3054-Chapter 2 Flashcards
What is ethics about?
Less about the one and only right thing to do but rather the better thing to do.
What is ethics?
It is the study and practice of decisions about what is good or right.
Business ethics is the application of ethics to the special problems and opportunities experienced by businesspeople. T/F
T
What is an ethical dilemma?
It is a problem about what a firm should do when there is no clear right decision.
What is the social responsibility of business?
It consists of the expectations that the community imposes on firms doing business inside its borders.
What are the requirements for commercial speech?
1) whether the expression is an advertisement 2) whether it refers to a specific product 3) whether the speaker has an economic motivation for speaking
What is the WPH process of ethical decision making?
W- Who (Stakeholders) P- Purpose (Values) H- How (Guidelines)
Who are stakeholders?
1) Owners or shareholders
2) Employees
3) Customers
4) Management
5) General Community
6) Future Generations
What are values?
They are positive abstractions that capture our sense of what is good or desirable.
What is the premise of the universalization test?
Consider what the world would be like if our decision were copied by everyone else.
What is ethical relativism?
It is a theory of ethics that denies the existence of objective moral standards. Instead individuals must evaluate actions on the basis of what they feel is best for themselves.
If morality is relative what is the conclusion?
That no one can criticize the behavior of another as immoral. It promotes tolerance.
What is situational ethics?
It requires evaluation of the morality of an action by imagining ourselves in the position of the person facing the ethical dilemma.
What is absolutism?
It requires the use of a set of rules to guide the ethical decision making process.
What is ethical fundamentalism?
Absolutism
What is the downfall of ethical relativism?
No judgements can be made about any behavior. Any behavior can be deemed ethical no matter how heinous if the perpetrator believed it was in their best interest
What is the downfall of situational ethics?
It does not tell us how to evaluate that person’s actions.
What is the downfall of absolutism?
There can be disagreement about which set of rules to follow. Unquestioning adherence to the rules may inappropriate in some circumstances like killing in self-defense.
What is consequentialism?
It is an approach to ethical dilemmas that require inquiry into the consequences to relevant people.
How does utilitarianism guide managers to take actions?
It urges managers to take actions that provide the greatest pleasure after having subtracted the pain or harm associated with the action in question.
What are the two branches of utilitarianism?
Act and rule
What is act utilitarianism?
It tells business managers to examine all the potential actions and choose the action that yields the greatest pleasure over pain.
What is rule utilitarianism?
Rule utilitarianism holds that general rules that on balance produce the greatest amount pleasure for all involved should be established and followed in each situation.
Deontology is an alternative theoretical approach to consequentialism. T/F
T
What is deontology?
It consists of acting on the basis of the recognition that certain actions are right or wrong regardless of their consequences.
The duties or obligations we owe one another as humans are much more ethically significant than are measurements of the impacts of business decisions
What is the categorical imperative?
An action is moral only if it would be consistent for everyone in society to act in the same way. (Kant)
What is the principle of rights?
It asserts that whether a business decision is ethical depends on how the decision affects the rights of all involved.
What is the downfall of deontology?
It is difficult to agree on which duties we owe to one another and which are more important when they conflict.
What is the downfall of consequentialism?
It is very difficult to measure consequences in terms of actual impact and to balance the few versus the many in any situation.
What virtues or positive character traits does virtue ethics encourage as a basis for morality?
courage
justice
truthfulness
What is the downfall of virtue ethics?
What is the “good life”?
What is the ethics of care?
Ethics of care holds that the right course of action is the option most consistent with the building and maintaining of human relationships.
What is the ethics-of-care theory?
That when a caregiver meets the needs of the cared-for, the caregiver is actually helping meet the needs of all the individuals who fall within the cared-for’s web of care
