This literature review systematically synthesizes studies that link consumer research to differences and similarities in virtue ethics between the East and the West, with a focus on early Chinese and ...ancient Greek virtue ethics. These two major traditions provide principles that guide consumer behavior and thus serve as a background to comparatively explain and evaluate the ethical nature of consumer behavior in the East and the West. The paper first covers Eastern and Western theoretical and normative approaches of virtue ethics in the field of consumer research. The subsequent systematic literature review then synthesizes empirical works in this field. Since only a few papers adopt a cross-cultural consumer research perspective, one of the main aims of this review is to encourage scholars to pursue both theoretical and empirical cross-cultural consumer research on virtue ethics. To this end, the paper closes by suggesting some fruitful directions for future research to stimulate this relatively under-researched area.
In the real world of practice, data-driven supply chains have gained huge popularity in recent years. This has led operations and supply management researchers to the focus on the role of advanced ...information and technology, including big data. Literature highlights that the use of big data can enhance business performance. Nonetheless, big data is analyzed by humans and a lack of virtue ethics could lead to disastrous consequences (erroneous decision-making can stem from bad data analysis resulting in not only huge business losses but also deterioration of relationships with suppliers and customers in the supply chain). To address the calls of previous researchers, this study utilizes the Ethical Theory of Organizing framework and Stakeholder theory to develop the theoretical model and further examine the relationships. The samples are drawn from the manufacturing industry. Hypothesis testing is executed through covariance-based structural equation modeling and finally, the conclusions are drawn. The findings of this work provide a more nuanced understanding of virtue ethics and big data implications, thereby answering the important questions of “why” and “how” data-driven green and lean practices increase the stakeholders' trust and enhance viable, sustainable, and digital supply chain performance.
•Lack of virtue ethics among the person analyzing the data could also lead to a man-made disaster.•The ethical risks related to big data analysts must be considered and taken into account in digital SCs.•Ethical behavior of big data analytics personnel aids virtue ethics to enhance data-driven lean and green practices.•Data-driven lean and green practices increase stakeholders' trust and the firm's reputation.•Stakeholders' trust and the firm's reputation are essential for viable, sustainable and digital SC performance.
Calls for an ethically aligned technology design have led companies to publish lists of value principles that their engineers should adhere to. However, it is questionable whether such lists can ...grasp a technology’s wide-ranging ethical implications. The bottom-up elicitation of values from the specific technology context avoids problems that predefined lists of values have but has been criticized for lacking an ethical foundation. In this empirical study, we explore how three grand ethical theories of Western philosophy—utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and deontology—can support the discovery of values. Based on three technologies, our results show that ethical perspectives can support IT professionals in identifying values that are not only context-specific but also cater to higher ethical principles (i.e., intrinsic values) and a broad spectrum of sustainability goals (e.g., economic, technical, individual). Each theory of ethics served a unique role in the identification of ethical issues and value potentials of a technology. However, results also suggest a focus on mainstream values and individual values while environmental issues were neglected. We conclude that theories of ethics encourage different perspectives on a specific technology and thus argue for a pluralist ethical basis for values in technology design.
There has been an impressive revival of virtue ethics as a rival to deontology and consequentialism in contemporary Western normative ethics. Correspondingly, many comparative philosophers have shown ...a great interest in finding virtue ethics potentials in other philosophical traditions in the world, the most impressive of which is Confucianism. While the result of such comparative studies is equally impressive, in almost all these studies, scholars tend to use a historical example of virtue ethics in the Western philosophical tradition, particularly the Aristotelian one, as the ideal type of virtue ethics, to measure historical examples of virtue ethics in other philosophical traditions. The result is thus conceivably skewed: however great these non-Western examples of virtue ethics are, they are perceived to be deficient in one way or another in comparison with the Aristotelian one. In this paper, I first construct an ideal type of virtue ethics in its contrast with ideal types of consequentialism and deontology: a normative ethics in which virtue is primary. I then use this ideal type of virtue ethics to measure Aristotle’s virtue ethics and Zhu Xi’s virtue ethics, both regarded as historical types of virtue ethics, concluding that Zhu Xi’s is closer to the ideal type of virtue ethics than Aristotle’s.
This editorial to the special issue addresses the often overlooked question of the ethical nature of social enterprises. The emerging social entrepreneurship literature has previously been dominated ...by enthusiasts who fail to critique the social enterprise, focusing instead on its distinction from economic entrepreneurship and potential in solving social problems. In this respect, we have found through the work presented herein that the relation between social entrepreneurship and ethics needs to be problematized. Further, we find that a range of conceptual lenses and methodological approaches is valuable as the social entrepreneurship field matures.
This volume addresses issues of moral pluralism and polarization by drawing attention to the transcendent character of the good. It probes the history of Christian theology and moral philosophy to ...investigate the value of this idea and then relates it to contemporary moral issues. The good is transcendent in that it goes beyond concrete goods, things, acts, or individual preferences. It functions as the pole of a compass that helps orient our moral life. This volume explores the critical tension between the transcendent good and its concrete embodiments in the world through concepts like conscience, natural and divine law, virtue, and grace. The chapters are divided into three parts. Part I discusses metaphysical issues like the realist nature and the unity of the good in relation to philosophical, naturalist, and theological approaches from Augustine to Iris Murdoch. The chapters in Part II explore issues about knowing the transcendent good and doing good, exemplified in the delicate balance between divine command and human virtuousness. Early Protestant theological views prove to be excellent interlocutors for this reflection. Finally, Part III focuses on how transcendence is at stake in two heavily debated moral issues of today: euthanasia and the family. The Transcendent Character of the Good will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in theological ethics, moral philosophy, and the history of ethics. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Organizations often involve collaboration such that when they function well, their members engage in purposive coordination and cooperation with others. Previous research has focused on the role of ...shared, organizational-level goals and supportive governance mechanisms in promoting collaboration. But this research has not adequately addressed the question of the role of moral legitimacy in sustaining commitment to organizational goals and in facilitating good governance. In this article, we identify novel ethical microfoundations of collaborative organizations, explaining the role of organizational ethics in supporting organization-level goals and good governance. We draw upon virtue ethics, adopting a practice perspective on joint production to explain how standards of professional excellence and the virtues function so as to sustain commitment to organizational goals within collaborative organizations. We also draw upon goal-framing theory to articulate the reciprocal and mutually supportive relationship between governance and virtue, where governance requires virtue to function well, and virtue is sustained by governance mechanisms.
Virtue is a normative concept that constitutes social and moral codes. The notion of virtue can be identified in both the West and the East. Since this concept was revived in academia in the 20th ...century after a long sinking into oblivion, contemporary professional researchers, but not the general public, may be familiar with this notion. We conducted a survey on the attitudes of educational specialists and the general public regarding the notion of virtue in Japan. Our study found that, in contrast to educational specialists, the general public were not so familiar with the notion; both had a positive image of virtue and a poor understanding of the Confucian notions of virtue; both retain Buddhist values under the term of virtue, but educational specialists tended to associate ancient Greek and Western elements with the notion of virtue. Educational specialists emphasized active, intellectual virtues, such as practical wisdom, whereas the general public emphasized passive, emotional virtues, such as gratitude. Our study showed that, the notion of virtue was understood in different ways between educational specialists and the general public in Japan. This finding has several social implications, such as academic integrity and educational policy.
PDF
