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Normative Ethics:
Norms are sentences or concepts with practical, i.e. action-oriented
(rather than descriptive, explanatory, or expressive) import.
For any act, there are three things that might be thought to be morally
interesting: first, there is the agent, the person performing the act;
second, there is the act itself; third, there are the consequences of the
act. There are three types of normative ethical theory--virtue,
Virtue Ethics
This first normative ethical theory, virtue theory, concentrates on the
moral character of the agent. According to virtue theory, we ought to
possess certain character traits--courage, generosity, compassion,
etc.--and these ought to be manifest in our actions. We therefore ought
to act in ways that exhibit the virtues, even if that means doing what
might generally be seen as bad or bringing about undesirable
consequences.
Deontology
Normative theories of the second type, deontological theories,
concentrate on the act being performed. According to deontological
theories, certain types of act are intrinsically good or bad, i.e. good or
bad in themselves. These acts ought or ought not to be performed,
irrespective of the consequences.
Consequentialism
The third approach to normative ethics is consequentialism.
Consequentialist theories hold that we ought always to act in the way
that brings about the best consequences. It doesn’t matter what those
acts are; the end justifies the means. All that matters for ethics is
making the world a better place.
Application
The virtue theorist will be most interested in the bravery that the man
exhibits; this suggests that he has a good character.
The deontologist will be more interested in what the man did; he stood
up for someone in need of protection, and that kind of behaviour is
intrinsically good.
Descriptive Ethics
Applied Ethics
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Ethics and morality then translate into law with the intention of
creating a basis for encouraging people to opt for what is good or right
instead of merely relying upon every individual’s value judgments or
conscience. Ethics and morality also differ since ethics involves the
consideration of reasons underlying existing principles or values while
morality constitutes cognitive judgments of the individual regarding
right or wrong. This means that ethics consider principles in the
decision on right and wrong while morality is the result of the cognitive
processing of ethical principles. This further implies that the resulting
judgment may not necessarily be aligned to ethical values.
Our aspiration to be the world’s most loved and admired brand can
only be achieved by considering not just what we do but how we do it.
It requires us to strictly adhere to laws and regulations and to go
beyond this, by setting our goals much higher. We want to be the
leader in ethical business conduct.
The last two approaches are very important for us to develop a new
concept and term on business ethics. The approach which gives
priority to the ethical values is important, because the enterprises are
not a purpose; they are only a tool which we use to get benefits. If this
tool causes various damages on the ecosystem to get profit, then we
should revise our organizational goals, targets and activities. A
pragmatic approach is characterized with the importance of individual
conscience and discussion of alternative individual courses of actions.
Therefore, these two approaches define the new term business ethics
as an institutional concept. This concept includes both organizational
responsibility and individual duties as business managers, also covered
the ecosystem. We can name this concept as "environment oriented
business ethics" or "enterprise ethics".
Egoism vs Altruism
Egoism:
One ought to act in his or her own self interest
Ethical behavior is that which promotes one’s own self
interest
Does not mean should not obey laws - only do so if in self
interest
Ethical egoism contrasts with ethical altruism, which holds that moral
agents have an obligation to help and serve others.
Altruism:
Altruism means unselfish concern for the welfare of others;
selflessness.
Altruism (also called the ethic of altruism, moralistic altruism,
and ethical altruism) is an ethical doctrine that holds that individuals
have a moral obligation to help, serve, or benefit others, if necessary
at the sacrifice of self interest. Auguste Comte's version of altruism
calls for living for the sake of others. One who holds to either of these
ethics is known as an "altruist."
Entrepreneur:
An entrepreneur is an individual who accepts financial
risks and undertakes new financial ventures. The word
derives from the French "entre" (to enter) and "prendre"
(to take), and in a general sense applies to any person
starting a new project or trying a new opportunity.
founder, Steve Wozniak, left to pursue other interests, while the other,
Steve Jobs was ultimately fired and replaced with a CEO from a much
larger company. Note that many years later, Jobs returned to the helm.
Social Entrepreneurship:
synergies and benefits when business principles are unified with social
ventures.
Manager:
A person who manages, conducts, trains, directs, deals,
supervises, organizes and controls resources,
expenditures, an organization, an institution, a team, a
household, etc.
What are the roles and responsibilities of a managerial position?
1. Supervise and manage the overall performance of staff in
his department.
2. Analyzing, reporting, giving recommendations and
developing strategies on how to improve quality and
quantity .
3. Achieve business and organization goals, visions and
objectives .
4. Involved in employee selection, career development,
succession planning and periodic training
.
5. Working out compensations and rewards
.
6. Responsible for the growth and increase in the
organizations' finances and earnings.
The Japanese proved that firms can produce goods that were both high
quality and low cost.
There is proof from legal aid charities that nestle has been targeting
and profiting out of third world countries for over twenty years now. So
why did it only come to light in 2003? Personally, I think it was because
of media attention. It was widely covered by the daily mail and the
guardian.
The guardian published this quote:
“Nestle, in the first six months of this year, made a profit of 3.7bn
Swiss francs (£1.63bn), up 32% from a year ago.” (Mark Tran, 2005,
the guardian)
This was published on the 1st September 2005 just after nestle had
published their annual report showing that they were then making
more profit than ever before. So all in all, the top management for
nestle were doing an outstanding job (profit wise), the business was
successful. But by now they had over 20 countries with organizations
trying to boycott them.
Nestle claimed they had not done anything wrong. In a way they were
right (legally anyway), there WAS nothing wrong with their breast milk,
it was sterile, cheap, nutritious and it only had to be mixed with water.
It was being sold all over the world to healthy children in Britain and
America also. What was going wrong in the third world countries was
that the milk powder was being mixed with contaminated water. The
state of the contaminated water in Africa couldn’t be helped.
Finally the world health organization stepped in and said that although
pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers should be told of the
benefits of breastfeeding, they should also be given the option to use
powdered milk. Nestle also started to give mothers more information
about the social and financial opinions of using powdered milk.
They said that nestle had broken part of the 1981 health code of
breast milk substitutes by giving away free sample to encourage
They have now a section on their website all about the breast milk
issue and the main title is:
“Nestle: Committed to the encouragement of breastfeeding all
over the world”
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