Paradigms in corporate ethics: the legality and values of corporate ethics

Abstract

Purpose

It has always been claimed that business ethics are ambiguous and thus hard to define. As such, with recognizable unethical corporate behaviors as an epidemic, it is hard to hold perpetrators accountable. Even more detrimental are the miscommunication, the misunderstanding, the misinterpretation, and the misuse of the various paradigms in business ethics. Such flawed values and legality of business ethics paradigms cannot persist. There exist a gap and a bridging in the analysis of the paradigms in business ethics between the practitioners and the ethicists. This paper aims to provide an elaborate analysis of the values, trust, and legality of corporate behaviors in business ethics utilizing various paradigms.

Design/methodology/approach

The analysis of this paper focused on the founding values and legality of business ethics and the underlying paradigms that practitioners and ethicists adopt.

Findings

The limitation of this study is that the probability of the diverse schools of thought intertwining is smaller than that their coexisting.

Originality/value

It is this coexistence of schools of thought that makes corporate USA humane, civilized, and balanced. Thus, to maintain this coexistence, if not improve it, this paper maintains that practitioners of higher education and corporate USA must take responsibility in training, educating, and producing future ethical business practitioners.

Citation

Tran, B. (2008), "Paradigms in corporate ethics: the legality and values of corporate ethics", Social Responsibility Journal, Vol. 4 No. 1/2, pp. 158-171. https://doi.org/10.1108/17471110810856929