Ethics and Social Responsibility

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 481.

Ethics and Social Responsibility of Business

Think ahead

1. Do you think there is a difference between ‘social responsibility' and ‘ethics'? What is the purpose of business in your opinion? Give your reasons.

2. Match the following companies' principles with the type of social responsibility strategies:

1) Go with the flow. a) obstructive

2) It is not our responsibility. b) defensive

3) Build a better society. c) adaptive

4) We do our best. d) proactive

TEXT 8.1Scan the text and discuss the difference between ‘ethics', ‘business ethics', ‘social responsibility', ‘legal responsibility'.

Ethics is concerned with the code of values and principles that enables a person to choose between right and wrong. Ethics is about norms, values, rights and responsibilities, sharing, fairness, obligation and exchange.

The subject of business ethics, however, looks at more than the issue of behaving in a socially responsible manner. Business ethics focuses on a wide range of conduct by managers and employees. Moreover, the focus is on both the results and the means to achieve this result. For example, most people would feel that bribing a foreign official to obtain a contract is unethical.

It is important to differentiate between the concepts of legal and social responsibility. Legal responsibility deals with specific laws and regulations that dictate what an organization may and may not do. An organization that obeys all these laws and regulations is behaving in a legally responsible way, but it is not necessarily being socially responsible.

Social responsibility, in contrast to legal responsibility, involves a degree of voluntary response from the organization. This response is above and beyond what is specified by a law or regulatory agency.