Transcript BEJ Summary File

Summary
William Sin BEJ 20 July 16
Milton Friedman: Responsibility of Business is
to Increase Profit
Being legal and being moral
Milton (Friedman) vs. Edward (Freeman)
• Milton (Friedman)
• Edward (Freeman)
• The only group that has
• Many groups have a
a moral claim on the
moral claim on the
corporation is the
corporation because the
people who own shares
corporation has the
of the stock (that is, the
potential to harm or
shareholders).
benefit them (call these
groups stakeholders).
Who are these stakeholders?
Morality and Reasons
Kant on Ends-in-themselves
• Kant’s Categorical Imperative
“Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own
person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an
end and never merely as a means to an end.”
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4:428
7
Rawls on Justice
Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is to
systems of thought.
A theory however elegant and
economical must be rejected or revised if it is untrue;
likewise laws and institutions no matter how efficient and
well-arranged must be reformed if they are unjust.
John Rawls
Mill on Justice
Justice remains the appropriate name for certain social utilities which
are vastly more important, and therefore more absolute and imperative,
than any others are as a class … ; and which, therefore, ought to be, as
well as naturally are, guarded by a sentiment not only different in degree,
but also in kind; distinguished from the milder feeling which attaches to
the mere idea of promoting human pleasure or convenience, at once by
the more definite nature of its commands, and by the sterner character
of its sanctions.
The market logic
• individuals are motivated by self-interest;
• the harder you work, the greater the rewards you will get;
• the freer the people are, the more rational they will be;
• market as the measure of truth;
• private enterprise as a model for the state as well as for individuals.
Integrations
• “Globalization is the inexorable integration of markets,
transportation systems, and communication systems to a degree
never witnessed before -- in a way that is enabling corporations,
countries, and individuals to reach around the world farther,
faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before...”
• Thomas Friedman, The World is Flat (2005)
What is an MNC
• A Multinational Corporation (MNC) is any business that owns and
controls production or service facilities in two or more countries.
• Examples include Starbuck, Apple, Sony, Microsoft, Nike, etc.
© He et al.
Sweatshops
Definition:
• A shop employing workers at low wages, for long hours, and under poor
conditions.
• Factory where workers do piecework for poor pay and are prevented from
forming unions; common in the clothing industry