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When you're covering corporate scandals, executive compensation debates, or environmental controversies, you're not just reporting facts—you're analyzing how different people justify their decisions. Business ethics frameworks give you the vocabulary and conceptual tools to understand why a CEO defends layoffs as "necessary for shareholder value" while union leaders call the same decision "morally bankrupt." These frameworks show up constantly in earnings calls, regulatory hearings, and corporate press releases, often without being named explicitly.
As a business journalist, you're being tested on your ability to identify the ethical reasoning behind corporate actions, critique that reasoning fairly, and explain competing perspectives to your audience. The frameworks below fall into distinct categories: consequence-focused, rule-focused, character-focused, and relationship-focused approaches. Don't just memorize definitions—know which framework applies when a source makes a particular argument, and understand how to probe the assumptions behind their ethical stance.
These frameworks judge actions by their outcomes. The central question isn't "Was this the right thing to do?" but rather "Did this produce good results?" When sources defend decisions by pointing to data, projections, or aggregate benefits, they're typically reasoning from this tradition.
Compare: Utilitarianism vs. Ethical Egoism—both focus on outcomes, but utilitarianism aggregates everyone's welfare while ethical egoism prioritizes the individual actor's benefit. When a CEO claims layoffs "help everyone in the long run," probe whether they mean society broadly (utilitarian) or shareholders specifically (closer to egoism).
These frameworks focus on duties, rights, and principles rather than outcomes. An action can be wrong even if it produces good results—because it violates a fundamental rule or right. Listen for this reasoning when sources invoke "principles," "obligations," or "inalienable rights."
Compare: Deontological Ethics vs. Rights-Based Ethics—both emphasize rules over outcomes, but deontology focuses on universal duties (what we must do) while rights-based ethics focuses on protections (what cannot be done to us). In an FRQ on corporate surveillance, deontology asks "Is monitoring employees ever universally justifiable?" while rights-based ethics asks "Does monitoring violate workers' fundamental privacy rights?"
These frameworks shift focus from actions to actors—asking what kind of person or organization is making decisions, and how relationships shape ethical obligations. These perspectives often emerge in profiles, feature stories, and coverage of corporate culture.
Compare: Virtue Ethics vs. Care Ethics—both focus on the moral agent rather than isolated actions, but virtue ethics emphasizes individual character development while care ethics emphasizes relational responsibility. A CEO who personally mentors employees demonstrates virtue; a company that restructures to protect vulnerable workers demonstrates care.
These frameworks address the question of to whom businesses owe ethical obligations. They're particularly relevant for corporate governance stories and debates about the purpose of business itself.
Compare: Stakeholder Theory vs. CSR—stakeholder theory is a philosophical framework about who matters, while CSR describes what companies do to fulfill broader obligations. A company can claim CSR initiatives (donating to charity) without genuinely practicing stakeholder theory (ignoring worker concerns). Strong business reporting distinguishes between the two.
| Framework Category | Best Examples | Key Question Asked |
|---|---|---|
| Consequence-focused | Utilitarianism, Ethical Egoism | "What outcome does this produce?" |
| Rule-focused | Deontological Ethics, Rights-Based Ethics | "Does this violate a fundamental principle?" |
| Fairness-focused | Justice Theory | "Is this distributed equitably?" |
| Character-focused | Virtue Ethics | "What does this say about the actor?" |
| Relationship-focused | Care Ethics | "How does this affect human connections?" |
| Obligation-focused | Social Contract Theory, Stakeholder Theory | "To whom are obligations owed?" |
| Practice-focused | Corporate Social Responsibility | "What actions demonstrate responsibility?" |
A pharmaceutical company defends raising drug prices by arguing the revenue funds research that will save more lives in the future. Which framework are they invoking, and what counter-framework might critics use?
Compare and contrast how Stakeholder Theory and Shareholder Primacy (a form of ethical egoism applied to corporations) would evaluate a decision to close a profitable factory in a small town.
Which two frameworks both emphasize rules over outcomes, and how do they differ in what they prioritize?
A journalist is profiling a CEO known for personal integrity who nonetheless presides over a company with exploitative labor practices. Which framework best captures this tension, and why?
If a source argues that a company's environmental violations are acceptable because "everyone in the industry does it," which framework's assumptions are they implicitly rejecting, and which might they be (poorly) invoking?