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Study guide for Business Ethics in a Globalized World, 723G43/54
Welcome to Business Ethics in a Globalized World!
Daily, we are confronted by different ethical issues and dilemmas, for example in
the media and in different organizational settings. In this course we will explore
different aspects of such ethical issues and dilemmas.
After completion of the course you should be able to:
-account for and discuss critically key ethical theories in a historical and
global perspective
-account for and assess research on organizational and business ethics in a
historical and global perspective
-problematize and assess organizations’ ethical tools
-problematize and assess organizations’ engagement with social
responsibilites
-problematize and assess the consequences of unethical organizational
behavior on people, other organizations and society
-reflect upon the individual’s responsibility and possibility to act as an ethical
organizational member (Syllabus 723G43/54)
All information about the course including schedule, assessments and grading will
be provided on the learning platform Lisam. You will get access to Lisam once
you’ve registered on the course in the Student Portal. Problems regarding
registration should be sent to registreringsakuten@liu.se.
You can get notifications on new announcements by e-mail or SMS: Log into the
course and click on your name in the upper right corner. Choose My settings. Click
on My Alerts. Click on Add Alert. Fill in Announcements. Click Next. Choose
Delivery Method. Click OK. Questions regarding Lisam should be e-mailed to
helpdesk@student.liu.se.
Teaching Format
The teaching format consists of lectures and seminars. Besides business ethics you
will also get the opportunity to listen to lectures on referencing and plagiarism and
academic writing. Each week covers a specific theme:
Week 1 (Aug 17-21): Mapping the field (Introduction to business ethics and
ethical theories, seminar 1. Readings: Crane & Matten, chapters 1,3,4)
Week 2 (Aug 24-28): The organization and its stakeholders (A critical review of
stakeholder theory and corporate social responsibility; Deepwater Horizon: Safety
and environmental failures in the offshore oil industry, seminar 2. Readings
(intensive): Crane & Matten, chapter 2, Likic-Brboric, Slavnic, Woolfson 2015
(available on Lisam), chapters 6-11 (extensive)
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Week 3 (Aug 31-Sept 4): Tools and techniques of business ethics management
(seminar 3. Readings: Crane & Matten, chapter 5)
Week 4 (Sept 7-Sept 11): The Individual’s Role (Righting ethical wrongs: whistleblowing theory and practice, Managing ethical dilemmas in the workplace,
seminar 4. Readings: Articles in the Resource folder on Lisam)
Week 5 (Sept 14-Sept 18): Exam week. The whole week will be devoted to the
exam.
The seminars are mandatory and need preparations (see Assignments in this
document). You will work both individually and in teams. The teams will be
formed at the course introduction on August 17 and listed on Lisam in the
Collaborative workspace. If you cannot attend the course introduction, please fill
in your name in the team list.
To get the credits for seminar attendance, your presence must be registered.
Download the attendance form in the Course Document folder. This form should
be signed by the teacher at the seminar. The form should be handed in to the course
director before the course is over (September 18), either face-to-face or by email
(scanned). If you cannot attend a seminar notify your team and the teacher
responsible for the seminar as your absence might have consequences for the
seminar set-up. A compensatory assignment will be given to make up for any
absence. See the ”Oh no, I can’t attend the seminar-document” in the Course
Document folder. All compensatory assignments should be done by September
18.
These are the participating teachers and their roles (in order of appearance):
Dr. Åsa-Karin Engstrand, Senior Lecturer, Course Director, Division of Business
Administration (week 1, seminar 1, examining teacher home exam),
asa-karin.engstrand@liu.se
Dr. David Lawrence, Managing Editor, Linköping University Electronic Press,
LiU Library (week 1, Referencing and Plagiarism), david.lawrence@liu.se
Emile Farmer, Adjunct, Department of Culture and Communication, (week 1,
Academic Writing), emile.farmer@liu.se
Dr. Branka Likic-Brboric, Senior Lecturer, Institute for Research on Migration,
Ethnicity and Society, Department of Social and Welfare Studies (week 2, seminar
2), branka.likic-brboric@liu.se
Professor emeritus Charles Woolfson, Institute for Research on Migration,
Ethnicity and Society, Department of Social and Welfare Studies, (week 2,
seminar 2), charles.woolfson@liu.se
Licentiate Svjetlana Pantic Dragisic, PhD-candidate, Division of Business
Administration (week 3, seminar 3), svjetlana.pantic.dragisic@liu.se
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Dr. Alf Crossman, Senior Teaching Fellow in Industrial Relations and HRM,
Surrey Business School, University of Surrey, (week 4, seminar 4),
a.crossman@surrey.ac.uk
Dr. Lena Högberg, Senior Lecturer, Division of Business Administration
(examining teacher Reflection Journal), lena.hogberg@liu.se
Course Literature
The course book is Andrew Crane & Dirk Matten (2010) Business Ethics.
Managing Corporate Citizenship and Sustainability in the Age of Globalization
Oxford UP. It has been ordered to the Students’ Bookstore in the Kårallen building
on Campus Valla. It can also be bought online, e.g. on adlibris.com or
amazon.com.
Other literature in the forms of articles/chapters will be uploaded on Lisam in the
folder Course Documents---subfolder Resources.
Examination
To pass the course you need to:
-pass all four seminars/assignments (grading attendance) (2,5 credits)
-pass the Reflection Journal (grading Pass/Fail) (1 credit)
-pass the Home Exam (grading A-F) (4 credits)
The grade on the home exam will determine the grade on the whole course.
Assignments and seminars
Seminar 1. Mapping the Field: a Vernissage (with Åsa-Karin Engstrand)
The purpose with this assignment is for you to learn more about various research
topics within the field of business ethics and to communicate what you have
learned.
Individual preparations before the seminar: Your team has been asssigned a
specific theme. See document ”Themes per team” in the Course Document folder.
You should individually search for a scientific peer-reviewed article that covers
the specific theme. Search in the University Library’s catalogue or on Google
Scholar (log in with your LiU ID for full access to journals), for example in
Journal of Business Ethics, Business Ethics: A European Review, Business Ethics
Quarterly, Organization. You can also look for relevant articles cited in the course
book.
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Review the article by focusing on the main research findings, theoretical
framework/s and methodologies. Why did you choose the article? What are the
most interesting findings? What did you learn from reviewing it?
At the seminar/”vernissage”: At the seminar you will first discuss the chosen
articles in your team. Then you should design a poster in which you present the
key take-aways from your reviews. The poster will be put up on the wall in the
class room and you will take turns in presenting the poster for the vernissage’s
”visitors” as you should have time to look at the other teams’ posters as well.
Seminar 2. The People’s Court: Securing accountability for the Deepwater
Horizon Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico (with Charles Woolfson and Branka LikicBrboric)
This exercise in role play allows students, working in four teams of four or five
persons, to explore the various dimensions of the Deepwater Horizon disaster
from the point of view of securing accountability for the social and environmental
harms created by large corporations. The unique feature of the People’s Court is
that the voices of 1) the disaster victims and their families, and 2) the local
communities and environmental stakeholders are given a ‘courtroom’ hearing. We
shall also hear the evidence of 3) representatives of government whose duty it was
to provide appropriate oversight of the industry, in terms of the regulation of risk
taking and the enforcement of legislation, and we shall hear from 4) the chief
defendant, the spokesperson for the BP oil company.
Each student group will be involved in 1) researching and preparing one of their
team members to appear as a ‘defendant’, and 2) to prepare ‘cross-questioning’ of
another group ‘defendant’. While only one person is the defendant, all members
in the team are involved in preparing the case and in the cross-questioning. Each
defendant has 10 minutes to deliver their evidence. Cross-questioning will take
another 10 minutes. So, each trial session will last 20-25 minutes and, in total, the
whole Court hearing lasts one complete morning or afternoon. The jury
(comprising all the members of class will then collectively assess the strengths
and weaknesses of the arguments presented by each team. At the end of the trial
there should be a written summary of the evidence presented by the defendant.
The People’s Court concludes with a ‘judicial review’ and ‘sentencing’ delivered
by the course leader.
More information on the team set up etc. will be posted on Lisam.
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Seminar 3: Social accounting in action (with Svjetlana Pantic Dragisic)
The purpose with this assignment is for you to learn more about how organizations
manage business ethics in practice, and to communicate what you have learned.
The focus of this seminar will be on social accounting. In preparation for the
seminar you should individually select one organization that engages in social
accounting. The organization that you choose can operate in any industry and
country. After choosing an organization, answer these questions individually:
1. Why did you choose this organization?
2. Why does this organization engage in social accounting?
3. How would you assess the quality of the social accounting approach
utilized in this organization according to Zadek et al.’s (1997) criteria?
(see page 216 in the course book).
At the seminar you will first present the organization you have chosen, and the
answers to the questions above to your team members. Then you will discuss the
two following questions in your team:
1. What differences are evident between the organizations you have chosen?
2. To what extent can these differences be explained by industry or country
differences?
Finally, you will present your findings to the rest of the seminar group, and discuss
the main learning outcomes of this assignment.
Seminar 4. Moral DNA (with Alf Crossman)
Preparations: Visit http://www.moraldna.org and complete the online
questionnaire. The seminar will address the differences in outcomes and explore
whether organisation’s themselves can be ethical or whether it relies on the people
in them.
Reflection Journal (Lena Högberg)
During the course you will write a Reflection Journal (RJ). The purpose with the
journal is for you to reflect upon your learning process and to see how you have
engaged with the course content and assignments. It is advisable that you attend
as many lectures and seminars as you can, as these will give you input to your
journal. Although the deadline for the RJ is September 11 (5.30 pm) you should
write continuously during the course (for your own purpose). Upload the RJ in
Submissions on Lisam. Format: 3-4 pages, spacing 1,5, Times New Roman, 12
pt. These are the themes that should be covered in your journal:
1. Issues/ethical dilemmas that you find of importance to the topic studied
and your learning in relation to these (select 3 issues to discuss)
2. Working methods deployed in the course and their relevance to your
learning in relation to the studied topic and the issues previously selected
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3. Your general understanding of business ethics and the responsibilities of
organizations and their members – how it develops with and during the
course
4. Possible implications of the course work and content for future work
positions
Home Exam (Åsa-Karin Engstrand)
On September 11, the home exam will be published on Lisam. The deadline is
September 18 (5.30 pm). Further instructions on format and grading criteria will
be announced on the exam. The exam should be uploaded in Submissions on
Lisam. The exam will be corrected anonymously so do not state your name on the
exam. Exams not uploaded on time will not be corrected. Please notify the course
director if you experience any problems with uploading on time. If you get an F
or do not hand in your exam in September, there will be two other opportunities
(new exam question/s): October 23 (deadline October 30) and December 4
(deadline December 11).
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