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Summary

Summary Business and Consumer Ethics

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Summary of the course Business and Consumer Ethics based on slides, notes and the book For Business Ethics. Passed in June

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  • May 27, 2022
  • 16
  • 2021/2022
  • Summary
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Introduction: What is (applied) ethics?
Normativity – Humanity – Individuality
o geworfenheift, jemeinigkeit (Heidegger), obligation/ethical demand of claim
 geworfenheit: being thrown into a world (we didn’t ask this)
 jemeinigkeit: mineness, each-their-own-ness: nobody can replace myself, everybody is
different
o ethics is about normativity; about what we ought to do (vs what is)
 freedom: boundaries to our freedom? if so, which, where? are we free?
 comparison to animals: are they unfree?
o humanity
 we, humans, are raising questions on our actions ( no reflexivity within animals)
 normativity: we are speaking about us humans  humanity
o individuality: speaking about humans  speaking about individuals

0.1 The threefold characteristics of the ethical demand
‘Demand:’ is there something that we are obligated to (not) do? Is there an ethical demand? Yes 
threefold  they refer to each other and make clear what we mean with ethical demand
Demand can not be relativistic because than we do what we want (~ relativism)
1. singular: ‘silent character’ of the demand
o what we do is not indifferent – reflections are always singular: first reflection is about what I should
do/what is expected of me
o we always refer to our situation first
o ~ jemeinigkeit: different reflections
o ‘silent’: we cannot share something in the demand with others, because we live our lives as
individuals
2. absolute: life is a gift
o always already there from the moment we are human, we are born ~ geworfenheit
o escaping ethical obligation = escaping life
o gift: het kado van leven is ons toegeworpen  geworfenheit
3. infinite: ‘life is lived forwards and understood backwards’
o ethical obligations do not end, they have an infinite characteristic

Disruptive nature of ethics: “A person can never be sure that he or she acted in the right manner. Our
uncertainty is our guilt”
o existential guilt: we never know if we acted right
Morals, morality, ethics
o morals = totality of rules of conduct, rules and norms of a community
o morality = reflection on morals; individual deliberate action
 fe eating meat
o ethics = systematic and critical reflection reflection on morals and morality
  religion: criticizing vs not criticizing
Twofold meaning of ‘ethos’
o éthos = belief from which someone does something
  morals
o èthos = reflexivity
  morality
Two forms of ethics
o non-normative ethics:



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,  descriptive ethics: a description of what morals are at stake in a group – is needed to be able
to reflect on
 meta-ethics: beyond or above the physical world
 fe why are there values, what do we do when we reflect,..
o normative (prescriptive) ethics
 transition from is  ought – prescription of what humans should do
 fundamental ethics: consequentialism, deontological ethics, virtue ethics
 applied ethics: bio-ethics, medical ethics, animal ethics, media ethics, business ethics,..

0.2 General remarks
Negatively framed: that what [ethics] can not and may not be
o no supermodel of ethics
o ethics is not a form of praxis
o ethics is no moral education: we only provide a method
o ethics cannot and may not bypass personal and contextual specificity (phronesis)
Positively stated: offering a theoretical, reasonable funding
o normative character: is  ought
o related to existing fields of morals
o presupposes individual responsibility and autonomy of the will
Relation with law: similarities but no reduction
o law = compulsory and enforceable
o legitimacy ≠ justice (mediation = jurisprudence)
o exception: moral laws are the opposite of laws, fe dictorial regimes  need to break the law




Chapter 1: Against Business ethics
A) Foreclosing philosophy
Foreclosure = something that is closed/finished before it should be
Problem with the way that business ethics do philosophy
o 20th century philosophy is actually clearly excluded from or misrepresented in business ethics
Solution:
1. rereading business ethics in the light of developments in contemporary thought
2. turning to sources that have been pretty much ignored in the development of business ethics
 go back to the basics of traditional ethical theory at first

B) Foreclosing society
Problem is individualism – ignorance of social context
o individualism in business ethics: corporate scandals or other wrongdoings are attributed to
the selfish character of individuals
Solution: stress that individual action always takes places in relation to social structures
o look at individual responsibility and social context
Sometimes we need to criticize the actions of individuals, but sometimes also social structures

C) Foreclosing ‘the ethical’
Problem: business ethics rests on a very narrow definition of what counts as ‘the ethical’
o by labeling certain things as ethical issues; other things are treated as if they do not involve
ethical questions  business ethic has treated many practices of contemporary organized
life as if they do not present ethical concerns


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