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Summary ethics lecture
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A summary of the prerecorded lectures of the ethics course
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Lecture 1Business science focuses on organizations
Organizations as agents – as they make decisions in the market or global economy, and their decisions have
consequences for other parties
Organizations as events – structured social environment where people work and affect each other through
their interactions
Both perspectives elicit fundamental ethical questions, e.g.:
If organizations are agents, their behavior can be evaluated on ethical grounds: which of their actions and
decisions are ethically justifiable
If organizations are environments (i.e. structured groups of agents), then how does the organizational
structure affect the behavior or the individual agents within the organization and outside the organization
from an ethical perspective?
Business science focuses on markets
Markets as environments in which organizations operate
Markets as coordination systems alternative to organizations
Both perspectives elicit fundamental ethical questions, e.g.:
If markets are environments in which organizations operate, how do organizations balance their need to be
competitive with their ethical standing? And how should markets be regulated in a way that makes it
possible for organizations to find a balance?
If markets are alternative to organizations, then in which ways this difference affects the form of evaluations
(including ethical evaluations) practices within and outside organizations?
Business science focuses on markets in society
The impact of markets on society
The impact of society on markets
Both perspectives elicit fundamental ethical questions, e.g.:
To which extent current societal values are affected (or should be affected) by “what is good for the
markets”?
To which extent should regulations on markets reflect societal values? – how much should we as a society
intervene and affect the organization, structure and operation of markets?
Ethical decision-making
The process of evaluating and choosing among alternatives in a way that is consistent with ethical principles.
This entails:
o Recognizing alternatives – what kind of options do you have?
o Recognizing stakeholders – who will be affected by our actions
o Recognizing consequences – how will stakeholders be affected by our actions
Decision-making processes are multi-dimensional
Hence, decisions involve clashes (conflicts) of legitimate rights or values or different principles and notions of
what is good
Core to ethical decision-making is the ability to balance clashing values
o Is it restricting someone’s freedom, is it infringing someone’s right, how can we contrast this loss
and gain?
o No clash of legitimate values no ethical problems!
Important to see what the important ethical values are
What ethical behavior is NOT
Not the same as acting according to one’s feelings/emotions/gut
Not the same as acting according to religious beliefs
o Religious beliefs do play a part in shaping of ethics, and ethics play a part in shaping religious beliefs,
but they are not the same
, Not the same as abiding by (following) the law – many systems of law around the world, just following the
law is not (un)ethically per se.
Not the same as following social conventions/culturally accepted norms
Not the same as acting on the basis of scientific knowledge
o To identify alternatives, stakeholders and consequences we need accurate knowledge and to analyze
the situation, but we cannot reduce ethics to this
Thus, although feelings, beliefs, legal and social norms, and true facts and evidence might provide valuable input to
consider, they are often not enough, and ethics cannot be reduced to any of these.
What is hard about ethical decision-making?
Is there an unquestionable basis on which we can ground our ethical principles?
Different answers:
Aristotle: do what brings you closer to virtue
Kant: do what respects human fundamental dignity and self-determination
Utilitarianism: do what provides the best and the least harm – about consequences
Rawls: do what is necessary to “share one another’s fate” – about position in society, fairness
Communitarianism: obligations to our communities – we have obligations to our communities
These general ethical principles might clash with each other when we try to apply them to concrete situations.
Lecture 2
Beginning of this journey
The word ethics is derived from the Greek word ἦθος (êthos) meaning character, custom or habit.
Today ethics can mean:
o a set of moral principles: a theory or system of moral values
o the discipline dealing with what is good and bad and with moral duty and obligation
In these lectures we will trace the history of ideas around moral values and the ethical theories they have
given rise to.
We will not follow the order of the book’s chapters but instead we will follow a chronological order.
History provides the dialogue of these ideas, their context and how they arose.
Aristotle (384-322 BC)
Greek philosopher, a scientist and a polymath
Student of Plato’s Academy in Athens
Tutor of Alexander the Great
Founder of the Lyceum in Athens
The Corpus Aristotelicum is what we are left
o Logic, physics, metaphysics, ethics & politics, rhetorics & poetics
“Quality is not an act, it is a habit”. “All virtue is summed up in dealing justly”. “He who is unable to live in society, or
who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god”.
“I have gained this from philosophy: that I do without being commanded what others do only from fear of the law.”
Ethics for Aristotle
Ethics is not a theoretical discipline
We are asking not because we want to satisfy our curiosity, but because by knowing we will be more capable
to reach our goals
Give answer to the practical question: How should men best live?
Give answer to questions such as: What is the highest good?
o What is the highest goal in life? What is the most important thing for a person to have in life?
And these questions are always connected with politics.
“Since political science employs the other sciences, and also lays down laws about what we should do and refrain
from, its end will include the ends of the others, and will therefore be the human good. For even if the good is the
same for an individual as for a city, that of the city is obviously a greater and morecomplete thing to obtain and
preserve. For while the good of an individual is a desirable thing, what is good for a people or for cities is a nobler and
more godlike thing. Our enquiry, then, is a kind of political science, since these are the ends it is aiming at.”
, The goal of political science is the human good
If the good for one man is desirable, the good for the citizens is far more noble and devine
The highest good
Eudaimonia is the highest good (eu = good, daimōn = spirit): Often translated as happiness, flourishing, well-
being, welfare.
Where does eudaimonia consist of? Aristotle: “Verbally there is a very general agreement; for both ordinary
men and wise men say that it is [eudaimonia], and identify living well and faring well with being happy; but
about what [eudaimonia] is they disagree, and the many do not give the same account as the wise.”
Disagreement: different people give different answers
What could eudaimonia consist of:
o Pleasure? No, because there are many other goods that have nothing to do with pleasure that would
enhance life
o Wealth? No, because wealth is something we want, not for itself, but to get some other thing –
wealth is a tool to obtain other things
o Honor? No, as it depends on who bestows it and not only on who receives it. Also, the highest good
should come from within and not be something that can be taken away
o Having virtue? No, it is not enough because you can have virtues but maybe my life is very inactive
Aristotle continues: “For the former think it is some plain and obvious thing like pleasure, wealth or honor.”
The highest good and the telos
According to Aristotle, the highest good:
o is self-sufficient: something that is enough for a good life (also why he rejects pleasure_
o is desirable for itself,
o is not desirable for the sake of some other good, and
o all other goods are desirable for its sake.
Hence, the highest good is the ultimate purpose, or end.
Telos: goal, end, purpose, function – everything exists to be able to provide something (everything has a purpose)
Teleological: relative to the purpose
Goodness resides in the fulfilment of one’s telos.
Logos as human telos
“Life seems to be common even to plants, but we are seeking what is peculiar to man. Let us exclude, therefore, the
life of nutrition and growth. Next there would be a life of perception, but it also seems to be common even to the
horse, the ox, and every animal. There remains, then, an active life of the element that has a rational principle.”
Logos: Speech, structured thought, reason, ratio
Addendum: Man as political animal
“[...] and man alone of the animals possesses speech. The mere voice, it is true, can indicate pain and pleasure, and
therefore is possessed by the other animals as well [...] but speech is designed to indicate the advantageous and the
harmful, and therefore also the right and the wrong; for it is the special property of man in distinction from the other
animals that he alone has perception of good and bad and right and wrong and the other moral qualities, and it is
partnership in these things that makes a household and a city-state.”
Arete and the eudaimon life
Arete: Excellence, virtue
"excellence displayed in the fulfillment of purpose or function (telos)”.
Notice that the basic meaning of “arete” is not an ethical one as “moral virtue”. Its meaning changes depending on
what it describes since everything has its own peculiar excellence; the arete of a man is different from the arete of a
horse.
The arete of the horse is to be good at running, at carrying its rider and at facing the enemy.
“[...] we state the function of man to be a certain kind of life, and this to be an activity or actions of the soul implying
a rational principle, and the function of a good man to be the good and noble performance of these, and if any action
is well performed when it is performed in accordance with the appropriate excellence: if this is the case, human good
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