Beyond risk management, toward ethics: Institutional und evolutionary perspectives

Abstract

The management of risk is important and it is clearly related to moral concerns in life. In this paper, however, I argue that considering risk in business ethics is necessary but not sufficient for addressing these moral concerns since ethics in general is not merely about avoiding harm, but also about “a good life”, and because business ethics in particular is not merely about avoiding “bad practices”, such as corruption and fraud, but also about reflections on “good business practices”. In this paper I will first elaborate on some general normative perspectives in business ethics and then, based on these reflections, suggest two complementary institutional measures for firms. It is argued that compliance approaches need to be supplemented with by so-called integrity approaches that not only bring the individual as (moral) actor back into play but also characterize more reflective institutional measures within the organization to foster corporate social responsibility.