Ethics Foundations Paper - Business Ethics Essay

Ethics Foundations Paper - Business Ethics - Essay Example Some engagements in business could be legal but then again not ethical. Ethical reasoning regarding business conventionally has been described by two essential approaches. One approach outlines ethical behaviour as a duty or formalism or deontology. Formalism is a duty-centred ethical principle that is frequently derived from moral values entrenched in religious foundations. For instance, the Ten Commandments create guidelines for moral deeds. Various faiths have their identifiable sources of publicized truth for example the Koran in the Muslim faith. Within the boundaries of their guidance, moral ethics are collective, unconditional and undisputable (Boucher and Kelly 158). When an act is forbidden by religious teachings that function as the basis of an individual’s moral or ethical principles, the act is regarded as unethical for that individual and must not be accepted, irrespective of the consequences. Ethical principles based on an impression of duty can also be exclusively consequential to moral values. John Rawls’ social contract theory gives a significant contemporary illustration of how formalism has prejudiced philosophy about business as well as subjective ethics. This theory apprehends itself with exactly how to build an unbiased society given the various variations in prosperity, awareness, and social status. Rawls proposes a humble first step in defining the ethical standards on which an unbiased society can be constructed (Rawls and Rawls). This can be accurately illustrated by ignoring factors like wealth, intellect, gender, strength, race, or social ranks. Rawls suggests two ethical ideologies which include: first, every person is eligible for assured equal basic rights, comprising of autonomy, own security, and freedom of association. Second, even if there may perhaps be inequalities (social and economic), these disparities must be built on anything an individual engages in, not on who