1 Moral Philosophy Closely Relates to Value Theory Which Can Be Understood Inside the Philosophical Area of Normative Ethical Theory

Notes 1 Moral philosophy closely relates to value theory which can be understood inside the philosophical area of normative ethical theory. This is of particular concern to consequentialists. In their understanding, value theory can be seen as being syn- onymous with axiology which is primarily concerned with classifying which things are good, and how good they are (Hartman 1967; Findlay 1970; Jones 1989:2; Koslowski 2002 & 2010). 2 In the context of this book management is not seen as the invented and dreamed- up version of affirmative textbook writers (cf. Alvesson & Willmott 1996:25; Klikauer 2007:90f. & 216f.) who more often than not are pure ‘Servants of Power’ (Baritz 1960; cf. Durkheim 1983:34). Instead, management is seen as outlined by Magretta (2002:7 & 196). In the following chapters all text that appears in italics is taken from her book if not otherwise referenced. The chapter is not designed as a negative view of management but as a realistic one as put forward by the former editor of the Harvard Business Review (HBR), Magretta, whose subsequent book truthfully divides the essential from the accidental (cf. Essentialism). There may be accidental articles in various journals and chapters in textbooks that contradict Magretta’s overview of management but her book does not rely on the occasional or accidental article but on the essence of ‘What Management Is’ (2002). Hence, this book seeks to represent her views as authentic as possible, even though some might argue that one cannot elaborate on the essence of management by relying on one single book. Firstly, the book relies predominantly on her work but also on a few other sources as well. Secondly, the HBR is, after all, the most widely read journal in management. Thirdly, the HBR and its editor strongly reflect mainstream views on management and with it the essence of management. Fourthly, Margretta’s book is not just ‘a book’ but combines years, if not decades, of experience in editing the HBR; and finally, there might be sources that contradict the HRB editor – even inside the HRB itself – but they, unlike Magretta (2002), do all too often constitute marginalised, accidental, isolated, etc. view- points that are not representative of mainstream management. 3 The former CEO of Standard Oil Company (Indiana) ‘called on big business col- leagues to run their business as they intended to and – for profit to stand up and fight, to talk about profits in terms of their central function, and to throw all sen- timents to the wolves’ (Levitt 1958:43; cf. Kothari 2010). In other words, the main game of management is profit-making just as Karl Marx (1844 & 1890) had outlined 100 years earlier. Managers should not bother with ethics – ‘throw all senti- ments to the wolves’ – just as Marx predicted. Marx would have agreed with Standard Oil’s CEO that management’s No. 1 goal is profits (cf. Baumhart 1961:19 & 163; Carr 1968:143; Hawken 1993:10; Alvesson & Willmott 1996:23; Kirkeby 2000:3; McCloskey 2006:2; Crowson 2009:106). ‘Mit entsprechendem Profit wird Kapital kühn. Zehn Prozent sicher, und man kann es überall anwenden; 20 Prozent, es wird lebhaft; 50 Prozent, positiv waghalsig; für 100 Prozent stampft es alle men- schlichen Gesetze unter seinen Fuß; 300 Prozent, und es existiert kein Verbrechen, das es nicht riskiert, selbst auf Gefahr des Galgens. Wenn Tumult und Streit Profit bringen, wird es sie beide encouragieren. Beweis: Schmuggel und Sklavenhandel.’ (P.J. Dunning, quoted in Karl Marx: ‘Das Kapital’ (1890), vol. 1, p. 801, Berlin: Dietz-Publisher, 225 226 Notes 1961); translation: ‘With adequate profit, capital is very bold. A certain 10% will ensure its employment anywhere; 20% certain will produce eagerness; 50%, positive audacity; 100% will make it ready to trample on all human laws; 300%, and there is not a crime at which it will scruple, nor a risk it will not run, even to the chance of its owner being hanged. If turbulence and strife will bring a profit, it will freely encourage both. Smuggling and the slave-trade have amply proved all that is here stated’ (cf. Hare’s What is Wrong with Slavery, 1979). The Harvard Business Review listed 939 articles on profit and 29 on morality between 1922 and 2009 which represents a 33:1 ratio and indicates the true state of morality as seen from a managerial perspective by the world’s foremost important management journal (cf. Cohen 1973; Chamberlain 1973:3; Clinard 1983:10 & 133; Sores 2002; Satre 2005). 4 For example, employees, staff, customers, suppliers, competitors, communities, trade unions, states, and even NGOs – Non-Governmental Organisations such as Amnesty International, Oxfam, Greenpeace, PETA, etc. (cf. Lucas 2003:20; Campbell & Kitson 2008:17; Friedman 2008). 5 Charles Darwin (1871:129) even argues that our ability to anticipate the more remote consequences of [our] action is contributed to the development of morality in human evolution. In other words, the better management anticipates consequences of [their] action, the more developed its morality is. This stands in sharp contrast to management’s reality of externalisation (Petit 1961:98; Fried- man 1970; Gintis 1976; Trevino 1986:603–4; Cornes & Sandler 1986; Alvesson & Willmott 1996; Mander 2001; Magretta 2002; Bakan 2004; Painter-Morland 2008; Archie 2009; Wicks 2010) and its focus on shareholder value i.e. profit maximisation. For Korten (1995:9), it is ‘making money for the rich at the expense of the life of society and the planet’. In the words of Levitt (1958:49) ‘business will have a much better chance of surviving if there is no nonsense about its goals – that is, if long-run profits maximisation is the one dominant objective in practice as well as in theory’. According to McCloskey’s Ethics for an Age of Commerce (2006:1) externalities have been part of management’s virtues, ‘the American bourgeois organised official and unofficial apartheids. It conspired against unions. It sup- ported the excesses of nationalism. It delighted in red bating and queer bashing’. From ‘The Servants of Power’ (Baritz 1960) this sounds rather different: ‘by providing jobs, investment capital, purchasing goods, and doing business every day, corporations have a profound and positive influence on society’ (Porter & Kramer 2006:91). The positive influence on society comes from investing. Unmentioned is that this is done in expectation of returns so that profits can be made. And finally, it is summed up as doing business. This leaves providing jobs as the only positive for society. And those jobs are, according to Porter’s only ideology, a cost- factor that needs to be reduced. In line with that, Drucker (1981:35) has argued that ‘business ethics might well be called “ethical chic” rather than ethics – and indeed might be considered more a media event than philosophy or morals’. This sentiment is echoed by an executive who complained ‘morality threatens to engulf us’ (Silk & Vogel 1976:229; cf. Powers & Vogel 1980:8). 6 Hence, a book on ethics – the philosophical study of morals – needs to be written in theory language rather than observation language. Theory language is abstract language. According to Marcuse (1966:138), ‘nobody really thinks who does not abstract from that which is given, who does not relate the facts to the factors which have made them, who does not – in his mind – undo the facts. Abstract- ness is the very life of thought, the token of its authenticity’. Observable science is often linked to a technical-scientific project that ‘tends to identify things and Notes 227 their function. As a habit of thought outside the scientific and technical language, such reasoning shapes the expression of a specific social and political behav- iourism. In this behavioural universe, words and concepts tend to coincide or rather the concept tends to be absorbed. The former has no other content that is designated by the word in published and standardised usage, and the word is expected to have no other response than the publicised and standardised behav- iour (reaction)’; cf. Feldman (1978); MacIntyre (1989); Singer (1994); Arrington (1998); Malachowski (2001); Calaco & Atterton (2003); Shaw (2003); Graham (2004); Campbell et al. (2005); Olen et al. (2005); Wiggins (2006); Driver (2007); LaFollette (2007); Shafer-Landau (2007); Shafer-Landau & Cueno (2007); Hinman (2008); Pogge & Horton (2008); Koslowski (2010); Muhr et al. (2010); Velasquez (2012:38–45). 7 Singer (1985:1); cf. www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1985. 8 Perhaps this is not so for management because management’s foremost existence is found in creating shareholder value i.e. profit maximisation, the bottom line, market shares, business growth, competition (cf. Kohn 1999:22; Kothari 2010), etc. Hence, standard textbooks on management rarely engage in moral philosophy, often not even at the level of pure tokenism. In Hegelian terms (cf. Klikauer 2010:88–125), the essence of management is shareholder value i.e. profit maximisation while the essence of humanity is morality. Hegel would say that shareholder value and profit maximisation are not essential to humans, they are accidental while for management, it is the other way around: shareholder value and profit maximisation are essential, not accidental. Koslowski (2002:54) quotes a shareholder, ‘I do not want management to use the capital I have entrusted to it to impose its notions of international morality on the world’. ROI (return of investment), not ethics or international morality counts. 9 If this is an acceptable definition of ethics, then the Journal of Business Ethics is a tautology because it is not concerned with the ‘philosophical’ study of morality (Collins 2000). Instead it is concerned with empirical studies, sur- veys, business improvement, and ethical codes etc.

Load more