Compare and contrast Anglo-American, European and Asian approaches to the key questions of business ethics and assess critically their various merits.
Different nations and cultures have recently established research in the field of business ethics, as there is a rising awareness to the topic that profit is not the only goal to businesses. According to ENDERLE, it is business ethics that is established to “set barriers” and to “humanize business” (Enderle 1996). The United States where the first nation where studies of the field of business ethics could be observed in the early 70s. In the 80s, the topic arose in Europe as well as in Asia (Enderle 1996). Not only on the timeline are there differences between the ethics of the United States, Europe and Asia but also concerning the cultural heritage, the moral values and therefore the view on different topics and problems in the context of business ethics. VOGEL supports this by stating that business ethics “has not yet globalized” (Vogel Fall 1992). He also talks about “fundamental national differences” (Vogel Fall 1992). The different heritage and culture not only leads to different answers to certain questions in the context of business ethics but also to completely different approaches to the subjects. Different cultures have different focuses and actors concerning the ethics in enterprises. ENDERLE states, that Ethics are “deeply culture-bound” (Enderle 1996, p. 36). CHAN states that Ethics are strongly related “to a value system or religious belief“ (Chan et al. 01.08.2010, p. 40). In the following, different approaches shall be examined closer and shall be differentiated from each other. What is the impact of those different approaches at the world of business and what can be advantages of each approach?
The essay will not discuss practical solutions but different ways and viewpoints from which questions are approached and answers are evolved.
Before being able to compare different approaches to business