Beginning with the premise that large corporations are legal entities but not members of the moral community, the paper examines how “corporate ethics codes” might facilitate ethical actions by employees. “Wide reflective equilibrium” is explored as a way of creating “corporate ethics...

In 1981, the noted psychologist Robert Coles lectured at the University of Southwestern Louisiana on Kenneth Toole's Pulitzer Prize winning book, A Confederacy of Dunces ( Coles, 1983 ). When asked about Dr. Coles’ interpretation of the book's central character, Ignatius J. Reilly, as a...

Taxonomies (e.g., classification schemes) are valuable in that they clarify and create conceptual and theoretical frameworks to integrate a large variety of research (Brinkmann, 2002; Crié, 2003). In addition, taxonomies draw attention to the importance of a subject and provide a framework for...

WorldCom has been in the headlines since 2002 because of the $11 billion fraud that it acknowledged at that time. In order to please Wall Street and investors, WorldCom's top executives inflated the firm's profits by misallocating expenses and making many false accounting entries. The reactions...

Robert L. Bunting (2005) , the newly installed chairman of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), recently remarked as follows:A great profession takes a long view. Its members inherit a legacy from the past, derive benefit from it, build on it and pass it on to the next...

Considerable discussion has taken place during the past 25 years or so regarding professional ethics ( Donaldson, 2000 ). While there has been some degree of disagreement surrounding “who counts” as a professional, there tends to be general agreement that law is a profession. The practice of...

From the very beginning of medical practice, physicians have enjoyed a degree of autonomy which exceeds that of almost any other profession. Although regulated by state medical boards, and limited by the threat of litigation, physicians are generally held in high esteem by society and allowed to...