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The Impossibility of the Separation Thesis: A Response to Joakim Sandberg

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Jared D. Harris  and
R. Edward Freeman
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Abstract

Distinguishing “business” concerns from “ethical” values is not only an unfruitful and meaningless task, it is also an impossible endeavor. Nevertheless, fruitless attempts to separate facts from values produce detrimental second-order effects, both for theory and practice, and should therefore be abandoned. We highlight examples of exemplary research that integrate economic and moral considerations, and point the way to a business ethics discipline that breaks new ground by putting ideas and narratives about business together with ideas and narratives about ethics.

Information

Type
Dialogue: Commentators and Author
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 18 , Issue 4 , October 2008 , pp. 541 - 548
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 2008

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