COMM1110

Frameworks for Ethical Decision Making

Dr Alex Bruce

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 COMM1110 EVIDENCE-BASED PROBLEM SOLVING

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10 11
Problems &
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evidence-
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problem and decision- fact Gathering hypothesising Week Identifying limited making communicate
solving disaggregation making effects the causes evidence decisions
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ASSESSMENTS

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This week:
Problem
Problem Solving Case studies
Solving
Framework and examples
Toolkit

• Merck Ivermectin and River

Blindness
Framework for
Ethical decision
• James Hardie Group
making
Last week to this week
Compare Last week This week
Bullet Proof Problem Define the problem Define the problem
Solving Framework steps Disaggregate Analyse
Tool kit Critical thinking Critical thinking
Information Ethical thinking
Statistical
What are we doing today?

1. Defining terms – ethics, rights and justice

2. Unpacking ethical thinking and frameworks – what are they
and how are they conceived?
3. Putting ethics into practice – the 7 – step process
 What are the facts? Why How might they be
does it have moral content? challenged? Any biases?
Who are the stakeholders?
1. Assess 2. Assumpt-
the ions & 3.
worldviews Principles,
situation Principles including
Duties and
Justice?
Stakeholder Rights? Care needs
7 Step Ethical Care needs?

Decision Making 5. 4. Options,

Character Outcomes and
factors? Consequences
What are the consequences
What virtues are relevant? of the options on key
What kind of person do I want to be? stakeholders?

Building on
COMM1110 and 6. Compre- 7. Justify
the Ethical hensive your
Thinking Tools Asssess- Decision
ment
What would be an ethical How to explain to those
decision? favouring a less ethical pathway?
T.W. 2022
Defining terms - ethics
Morality is concerned with the Ethics is concerned with the study
norms, values, and beliefs of morality and the application of
embedded in social processes which reason to elucidate specific rules
define right and wrong for an and principles that determine morally
individual or a community. acceptable courses of action. Ethical
theories are the codifications of
these rules and principles.

Source: Crane and Matten (2016: 8)

True or false?

If you obey the law, you’re being

ethical

Nowadays paying attention to ethics

is more important than ever

Businesses have to choose

between being ethical and making
money
Defining terms - business ethics

‘Business ethics can thus be understood as the study of the

ethical dimensions of the exchange of goods and services, and
of the entities that offer goods and services for exchange. This
includes related activities such as the production, distribution,
marketing, sale, and consumption of goods and services.’
Stanford encyclopaedia of philosophy
Defining terms – rights

Rights are entitlements (not) to

Human rights are norms that
perform certain actions, or (not)
aspire to protect all people
to be in certain states; or
everywhere from severe
entitlements that others (not)
political, legal, and social
perform certain actions or (not)
abuses.
be in certain states.
Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy
Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy
 Defining terms - justice

Justice
Justiceand
andImpartiality
Individual Claims
Justice
Justiceishas
thetoopposite of arbitrariness.
do with how It requires
individual people that where
are treated two his
(‘to each cases are
due’).
Thealike,
relevantly most they plausible candidate
should be treated for a core definition
in the same way. [of
justice] comes from the Institutes of Justinian, a
codification of Roman Law from the sixth century AD,
where justice is defined as ‘the constant and
Justice, Charity and Enforceable Obligation
perpetual
Justicewill to render to each his due’.
and Agency
Just treatment is something due to each person… justice is a
Justice requires an agent whose will alters the circumstances of its
matter of claims
Stanford that can be of
encyclopedia rightfully made against the agent
philosophy
objects. The agent might be an individual person, or it might be a
dispensing justice, whether a person or an institution like a
group of people, or an institution like a business firm or the state.
business firm or the state.

Justian I
Putting it together: a spectrum of ethics

Ethics as Ethics as
not harming doing good

Professional ethics Social development

(do no harm)

Adapted from Fisher, Lovell, and Valero-Silva (2012)

Putting it together: The Mectizan®
Donation Program

Ethics
Rights
Justice

See also https://www.merck.com/stories/mectizan/

Sightless Among Miracles outside WHO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland (Image: The Lancet)
 What are the facts? Why How might they be
does it have moral content? challenged? Any biases?
Who are the stakeholders?
1. Assess 2. Assumpt-
the ions & 3.
worldviews Principles,
situation Principles including
Duties and
Justice?
Stakeholder Rights? Care needs
7 Step Ethical Care needs?

Decision Making 5. 4. Options,

Character Outcomes and
factors? Consequences
What are the consequences
What virtues are relevant? of the options on key
What kind of person do I want to be? stakeholders?

Building on
COMM1110 and 6. Compre- 7. Justify
the Ethical hensive your
Thinking Tools Asssess- Decision
ment
What would be an ethical How to explain to those
decision? favouring a less ethical pathway?
T.W. 2022
Thought experiments

https://youtu.be/lDnO4nDA3kM
Unpacking ethical thinking and action
Taking action
Recognising the
to do the right
existence of an
thing
ethical issue

MORAL AWARENESS MORAL JUDGEMENT ETHICAL BEHAVIOUR

Involves: Involves: Involves:
• Moral imagination • Ethical reasoning • Reflective practice
• Empathic understanding • Normative philosophical • Influencing skills
• Recognition of mental frameworks • Consideration of others’
models, assumptions and • Moral maturity reasons and
biases rationalisations

Deciding
what’s right
Unpacking ethical thinking and action

How to assess whether something is right or wrong, good or

bad?
Unpacking ethical thinking and action

Ethical thinking implies an ability to:

• Think critically
• Recognise issues or practices that have moral content
• See beyond our own personal experience
• Address issues from all sides
• Consider the consequences of decisions, whether intended or unintended
• Evaluate the best arguments from each perspective
• Arrive at a conclusion based on a systematic analysis of these arguments
• Defend viewpoints; analyse new information or perspectives

Wilcox (2002) 18
Commonly used ethics frameworks
1. Consequences of Actions (consequentialism) –
includes Utilitarianism
2. Universal Principles or Duties (deontology) –
includes ideas of duties, rights, moral principles
also justice
3. Care Ethics – concrete relationships
4. Virtue Ethics – includes character, ‘good life’
 1. Consequentialism
Focus on the outcomes or consequences
when deciding what’s right or wrong:
• ‘What might the consequences of this
decision or action be?’
 Consider intended and unintended
consequences
 Consider a range of stakeholders
• Consequentialist frameworks are
common in business settings

Image: Depositphotos.com
 1. Utilitarianism

Thinking about utility and social costs and benefits.

• Seeks the greatest good (benefit) for the greatest number of
people.
 The best course of action is then one that brings about the best
outcome for most
 The end goal can justify the means to get there

Image: https://fallintowonderland.com/2014/04/08/the-greater-good/
How to define ‘good’?

What are some of the

taken-for-granted
understandings of ‘good’ in
business?

Whose ‘good’ is being

served?
1. Utilitarianism

Utilitarian frameworks have

uses and limitations.
• It’s useful to think about what
utilitarianism addresses and what’s
missing from its toolkit.
2. Universal principles and duties
(deontology)

• Greek word deon = duty

• Actions can be judged as right or wrong in themselves
(regardless of consequences)
• Examples include religious ethics; Kant’s ‘categorical
imperative’
• Notions of rights, overarching principles
2. Some universal principles

• People should be treated as ends in themselves (with intrinsic worth),

& never as instruments (or means to ends) - Kant
• Treat people as you would like to be treated yourself (‘Golden Rule’)
• Principles of non-maleficence (do no harm), justice, autonomy,
beneficence
• All people have rights that should be considered
Don’t need a consequentialist justification
2. What do we mean by rights?

Rights are specifications

Negative rights of important ways human beings
(or other species) are to be treated Positive rights
• Power over
• Natural vs legal rights • Power to
• Right to be free from certain
• Rights
typesare not withoutforms
of (illegitimate) limitsof(e.g., •‘free
Rightspeech’)
to claim the satisfaction
of human needs.
• Rights
powercan
overbe negative or positive
individuals.

26
2. Employee Rights & Duties

Rights
Right to freedom from discrimination Duties
Right to due process Duty to comply with labour contract
Right to healthy & safe working (performance, loyalty but note also
conditions whistleblowing)
Right to fair wages Duty to comply with the law
Right to privacy Duty to respect the employer’s
property
Right to collective bargaining &
association; right to withdraw labour
Crane et al. (2019)
27
 2. Justice
Types of Justice How do we evaluate
if something is fair?
Distributive justice: based on
the evaluation of social Benefits derived
General principles outcomes or results of a Equity in rewards
relationship
& specific rules, Procedural justice: based on Decision-making process
particularly relating the processes and activities
to fairness. that produce the outcome or Level of access, openness,
and participation
results
• ‘the constant and Interactional justice: based Accuracy of information
perpetual will to render on an evaluation of the
to each his due’. communication processes Truthfulness, respect,
used, and relative access to and courtesy in the
information process
2. Justice and John Rawls
2. Where does justice come from?

John do
“How Rawls: justiceaas
we develop fairness
theory as an
of justice
attempt
that is to sythesise
generally procedural
recognized and and
distributive justice approaches
accepted?”
“How do we develop a theory of justice that is
generally recognized and accepted?”

• Develop a Social Contract (the rules that govern the

society)
• … from behind a “veil of ignorance”
• … then discover who you are and your capabilities
2. Rawls’ two principles of justice as fairness
1. Equal basic rights and liberties
2. Inequality is ok only under two conditions:
• 2(a). Everyone must have opportunity
• 2(b). Any inequality must benefit the least well off
• Equality of treatment is preferable, except where
inequality is to everyone’s advantage
• Talent or luck may produce unequal distribution
• Not “just deserts” but “the outcome of the natural
lottery”
• Therefore: Redistribution 2(b) can be justified if
benefits the least well off and does not violate 1 or
2(a)
Let’s think about justice

If you had the veil

of ignorance…

What would fairness look

like? How would we create
a fairer society?
2. Deontology

Deontological frameworks
have uses and limitations.
• It’s useful to think about what
deontology addresses and what’s
missing from its toolkit.
 3. Care ethics
Main considerations are recognition
of, and responsiveness to, others’
well-being needs
• Instead of considering an abstract
or generalised ‘other’ in
approaching an issue (e.g.
justice)…
• …the ‘other’ is seen as concrete,
relational, and specific to a
particular context.
3. Care ethics
• Caring about - a recognition of another’s need,
which is a form of moral awareness
• Taking care of – acting when care is needed, An action is
entailing a sense of responsibility considered
• Care-giving – ensuring that care needs are met, right if it
meets the
entailing both empathy and competence
care needs
• Care-receiving – the interaction between the of another.
carer and the recipient, entailing responsiveness
and receptiveness with the aim of empowering and
emancipating others
3. Care ethics

Care ethics frameworks have

uses and limitations.
• It’s useful to think about what care
ethics addresses and what’s missing
from its toolkit.
4. Virtue ethics

Up until now, focus has been on our Virtue ethics is an

actions –which actions are right / ethical framework
wrong? based on the kind of
character traits
• Move now to idea of character
a person
• What sort of person should I be? demonstrates
• Endpoint (telos) is human through their
flourishing actions
Let’s think about justice

Think about
someone you
respect.

What virtues do they have?

4. Virtue ethics

All societies share a need to:

• Cooperate & live together
• Supply members with the necessities of life
• Communicate with one another
• Protect their members from harm
• Strive for human flourishing
4. Virtue ethics

• What kind of a person should I be?

• What makes a ‘good’ person?
• A ‘good’ business professional?
• Virtues are aspects of our character that we develop through
practice & commitment
• The viability of our political, economic & social systems
depends on the presence of certain virtues.
• What are they?
Some ideas of virtue
• Courage, Self-control, Generosity, Compassion, Gentleness,
Friendliness, Truthfulness (Aristotle)
• Integrity, Fairness, Respect, Trust, Empathy, Self-control
(Murphy)
• Faith, Hope, Charity, Prudence (Wisdom), Justice,
Temperance, Fortitude (Aquinas)
• Integrity, Constancy (MacIntyre)

41
 Justice is about one’s
capability to live a life
they have reason to
value, not simply how
many resources one
has access to.

Amartya Sen: Capability Approach

4. Virtue ethics

Virtue ethics frameworks

have uses and limitations.
• It’s useful to think about what virtue
ethics addresses and what’s missing
from its toolkit.
 What are the facts? Why How might they be
does it have moral content? challenged? Any biases?
Who are the stakeholders?
1. Assess 2. Assumpt-
the ions & 3.
worldviews Principles,
situation Principles including
Duties and
Justice?
Stakeholder Rights? Care needs
7 Step Ethical Care needs?

Decision Making 5. 4. Options,

Character Outcomes and
factors? Consequences
What are the consequences
What virtues are relevant? of the options on key
What kind of person do I want to be? stakeholders?

Building on
COMM1110 and 6. Compre- 7. Justify
the Ethical hensive your
Thinking Tools Asssess- Decision
ment
What would be an ethical How to explain to those
decision? favouring a less ethical pathway?
T.W. 2022
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 1: Assessing the situation
In the first step we assess the situation. You have used your moral imagination to identify
an ethical dilemma. Now take time to define the problem.
• Why does it have moral content?
• What are the facts?
• Who are the stakeholders (including employees and customers)? What might their
perspectives be? Think through some alternatives to the perspective that you prefer.
• What might be some lasting effects on key stakeholders?
• You need to conduct some initial analyses to find out what is really going on. Don’t jump
to conclusions/solutions at this stage.
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 2: Assumptions and worldviews
In the second step we reflect carefully on any assumptions, worldviews or biases
that we might Taking for granted in this case. This type of reflection is best done with
others.
• What are the assumptions that relate to this situation? Do they need to be considered
and challenged?
• Are there any biases in the way we are thinking about this issue?
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 3: Principles, duties and care needs
The third step brings us to the relevant principles, duties and relationships.
• Imagine yourself in a personal relationship with your stakeholders, especially those with
less power. How can we be receptive and responsive to their needs?
• What are the rights of our key stakeholders?
• How do we take into account their essential humanity and ensure they are not simply
used as means to an end?
• What, then, are our duties towards these stakeholders?
• Are any duties in conflict?
• How do we ensure truthfulness and integrity?
• How do we ensure fair processes and outcomes? How are justice needs addressed?
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 4: Process, Outcomes and Consequences?
In step 4, we move to some possible options and their consequences.
• What are our possible options?
• What are the consequences of these actions on key stakeholders?
• What would happen if this decision was made universal?
• How is the common good served?
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 5: Character factors
Now think about the overarching aim of human flourishing.
• What are the virtues that might apply to this situation?
• How does the decision relate to the kind of person I want to be?
• The kind of organisation we want to be?
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 6: Comprehensive assessment
It’s now time to weigh up all of the considerations you have just been working through.
• Do any factors warrant greater priority? Why?
• What is the fitting (best) position for this specific situation? Why?
Putting it together: the 7 – Step
Framework ethical toolkit
Step 7: Justify your decision
When you develop habits of ethical thinking, you become better able to justify your
decision.
• Is the decision feasible?
• Can you explain your decision?
• How might I respond to those who might be promoting a less-ethical pathway? (How to
counter their reasons and rationalisations?)
 What are the facts? Why How might they be
does it have moral content? challenged? Any biases?
Who are the stakeholders?
1. Assess 2. Assumpt-
the ions & 3.
worldviews Principles,
situation Principles including
Duties and
Justice?
Stakeholder Rights? Care needs
7 Step Ethical Care needs?

Decision Making 5. 4. Options,

Character Outcomes and
factors? Consequences
What are the consequences
What virtues are relevant? of the options on key
What kind of person do I want to be? stakeholders?

Building on
COMM1110 and 6. Compre- 7. Justify
the Ethical hensive your
Thinking Tools Asssess- Decision
ment
What would be an ethical How to explain to those
decision? favouring a less ethical pathway?
T.W. 2022
 Application of the 7 – Step Framework:
James Hardie

https://www.abc.net.au/
lateline/james-hardie-
wants-to-change-
compensation-
payments/5924008?jw
source=cl
 Application of the 7 – Step Framework:
James Hardie

Step 1: Assessing the situation

Step 2: Assumptions and worldviews
Step 3: Principles, duties and care needs
Step 4: Process, Outcomes and Consequences?
Step 5: Character factors
Step 6: Comprehensive assessment
Step 7: Justify your decision
Re-cap
• If we are faced with an ethical dilemma, we can make
a decision on the best course of action by applying
ethical frameworks such as:
• Utilitarianism
• Principles and Duties (deontology)
• Justice
• Care ethics
• Virtue ethics
• How we apply them will depend on the situation.
References and Further Reading
• Crane, A., Matten, D., Glozer, S., Spence, L. (2019), Business Ethics: Managing
corporate citizenship in an age of globalization, 5th Ed., Oxford University Press, Oxford.
• Fisher, C., Lovell, A., and Valero-Silva, N. (2014). Business Ethics and Values. Pearson
• Sutherland A. (2020) Study finds ethics can be taught – in finance, at least. The
Conversation. January 27, 2020
• Trevino, L. K., & Brown, M. E. (2004). Managing to be ethical: Debunking five business
ethics myths. Academy of management perspectives, 18(2), 69-81.
• Trevino, L. K., & Nelson, K. A. (2021). Managing business ethics: Straight talk about
how to do it right. John Wiley & Sons.
• Wilcox, T. (2002). Ethics, sustainability and strategy: A question of balance in human
resource management education. Business & Professional Ethics Journal, 21(2), 61-78.
Next week:
Compare This week Next week
Bullet Proof Problem Define the problem Disaggregate
Solving Framework steps Analyse Prioritize
Analyse
Tool kit Critical thinking Critical thinking
Ethical Information
Statistical
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