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...concerns are not well founded. Next, we describe three major goals from the literature related to teaching ethics: enhancing ethical awareness and sensitivity, promoting moral development, and appreciation of and skill handling complex ethical decision making. Third, we consider the empirical evidence to date addressing these goals. Finally, we consider directions for future research and offer several testable research propositions.
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Business ethics education has become commonplace in a variety of forms. These include ethics courses, ethics components of traditional functional courses, and different types of service learning projects (e.g., AACSB, 2005; Weber & Glyptis, 2000; Weber & Sleeper, 2003) designed to promote behavioral, managerial and/or cognitive competence (Rossouw, 2002). Nonetheless, critics of business ethics education remain vocal. Business school stakeholders are often skeptical that ethics education can be efficacious as a component of student curriculum. Business ethicists, for example, have noted a common belief of MBA faculty that, since their students are adults, they are too mature to be taught ethics (Hindo, 2002). Other observers point to the many recent corporate scandals as evidence that business ethics cannot be taught (Berenbeim, 2002). A Business Week survey of over 2700 readers found that business people question the utility of business ethics education, and the majority of the respondents said that ethics education is better taught outside of the business school (Business Week Online, 2003). Thus, it is clear that stakeholder skepticism represents an obstacle to the acceptance, prioritization, and development of effective business ethics education.
This paper offers an initial attempt to respond to stakeholder concerns by addressing four key issues. First, we will note three common stakeholder concerns regarding the utility of teaching ethics in the business school. We argue that these concerns have little merit. While proper education cannot prevent any and all unethical behavior, it is a vital component of a complex system that determines whether a person or group will behave ethically or unethically. Next, we identify three important goals for ethics education from the literature that are particularly relevant for business school students. Third, we review empirical research addressing each goal. While we find great room for advancing the study of teaching business ethics, the review is clear--you can teach business ethics. Finally, we recognize that the existing literature, while promising, leaves many questions unanswered. Additional effort is required to clarify and communicate the goals of business ethics education and additional research is needed to determine how best to teach ethics in the business school. Consequently, we conclude with several thoughts for future work in this area and include several testable research propositions.
Common Stakeholder Concerns
It is often stated that you can't teach business ethics. While many reasons are given, three main explanations seem to capture this sentiment. Some believe that by the time students enroll in college-level business courses their values have already been formed, rendering ethics education a waste of time. Others have argued that business is best conducted as a self-interested venture, suggesting that ethics are not of prime importance in a business context. Finally, others point to the failure of ethics training programs provided by businesses to prevent their employees' unethical behavior. These themes, and others, have been discussed in the literature (e.g., Sims, 2002; Toffier, 2003; Velasquez, 1998; Wilkes, 1989). In each of these three areas of skepticism there is a kernel of truth as well as much misperception. Below, we briefly address each these concerns and explain why they are not as well founded as is commonly believed.
Values Are Formed Prior to Higher Education
The first issue may be the most common objection to ethics training in the business school. You cannot teach ethics to business students because their values have already been formed prior to entering college. We concede that a significant amount of moral development occurs before students attend college. Importantly, this does not preclude further moral development during the time spent in higher education. At least two lines of research support this contention.
First, research indicates that during the pre-college years, moral development continues. It is not clear on what basis one would expect this process to simply end because a student has entered college. Clearly, the moral development of minor children is influenced by their family experiences, religious training, educational experiences, and other influences. Research demonstrates that the moral development of high school aged students is significantly higher than the moral development of primary school aged students (DeHaan & Hanford, 1997; Rest, Narvaez, Thoma & Bebeau, 1999; Williams, Yanchar, Jensen & Lewis, 2003).
Second, research specifically addresses the moral development of students during college. King and Mayhew's (2002) review of the literature on moral development during college identified 29 studies that found college education was positively associated with moral development as measured by the Defining Issues Test (Rest, 1979). Only one study was identified that did not find an effect of education on moral development. Further longitudinal research has also found that college experiences promote moral development. Studies that have compared the moral development of freshmen to the moral development of seniors have shown a significant and positive effect for educational experiences (e.g., Abdolmohammadi & Reeves, 2000; Foster & LaForce, 1999; Shaver, 1985, 1987). Additional longitudinal studies indicate that even a couple of years of college experience produces higher moral development than no college experience, and that more college experience in general promotes greater moral development than less college experience. Statistical differences between these groups persist even after age is controlled (Rest, 1979; Rest & Thoma, 1985).
Clearly we are not the first to note the ongoing moral development individuals experience throughout adolescence and young adulthood. However, given the presence of detractors, the fact bears repeating.
Ethics Are Irrelevant in a Business Context
A second source of skepticism regarding the value of business ethics instruction concerns the capitalistic, market-based perspective which dominates business schools. Business is successful because it is driven by self-interest; ethics is simply not important or relevant in a business context. Self-interested profit maximization as a primary goal of business enterprises is widely accepted among academics and the population as a whole. For example, it has been suggested that greed is part of the genetic material of capitalism, and that altruistic economic models have failed (Thurow, 2001). Others suggest that shareholder wealth maximization is actually a moral justification for business behavior (Dobson, 1999).
We agree that this is one primary goal. Perhaps influenced by Milton Friedman, Adam Smith, and Gordon Gecko (who proclaimed that "greed is good" in the 1987 movie Wall Street), some professors and businesspeople believe that the actions of businesspeople should be guided solely by self-interests without any moral compass. What casual observers often fail to realize is that Friedman, Smith, and others believe that both self-interested behavior and ethical behavior are essential for societal wealth maximization.
Milton Friedman's (e.g., 1970) writings on the social responsibility of businesses were not intended to advocate unethical, selfish behavior in...
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