Deidre Mccloskey, the Bourgeois Virtues:

Deidre McCloskey, the Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006). [HB501 M55341 2006 -- Grad]

Elizabeth Anscombe, "Modern Moral Philosophy," Philosophy, vol. 33 (1958) [B1 p63 grad & ugli]

Rosalind Hursthouse, on Virtue Ethics [BJ 1521 H881 1999 Grad & Ugli]

MW Baron, Kantian Ethics Almost without Apology,

Roger Crisp (ed), How Should One Live [BJ1521 H831 1996) grad & ugli]

Thomas M. Scanlon, What We Owe to Each Other [BJ1411 S. 361-1998 ugli]

Scanlon, "Contractualism & Utilitarianism" in Utilitarianism and Beyond, Amartya Sen & Bernard Williams, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), pp. 103-28)

Paul J. Borowski, "Manager-Employee Relationships: Guided by Kant's Categorical Imperative or Dilbert's Business Principle," Journal of Business Ethics, vol. 17 no. 15, pp. 1623-32 [HF 5387 J67 grad]

Wallace, R. Jay. 2002. 'Scanlon's Contractualism'. Ethics, 112 (3): 429-470. [BJ1 E87]

Onora O'Neill, "Kant's Virtues" in How Should One Live: Essays on Virtues, Roger Crisp, ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), pp. 77-98.

Michael Slote, "Virtue Ethics, Utiliarianism, and Symmetry in How Should One Live, pp. 99-110

Kantian Ethics and Business Management

The managers of business enterprises could benefit greatly by applying the ethical ideas of Immanuel Kant because following those ideas can promote consistent managerial principles. By the same token, however, those ideas involve some risks for managers because they can lead to overly rigid and inflexible decision-making. Kant's ideas are relevant to business management but they have to be used carefully.

Kant's idea of inner and outer legislation. Inner legislation involves rules that cannot be enforced from outside, often because they involve principles that are unique to oneself or purely personal concerns. Outer legislation is socially imposed. (O'Neill 86-87)

Kant's fundamental principle of ethics was that each person should base his decisions about right and wrong on the answer to the question "would this be right if it were elevated to a general rule that all of humanity would follow" (McCloskey, 263). This principle is known as the "Categorical Imperative." Thus, he believed that duties must be derived from unchanging general principles, through a deductive process of pure reason. (McCloskey 264). Kant thought that the peculiar circumstances of human situations should not determine the right and wrong of moral judgments (McCloskey, 266).

If a manager followed Kant's ideas about how to distinguish right from wrong in the context of the workplace, his decisions would be consistent. Such a manager would formulate uniform policies for making decisions about how to operate the business or manage employees

The prevailing fault of Kantian ethics is to "impose on ethical life some immensely simple model,' such as contract, behind a veil of ignorance, rationality as European bourgeois men might define it, or utility, which seems so measurable." (McCloskey 269) (quoting Williams, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy (1985))

Aaron Feuerstien of Malden Mills kept workers on the payroll for months after a fire that destroyed the plant. He seems the opposite of the adversarial boss that so many employees have come to expect. (Borowski, 1623)

Friedman thought that the only moral imperative for business was the promotion of the interests of the corporation's stockholders. (Borowski, 1624).

Kant's ideas of the Categorical Imperative are a way to the combat the "us vs. them" principle exemplified in Scott Adams' "Dilbert" cartoon. (Borowski, 1626-30).

Actions must be directed towards the common good, not just toward the profit of the corporation. (1628).

"An ethical relationship between managers and employees is due to the fact respect should govern all human relationship. . . . there is nothing in a 'morally correct' relationship between managers and employees that goes against the company's desire to make a profit -- on the contrary, such a peaceable relationship can help to meet this desire." (1631).

The Malden Mills plant dramatically increased production after Feuerstein's benevolence. (1631).

Child Labor from the Perspective of Virtues Ethics & Kantian Ethics

Anscombe criticized the rule-based ethics associated with the ideas of J.S. Mill and Kant. She thought it made no sense to rely upon a rule-based ethics which commanded a particular course of action for any situation on the basis of universal principles applicable everywhere. According to Anscombe, modern culture had given up on the idea of a single, universal "lawgiver" who would prescribe a single set of rules for all of humanity. In the absence of a god-like lawgiver, ethical judgments could not be so universal and had to account for the findings of modern moral psychology.

Anscombe contended that ethical judgments should be made with reference to ideas about character, virtue, and the promotion of human flourishing. (cite).

Eudaimonist virtue ethics promotes the idea that virtues are those characteristics and impulses that contribute to human flourishing and social happiness. Those who adhere to a eudiamonist perspective believe that ethical judgments should be made by employing reason to determine the best way to serve virtues in a particular situation. (get cites)

Tim Scanlon argues that virtue ethics is dangerous because it is too easy to confuse self-interest with the objects of virtue. He contends that moral principles guide individual reason about ethical problems. (Wallace, 450-51). Individuals don't reason from their desires; they reason on the basis of the moral rules that they observe. (Id). Some individual, subjective desires, shape reason. (Wallace 434; Scanlon, What We Owe, 40-45). but, in general, moral reasons are not contingent upon subjective facts. (Wallace 434). Individuals want to develop reasons that will win the approval of others and that will not seem purely subjective. (Wallace 434). Individuals achieve social standing when they do the right thing, as defined by others. (Wallace 455)