cultural uniqueness is associated with contemporary cultural forms like film and pop-rock music, and as such it is produced from within the national framework. The social production of aesthetic cosmopolitanism is analyzed through elaborations on Bourdieu's field theory, as an outcome of the intersection of and interplay between global fields of art and fields of national culture. A sociological explanation for the emergence of aesthetic cosmopolitanism is (...) proposed. It focuses on claims by social sectors within national contexts for status and recognition of their own contemporary cultural uniqueness. (shrink)

Cosmopolitan conceptions of justice in global politics are gaining in importance in the field of international political theory. Cosmopolitanism claims that we owe duties of justice to all the persons of the world and thus that normative theories of global politics should focus first on the interests or welfare of persons rather than of states. Providing a thorough analysis of relevant literature and covering issues such as war and conflict, peace and human security, accountability for gross violations of human rights, (...) environmental degradation, and the democratic deficit in transnational political actions and institutions, Patrick Hayden deftly examines the connections between accounts of cosmopolitanism and the part they play in contemporary global politics. He identifies competing theories of cosmopolitanism and defends them as strategies for serving the aims of justice in world affairs. Furthermore, he explores how cosmopolitan theories can function positively in processes of shaping international norms. (shrink)

Interactions between corporations and nonprofits are on the rise, frequently driven by a corporate interest in establishing credentials for corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this article, we show how increasing demands for accountability directed at both businesses and NGOs can have the unintended effect of compromising the autonomy of nonprofits and fostering their co-optation. Greater scrutiny of NGO spending driven by self-appointed watchdogs of the nonprofit sector and a prevalence of strategic notions of CSR advanced by corporate actors weaken the (...) ability of civil society actors to change the business practices of their partners in the commercial sector. To counter this trend, we argue that corporations should embrace a political notion of CSR and should actively encourage NGOs to strengthen “downward accountability” mechanisms, even if this creates more tensions in corporate–NGO partnerships. Rather than seeing NGOs as tools in a competition for a comparative advantage in the market place, corporations should actively support NGO independence and critical capacity. (shrink)