Chapter 5 International Business test 1

Ethical Dilemma

A situation where there is no ethically acceptable solution

Friedman Doctrine

Friedman's basic position is that "the social responsibility of business is to increase profits," so long as the company stays within the rules of law. He explicitly rejects the idea that businesses should undertake social expenditures beyond those mandated by the law and required for the efficient running of a business

Naive Immoralist

One who asserts that if a manager of a multi-national sees that firms from other nations are not following ethical norms in a host nation that manager should not either

Righteous Moralist

One who claims that a multinationals home country standards of ethics are the appropriate ones for companies to follow in foreign countries

Straw Men

Straw men approaches to business ethics are raised by business ethics scholars primarily to demonstrate that they offer inappropriate guidelines for ethical decision making in a multinational enterprise. These approaches can be characterized as the Friedman doctrine, cultural relativism, the righteous moralist, and the naive immoralist. All these approaches have some inherent value, but all are unsatisfactory in important ways

Cultural Relativism

The belief that ethics are culturally determined and that a firm should adopt the ethics in the culture of which they operate

Organizational Culture

The values and norms shared among an organizations employees

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)

U.S laws regulating behavior regarding the conduct of international business in the taking of bribes and other unethical actions

Business Ethics

are the accepted principles of right or wrong governing the conduct of businesspeople,

Ethical strategy

is a strategy, or course of action, that does not violate these accepted principles. (business Ethics principles)

Utilitarian approach to ethics

these hold that the moral worth of actions or practices is determined by their consequences