Business research and teaching institutions play an important role in shaping the way businesses perceive their relations to the broader society and its moral expectations. Hence, as ethical scandals recently arose in the business world, questions related to the civic responsibilities of business scholars and to the role business schools play in society have gained wider interest. In this article, I argue that these ethical shortcomings are at least partly resulting from the mainstream business model with its taken-for granted basic (...) assumptions such as specialization or the value-neutrality of business research. Redefining the roles and civic responsibilities of business scholars for business practice implies therefore a thorough analysis of these assumptions if not their redefinition. The taken-for-grantedness of the mainstream business model is questioned by the transformation of the societal context in which business activities are embedded. Its value-neutrality in turn is challenged by self-fulfilling prophecy effects, which highlight the normative influence of business schools. In order to critically discuss some basic assumptions of mainstream business theory, I propose to draw parallels with the corporate citizenship concept and the stakeholder theory. Their integrated approach of the relation between business practice and the broader society provides interesting insights for the social reembedding of business research and teaching. (shrink)

Purpose Responsible research and innovation is taking a role in assisting all types of stakeholders, including industry members, in moving their research and innovation initiatives to tackle grand challenges. The literature on RRI, however, focuses little on how industry can implement RRI principles. To solve this gap, the purpose of this study is to construct a conceptual framework for managing and assessing RRI principles in the industry. Design/methodology/approach Qualitative research was used to build the RRI key performance indicator list; 30 (...) interviews were conducted to design a framework which was pilot tested in a company to identify how to align technology outcomes to the values, needs and expectations of the society. Findings This study depicts five successive RRI implementation levels and exhibits RRI key performance indicators. Drawing on extant models, this study develops RRI levels and indicators to discuss why industry should become engaged in RRI, how it can embed RRI principles into R&I processes and how RRI indicators can be managed systematically. Originality/value The connection between RRI key performance indicators and RRI levels determines how industry can integrate principles and methodologies of RRI into R&I processes. The model in the study shows how companies move from one RRI stage to another and this study aims to exhibit an ideal stage of RRI for industry. (shrink)

Recent years have heralded increasing attention to the role of multinational corporations in regard to human rights violations. The concept of complicity has been of particular interest in this regard. This article explores the conceptual differences between silent complicity in particular and other, more "conventional" forms of complicity. Despite their far-reaching normative implications, these differences are often overlooked.Rather than being connected to specific actions as is the case for other forms of complicity, the concept of silent complicity is tied to (...) the identity, or the moral stature of the accomplice. More specifically, it helps us expose multinational corporations in positions of political authority. Political authority breeds political responsibility.Thus, corporate responsibility in regard to human rights may go beyond "doing no harm" and include apositive obligation to protect. Making sense of this duty leads to a discussion of the scope and limits of legitimate human rights advocacy by corporations. (shrink)

In this article, I will argue that it is time to rethink and reconfigure some of the established assumptions underlying our conception of moral responsibility. Specifically, there is a mismatch between the individualism of our common sense morality and the imperative for collaborative responses to global problems in what I will call the “collective age.” This must have an impact also on the way we think about the responsibility of corporations. I will argue that most plausibly we ought to reframe (...) corporate responsibility as a conception of collaborative responsibility. Such a conception of collaborative responsibility is characterized by five key elements: first, it is based on the moral imperative for collaboration. Second, it shifts emphasis from commission to omission. Third, it is not only negative but also, and perhaps essentially, positive responsibility. Fourth, it is political responsibility. And finally, it is, most basically, human rights responsibility. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Increasingly, global businesses are confronted with the question of complicity in human rights violations committed by abusive host governments. This contribution specifically looks at silent complicity and the way it challenges conventional interpretations of corporate responsibility. Silent complicity implies that corporations have moral obligations that reach beyond the negative realm of doing no harm. Essentially, it implies that corporations have a moral responsibility to help protect human rights by putting pressure on perpetrating host governments involved in human rights abuses. This (...) is a controversial claim, which this contribution proposes to analyze with a view to understanding and determining the underlying conditions that need to be met in order for moral agents to be said to have such responsibilities in the category of the duty to protect human rights. (shrink)

Contemporary persons are daily confronted with enormous quantities of information, some of which reveal causal connections between their actions and harm that is visited upon distant others. Given their limited cognitive and information processing capacities, persons cannot reasonably be expected to respond to every cry for help or call to action, but neither can they defensibly refuse to hear and reflect upon any of them. Persons have a limited obligation to know, I argue, which requires that they inform themselves and (...) others about their role in harmful social practices, with a view toward challenging the norms that sustain such practices. In this paper, I explore this obligation to know, and the related idea of excusable ignorance, offering accounts of the epistemic burden that it entails for persons in their capacities as citizens and in the context of global climate change and of reproach as a potentially effective tool for rectifying rather than excusing ignorance. (shrink)

Cet article étudie la notion de « responsabilité politique » définie par Young pour répondre au problème des injustices mondiales. Il tente d’expliquer pourquoi l’auteure prend pour point de départ le modèle de la responsabilité individuelle, écartée dès le xix e siècle pour penser la solidarité sociale, et montre que la responsabilité « politique » chez Young aboutit paradoxalement à la disqualification de l’action publique.

I argue that there are some causal relata for which it is indeterminate whether one caused the other. Positing indeterminacy in causation helps us defend contested principles in the logic of causation and makes possible new ways of thinking about the theoretical impact of symmetric causal overdetermination. I close by discussing amendments of current theories of causation that would help explain causal indeterminacy.

I argue that there are some causal relata for which it is indeterminate whether one caused the other. Positing indeterminacy in causation helps us defend contested principles in the logic of causation and makes possible new ways of thinking about the theoretical impact of symmetric causal overdetermination. I close by discussing amendments of current theories of causation that would help explain causal indeterminacy.

I argue that there are some causal relata for which it is indeterminate whether one caused the other. Positing indeterminacy in causation helps us defend contested principles in the logic of causation and makes possible new ways of thinking about the theoretical impact of symmetric causal overdetermination. I close by discussing amendments of current theories of causation that would help explain causal indeterminacy.

Sweatshop labor is often cited as an example of the worst and most pervasive form of exploitation today, yet understanding what is meant by the charge has proven surprisingly difficult for philosophers. I develop an account of what I call “Needs Exploitation,” grounded in a specification of the duty of beneficence. In the case of sweatshop labor, I argue that employers face a duty to extend to employees a wage sufficient to meet their basic needs. This duty is limited by (...) the degree of the employees’ dependence on the employer for basic needs and a reasonability standard where the employer may remain within a range of well-being between deficiency and luxury. (shrink)

Addressing the critique that communication activities with regard to CSR are often merely instrumental marketing or public relation tools, this paper develops a toolbox of CSR communication that takes into account a deliberative notion. We derive this toolbox classification from the political approach of CSR that is based on Habermasian discourse ethics and show that it has a communicative core. Therefore, we embed CSR communication within political CSR theory and extend it by Habermasian communication theory, particularly the four validity claims (...) of communication. Given this communicative basis, we localize CSR communication as a main means to receive moral legitimacy within political CSR theory. A typology of CSR communication tools is advanced and substantiated by a review of case studies supporting the categories. Thus, we differentiate between instrumental and deliberative, as well as published and unpublished tools. Practical examples for the literature-derived tool categories are provided and their limitations are discussed. (shrink)

Political theories in general and deliberative democracy in particular have become quite popular in business ethics over the past few years. However, the model of deliberative democracy as generally referred to in business ethics is only appropriate for conceptualizing interaction between business and society which occurs within a context which is more or less institutionalized. The model cannot account for “unregulated” interaction between business and civil society. The authors argue that scholars need to resort to the so called “critical strand” (...) of deliberative democracy if we want to conceptualize interaction that happens without the involvement of decision-making institutions as political action in a deliberative sense. Adopting this approach allows us to identify cases in which unregulated interaction between business and civil society is preferable over institutionalization. (shrink)

This article assesses some of the implications of globalization for the scholarly debate on business ethics, CSR and related concepts. The argument is based, among other things, on the declining capacity of nation state institutions to regulate socially desirable corporate behavior as well as the growing corporate exposure to heterogeneous social, cultural and political values in societies globally. It is argued that these changes are shifting the corporate role towards a sphere of societal governance hitherto dominated by traditional political actors. (...) This leads to a discussion of the ambivalent results of such a process for a responsible corporate role in a globalized world. While assessing the current reception these changes have received in the management literature, the contributions of the four articles in this Special Issue are framed and evaluated. The argument closes by highlighting avenues of future research on this new challenge. (shrink)

This article assesses some of the implications of globalization for the scholarly debate on business ethics, CSR and related concepts. The argument is based, among other things, on the declining capacity of nation state institutions to regulate socially desirable corporate behavior as well as the growing corporate exposure to heterogeneous social, cultural and political values in societies globally. It is argued that these changes are shifting the corporate role towards a sphere of societal governance hitherto dominated by traditional political actors. (...) This leads to a discussion of the ambivalent results of such a process for a responsible corporate role in a globalized world. While assessing the current reception these changes have received in the management literature, the contributions of the four articles in this Special Issue are framed and evaluated. The argument closes by highlighting avenues of future research on this new challenge. (shrink)

Iris Marion Young articulated a social connection model of responsibility to conceptualize political responsibility for structural injustice. Schiff argues that actually confronting our responsibility is problematic: the pervasiveness of structural injustice makes it difficult to acknowledge as a problem, while distances between sufferers and contributors complicate our acknowledgment of social connection. These problems are exacerbated by thoughtlessness, bad faith, and misrecognition. Narrative can facilitate the acknowledgment necessary for us to confront our political responsibility.

Iris Marion Young articulated a social connection model of responsibility to conceptualize political responsibility for structural injustice. Schiff argues that actually confronting our responsibility is problematic: the pervasiveness of structural injustice makes it difficult to acknowledge as a problem, while distances between sufferers and contributors complicate our acknowledgment of social connection. These problems are exacerbated by thoughtlessness, bad faith, and misrecognition. Narrative can facilitate the acknowledgment necessary for us to confront our political responsibility.

Under conditions of growing interconnectedness of the global economy, more and more stakeholders are exposed to risks and costs resulting from business activities that are neither regulated nor compensated for by means of national governance. The changing distribution of risks poses a threat to the legitimacy of business firms that normally derive their legitimacy from operating in compliance with the legal rules of democratic nation states. However, during the process of globalization, the regulatory power of nation states has been weakened (...) and many production processes have been shifted to states with weak regulatory frameworks where businesses operate outside the reach of the democratic nation state. As a result, business firms have to address the various legitimacy challenges of their operations directly and cannot rely upon the legitimacy of their regulatory environment. These developments challenge the dominant approach to corporate governance that regards shareholders as the only stakeholder group in need of special protection due to risks not covered by contracts and legal regulations. On the basis of these considerations, we argue for a democratization of corporate governance structures in order to compensate for the governance deficits in their regulatory environment and to cope with the changing allocation of risks and costs. By way of democratic involvement of various stakeholders, business firms may be able to mitigate the redistribution of individual risk and address the resulting legitimacy deficits even when operating under conditions of regulatory gaps and governance failure. (shrink)

This commentary is part of a symposium on my book 'Getting Our Act Together: A Theory of Collective Moral Obligations' (Routledge, 2021). Here, I respond to the members of the North American Society for Social Philosophy’s 2022 Book Award Committee. I discuss whether most moral theory is individualistic, arguing that “traditional ethical theories” - meaning the traditions of Virtue Ethics, Kantian ethics as well as consequentialist ethics - certainly are. All of these focus on what individual agents ought to do (...) or how they ought to be. The commentators wonder whether any substantive moral theory can accommodate the idea of collective obligations? I suggest that one of my conditions for collective moral obligations is incompatible with objectivist versions of act-utilitarianism, which require moral agents to choose the option that actually maximises utility. Having said that, core elements of my account of collective moral obligations can be used with any substantive theory. Further, the theory—in its entirety—can be used with several substantive theories, including versions of all the major types of moral theory. How common are collective obligations? On my understanding, as fundamentally social thinkers, we are fairly flexible at switching between the we-mode and the I-mode, and will regularly respond to contextual cues for framing collective action scenarios. As such, I am not worried that there would be too few circumstances under which we have all-out collective obligations. What is more, we can generate such obligations by providing contextual cues for others that prompt them to frame situations as opportunities for joint action and to perform contributory actions. Another question raised by the commentators was if for having collective obligations it is crucial that we believe others will contribute? My answer is that such obligations do not necessarily depend on having positive evidence that concrete others are or will be contributing. Having said that, where we have positive evidence that others will not contribute and in particular where we know that their failure to contribute will unilaterally undermine the possibility of success of any collective action (as in strict joint necessity cases) this may undermine collective obligations. On my theory, what happens if people disagree on what is morally best? On my view, where such divergence between moral positions comes as a result of disagreement between morally motivated, reasonable, and well-informed people it undermines their collective obligation. Finally, are there “negative” collective duties? Yes, in fact collective harm cases can be conceived of as generating “negative” duties to collectively refrain from generating these kinds of harms, including our obligations to mitigate climate change through reducing greenhouse emissions. (shrink)

Building on an illustrative case of a systemic environmental threat and its multi‐stakeholder response, this paper draws attention to the changing political impacts of corporations in the digital age. Political Corporate Social Responsibility (PCSR) theory suggests an expanded sense of politics and corporations, including impacts that may range from voluntary initiatives to overcome governance gaps, to avoiding state regulation via corporate political activity. Considering digitalization as a stimulus, we explore potential responsibilities of corporations toward public goods in contexts with functioning (...) governments. We show that digitalization—in the form of transparency, surveillance, and data‐sharing—offers corporations’ scope for deliberative public participation. The starry sky beetle infestation endangering public and private goods is thereby used to illustrate the possibility of expanding the political role of corporations in the digital sphere. We offer a contribution by conceptualizing data‐deliberation as a Habermasian variation of PCSR, defined as the (a) voluntary disclosure of corporate data and its transparent, open sharing with the public sector (b) along with the cooperation with governmental institutions on data analytics methods for examining large‐scale datasets (c) thereby complying with existing national and international regulations on data protection, in particular with respect to privacy and personal data. (shrink)

Multinational enterprises dominate the governance of global value chains, such that according to the concept of political corporate social responsibility, they are responsible to address governance gaps throughout the chains, even at the level of their independent suppliers. In practice, MNEs often struggle to cope with the complexity of these governance gaps, and PCSR does not provide a clear definition nor offer guidance for how to analyze and address them. By adopting the notion of governance mechanisms from GVC literature, this (...) study proposes a more nuanced view, in which governance gaps result from inactive, ineffective, or inequitable governance mechanisms adopted by relevant actors, rather than a complete absence of governance. MNEs, through their governance mechanisms, commonly create governance gaps. This study distinguishes different types of governance mechanisms to create a typology of governance gaps, such that it contributes to the literature on PCSR by offering a more refined understanding of governance gaps, along with a means to identify mechanisms to address them. Furthermore, it contributes to the literature on GVCs by defining governance-related terms and adding an ethical perspective on MNEs’ global business conduct. To illustrate the typology, this article presents the case of low wages for workers in the textile industry and efforts by H&M to deal with this governance gap. (shrink)

Journal of Economic Methodology, Volume 19, Issue 2, Page 159-163, June 2012.

In this article, I argue that conventional reasoning on corporate social responsibility (CSR) is based on the assumption of a liberal market economy in the context of a nation state. I build on the study of Scherer and Palazzo (Acad Manage Rev 32(4):1096-1120, 2007), developing a number of criteria to identify elements of liberal philosophy in the ongoing CSR debate. I discuss their occurrence in the CSR literature in detail and reflect on the implications, taking into account the emerging political (...) reading of the firm. I conclude that the apolitical framework in the mainstream CSR literature has to be overcome since it does not reflect recent changes in the socio-economic conditions for economic actors in a globalizing world. (shrink)

Recent structural innovations in global commerce present difficult challenges for legacy understandings of responsibility. The rise of outsourcing, sub-contracting, and mobile app-based platforms have dramatically restructured relationships between and among economic actors. Though not entirely new, the remarkable rise in the prevalence of these “not-quite-arm’s-length” relationships present difficulties for conceptions of responsibility based on interrogating the past for specifiable actions by blameworthy actors. Iris Marion Young invites investigation of a “social connection model of responsibility” (SCMR) that is, in many ways, (...) better suited to this new commercial reality. Scholars working to understand corporate responsibility have invoked Young’s model to some good effect, though often superficially and uncritically. In this paper, we look closely at Young’s social connection model and its potential for helping us understand corporate responsibility in a radically networked world. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that there is a philosophical basis for the claim that states can be held responsible for structural injustices such as gender discrimination and violence—a claim that has been made in international human rights documents, but one that has not gained much normative force. To show this, I draw on and develop Iris Young's notion of “political responsibility.” The purpose of political responsibility is not to find fault or blame the state for a past wrong, but (...) to encourage the state to make things more just in the future. I argue that the state is able to take responsibility in this sense and can discharge the duty of political responsibility in a more systematic way than individuals can. Further, I show that taking political responsibility would entail changing how states think about their human rights obligations. Rather than focusing on cataloguing abuses, states would be required to work toward changing conditions so that human rights violations are less likely to occur in the future. Consequently, I show that it does make sense to say that the state can be held accountable for structural injustices that lead to women's human rights violations. (shrink)

Modern society is challenged by a loss of efficiency in national governance systems values, and lifestyles. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) discourse builds upon a conception of organizational legitimacy that does not appropriately reflect these changes. The problems arise from the a-political role of the corporation in the concepts of cognitive and pragmatic legitimacy, which are based on compliance to national law and on relatively homogeneous and stable societal expectations on the one hand and widely accepted rhetoric assuming that all members (...) of society benefit from capitalist production on the other. We therefore propose a fundamental shift to moral legitimacy, from an output and power oriented approach to an input related and discursive concept of legitimacy. This shift creates a new basis of legitimacy and involves organizations in processes of active justification vis-à-vis society rather than simply responding to the demands of powerful groups. We consider this a step towards the politicization of the corporation and attempt to re-embed the debate on corporate legitimacy into its broader context of political theory, while reflecting the recent turn from a liberal to a deliberative concept of democracy. (shrink)

Care theorists often think of care as involving “caring-about”—concern or attentiveness—and “caring-for”—acting to nurture, look after, or meet needs. One problem for any theory of care is the scope of our obligations to care in both of those senses; in particular, our capacities for “caring-about” often outrun our capacities for “caring-for.” Accounts of care as potentially global in scope may ascribe overwhelming obligations to moral agents; however, we are often tempted to avoid or ignore situations that may call for a (...) caring response. I suggest that some Kantian ideas may help to strike a reasonable balance. (shrink)

As a Western citizen, am I responsible for the serious injustices, such as sweatshop labour, characterising our global economy? Benjamin McKean’s terrific new book, Disorienting Neoliberalism: Global Justice and the Outer Limit of Freedom, shows why this is a misleading question – one that will not properly orient us in relation to the neoliberal economy. McKean argues that we need to recognise that we are unfree under unjust transnational economic institutions and thus we have a shared interest in resisting neoliberalism. (...) This means that we should become disposed to heed the calls for solidarity by others across the world whose freedom is also impaired by neoliberal institutions. McKean’s book offers a powerful and persuasive new account of global (in)justice and solidarity; it is an inspiring call to arms for egalitarian theorists. Although I will raise two friendly critical observations about McKean’s argument, I recognise that this book is a major contribution to international political theory and that it sets a superb example of how to combine scholarly rigour with what might be called activist theorising. (shrink)

As a Western citizen, am I responsible for the serious injustices, such as sweatshop labour, characterising our global economy? Benjamin McKean’s terrific new book, Disorienting Neoliberalism: Global Justice and the Outer Limit of Freedom, shows why this is a misleading question – one that will not properly orient us in relation to the neoliberal economy. McKean argues that we need to recognise that we are unfree under unjust transnational economic institutions and thus we have a shared interest in resisting neoliberalism. (...) This means that we should become disposed to heed the calls for solidarity by others across the world whose freedom is also impaired by neoliberal institutions. McKean’s book offers a powerful and persuasive new account of global (in)justice and solidarity; it is an inspiring call to arms for egalitarian theorists. Although I will raise two friendly critical observations about McKean’s argument, I recognise that this book is a major contribution to international political theory and that it sets a superb example of how to combine scholarly rigour with what might be called activist theorising. (shrink)

The idea of global justice faces a serious challenge. We live in one global society and many regional and local societies at the same time. The existing plurality of institutional as well as cultural levels of social connection leads to this general question: what is the right site for addressing different questions of justice? Some philosophers argue that the paramount place for thinking about justice is the global level, but other philosophers claim that questions of justice presuppose a certain institutional (...) structure. It is therefore only at the local level, preferentially in the form of sovereign states, where questions of justice arise. I want to argue that it is possible to understand some issues of justice as global in an irreducible way, while other issues are best addressed on a local level not only for pragmatic reasons, but also for reasons that have to do with the normative significance of local institutions, cultural connections and social identities. (shrink)

The current philosophical debate on just international trade has moved away from purely idealistic theorizing into the direction of non-ideal theory. At the same time most philosophical thought on just trade is still rather idealistic and the main argument of the paper is that some philosophical reasoning about international trade justice should be more realistic. The paper develops in three steps. In a first step I will give a short overview over normative questions that arise with respect to international trade. (...) I will then highlight a proposal brought forward by Leif Wenar, because he is aware of the realist challenge and tries to counter it. In a second step I will discuss why it is important to integrate a realist perspective into philosophical considerations of international trade justice. Trade agreements are embedded in political contexts that influence the normative perspective one should take on trade justice. This leads to the third part of the article, where I will explore how a realist approach can go along with more idealistic perspectives, which leads to a weakly realist perspective on trade justice. (shrink)

Business research and teaching institutions play an important role in shaping the way businesses perceive their relations to the broader society and its moral expectations. Hence, as ethical scandals recently arose in the business world, questions related to the civic responsibilities of business scholars and to the role business schools play in society have gained wider interest. In this article, I argue that these ethical shortcomings are at least partly resulting from the mainstream business model with its taken-for granted basic (...) assumptions such as specialization or the value-neutrality of business research. Redefining the roles and civic responsibilities of business scholars for business practice implies therefore a thorough analysis of these assumptions if not their redefinition. The takenforgrantedness of the mainstream business model is questioned by the transformation of the societal context in which business activities are embedded. Its value-neutrality in turn is challenged by self-fulfilling prophecy effects, which highlight the normative influence of business schools. In order to critically discuss some basic assumptions of mainstream business theory, I propose to draw parallels with the corporate citizenship concept and the stakeholder theory. Their integrated approach of the relation between business practice and the broader society provides interesting insights for the social reembedding of business research and teaching. (shrink)

The concept of “structural injustice” has a long intellectual lineage, but Iris Marion Young popularised the term in her late work in the 2000s. Young’s theory tapped into the zeitgeist of the time, providing a credible way of thinking about transnational and domestic injustices, illuminating the importance of political, economic and social structures in generating injustice, theorising the role of individuals in perpetuating structural injustice, and the responsibility of everyone to try to correct it. Young’s theory has inspired secondary and (...) novel research. In this paper, I outline the main topics in this recent literature: what structural injustice is, responsibility for structural injustice, acting on responsibility, avoiding responsibility, and historical injustice. I conclude by noting how the influence of structural injustice theory is spreading beyond the confines of political theory. Any field that is concerned with structural inequalities, disadvantage, or oppression, can utilize structural injustice theory. (shrink)

This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and authenticity by developing a framework that explains the characteristics of CSR activities that lead to a perception by stakeholders that a firm’s CSR efforts are genuine. Drawing on the authenticity literature, we identify two core dimensions of authenticity that impact stakeholder perceptions of CSR: distinctiveness and social connectedness. Distinctiveness captures the extent to which a firm’s CSR activities are aligned with their core mission, vision and values while social connectedness refers (...) to the degree to which an organization’s CSR efforts are embedded in a larger social context. We use this framework to explore the question ‘when are a firm’s CSR efforts most likely to be perceived as authentic by stakeholders?’ and find that both of these dimensions are necessary; social connectedness or distinctiveness alone are necessary but insufficient conditions for perceptions of authenticity to occur. A detailed exploration of authenticity, therefore, advances research in the CSR domain that may help mend the growing divide between business and society. (shrink)

This article considers two prominent, competing approaches to defining the scope of business responsibility for human rights. The first approach advocates extension of business responsibility beyond the boundaries of the enterprise to encompass broader ' spheres of influence'. The second approach advocates a business ' responsibility to respect* human rights (but not a ' positive* duty to protect, promote or fulfil rights).Building on a critical evaluation of these competing accounts of business responsibility, this article outlines a modified account, referred to (...) as a framework of ' spheres of responsibility*. On such an account, business responsibility for human rights outcomes is conceptualised not only in relation to direct ' harms' imposed by business, but also in relation to corporate influence over broader relationships and institutions that shape and constrain the substantive realisation of human rights. (shrink)

This article considers two prominent, competing approaches to defining the scope of business responsibility for human rights. The first approach advocates extension of business responsibility beyond the boundaries of the enterprise to encompass broader ‘spheres of influence’. The second approach advocates a business ‘responsibility to respect’ human rights. Building on a critical evaluation of these competing accounts of business responsibility, this article outlines a modified account, referred to as a framework of ‘spheres of responsibility’. On such an account, business responsibility (...) for human rights outcomes is conceptualised not only in relation to direct ‘harms’ imposed by business, but also in relation to corporate influence over broader relationships and institutions that shape and constrain the substantive realisation of human rights. (shrink)

In light of recent attempts to determine the political role and status of corporations I discuss the normative implications of considering multinational corporations (MNCs) as political actors. I posit that corporations do indeed have a new political role in a connected world, in particular with respect to matters of human rights, social and environmental justice. We thus find a growing need for ethical and political knowledge to inform and guide the emerging political co-responsibility of MNCs. I draw on the rich (...) literature in cosmopolitanism to seek such guidance and discuss some of the implications that a cosmopolitan perspective implies. (shrink)

As the world is getting increasingly connected and interdependent it becomes clear that the world’s most pressing public problems such as poverty or global warming call for cross-sector solutions. The paper discusses the idea of business leaders acting as agents of world benefit, taking an active co-responsibility in generating solutions to problems. It argues that we need responsible global leaders who are aware of the pressing problems in the world, care for the needs of others, aspire to make this world (...) a better place, and act in word and deed as global and responsible citizens. The argument is structured as follows: first, in highlighting some leadership challenges we discuss why it takes a responsible, global, and ultimately cosmopolitan mindset to enhance human values on a global scale. Second, we define more specifically responsible global leadership and the (potential) role of business leaders acting as agents of world benefit. Third, drawing on latest research on cosmopolitanism, we discuss the hallmarks of contemporary cosmopolitanism. Fourth, and concluding our argument, we propose key cosmopolitan business principles to help leaders build a more inclusive world. (shrink)

Many corporations are large, powerful, and wealthy. There are massive shortfalls of global justice, with hundreds of millions of people in the world living below the threshold of extreme poverty, and billions more living not far above that threshold. Where injustice and needs shortfalls must be remediated, we often look towards agents’ capabilities to determine who ought to bear the costs of rectifying the situation. The combination of these three claims grounds what I call a ‘linkage-based’ account of why corporations (...) have demanding positive duties to the global poor. In this paper, I put forward a distinctive linkage-based account of corporations’ positive duties centred on the idea of dependence and the importance of meeting agents’ core needs. In addition to outlining and defending this account, I will show that we can utilise its basic conceptual components to make headway on questions that have received insufficient attention in the business ethics literature; specifically, we can say something substantive about the weighting of needy agents’ competing claims to assistance, and about the limits to the demands that can be lodged against corporations on the basis of others' unmet needs. Having integrated considerations of duties' grounding, their comparative weight, and the limits of their demandingness into a single account of corporate positive duty, I conclude by discussing a challenge to attributing to corporations duties owed to the worst-off amongst the global poor. (shrink)

Business firms play an increasingly influential role in contemporary societies, which has led many scholars to return to the question of the democratisation of corporate governance. However, the possibility of democratic deliberation within firms has received only marginal attention in the current debate. This article fills this gap in the literature by making a normative case for democratic deliberation at the workplace and empirically assessing the deliberative capacity of self-organised teams within business firms. It is based on sixteen in-depth interviews (...) in six German firms which practice various forms of self-organised teamwork. The article argues that self-organised teamwork can create a space for authentic, inclusive, and consequential deliberation by suspending authoritarian control structures within business firms. Finally, the article proposes the consideration of firms not only as necessary parts of a larger deliberative system but also as deliberative systems in themselves. (shrink)

In this paper I attempt to clarify the nature of the vice of greed, focusing on what can be called “modest greed”. Agents who are modestly greedy do not long for material goods or wealth with intense desires. Rather, they have quite modest desires, but ones whose satisfaction they pursue excessively relative to other goods. Greed - including modest greed - emerges as a particularly troubling and problematic vice.