A selection of six Harvard Business School cases, four Harvard Business Review articles, and three other articles make up the required module on Ethics in the MBA program at the Harvard Business School. The aim of this course module is to analyze the role ethical values play in making decisions on the corporate and individual level. The material is organized into nine sessions which move from discussions of the nature of ethics in the social and political environment to cases concerned with the corporate forces shaping individual decision making.



To many, the ethical aspects of management are both important and intractable. They are important because they pose fundamental questions abot the decision making of executive and the human impact of corporate power.

This module offers a set of cases and readings aimed at integrating ethical reflection with management decision making.

Several criteria have guided the selection and organization of these materials : topical relevance to the practicing manager, curricular relevance to management education, and conceptual relevance to applied ethics. Topically, they represent some of the most difficult management challenges of our time :

1. Corporate responsibility in the context of plant relocation decisions

2. The limits of economic and legal reasoning in connection with product-related environmental hazards

3. The challenges of ethical integrity in the context of international business operations, where values may differ across cultures

4. The potential conflict between management-incentive systems and ethical values

5. The importance of honesty and truthfulness in the implementation policy

6. Organizational pressures against personal integrity in middle management

7. The ethical dimensions of leadership



This module is not presented with an ethical "bottom line" in the normal sense of that phrase. It represents the opening, not the closing, of a dialogue. We hop, however that the process of actively discussing these cases and readings will advance the understanding of those who participat, energize deeper ethical inquiry in other courses, and ultimately lead to the fusion of administrative wisdom, economi realism, and moral integrity.



Contents :

Introduction

Introduction : Ethical values and Business Decision making

* The Poletown dilemma (9-389-017)

* The Poletown dilemma : the outcome (

* The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits

* Some avenues for ethical analysis in general management (383-007)

Ethics and the Corporation

* Allied Chemical Corporation (A)-- (379-137)

* Can a Corporation have a conscience ? (HBR Jan-Feb 82 #82104)

* Dow Corning Corporation A -- (9-385-018), B -- (9-389-178), C

* Trying Out one's new sword

Ethics and the individual

* H.J. Heinz Company : The administration of policy A-- (382-034), B-- (382-035), C, D

* Why "Good managers make bad ethical choices

* Protech Inc.

* Is Business bluffing ethical? (HBR Jan-Feb 68 #68102)

* The Parable of the Sadhu (HBR Sep-Oct 83 #83512)

* The Corporate climber has to find his heart

* Business ethics : the whistleblower

Ethics and leadership

* James Burke : a career in American Business A-- (9-389-177), B

* Dow Corning Corporation (B)