Kantian Business Ethics

In this original collection of essays, a group of distinguished scholars critically examine the ethical dimensions of business using the Kantian themed business ethics of Norman E. Bowie as a jumping off point. The authors engage Bowie’s influential body of scholarship as well as contemporary themes in business, including topics such as: the normative foundations of capitalism; the applicability of Kantian ethics, virtue ethics, and pragmatism in normative business ethics; meaningful work; managerial ethics; the ethics of high leverage finance capitalism; business ethics and corporate social responsibility; and responsibility for the natural environment. The contributors to this volume include both scholars sympathetic to Bowie’s Kantian business ethics and scholars critical of that perspective.

As one of the foundational figures in the establishment and legitimization of the study of business ethics as a field of scholarship, Bowie casts a long shadow over the field. Over the last thirty years he has applied a distinctive, Kantian approach to the analysis of problems in business ethics and his work has had a substantial impact on a wide range of theory and scholarship in the field. Bowie argues in his work that economic value is not the only value that should inform managers, executives, and policy makers when making both business policy decisions and everyday management decisions. He utilizes a Kantian framework to support the position that additional values – such as human dignity and rational consistency – should inform business practice and influence managerial decision-making. He also shows that business practices that include these additional values are consistent with sound management theory and that such businesses can be financially successful.

This volume of scholarly essays will be of considerable interest to students and scholars working in business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and organization studies.