Business and Ethics

Abstract

Business failures and scandals in recent years have produced a deepening sense of mistrust of corporate businesses and their leaders. Beginning from the 1960s, American corporations and the U.S. government have been addressing business ethics in various ways–compliance programs, ethics committees, codes of ethical conduct, value statements, social responsibility officers, and training programs. However, events of recent years have shown that all the efforts expended have not prevented companies from engaging in unethical practices. Several reasons have been suggested for the failures to control or reduce unethical behaviors. Given all these, this short article discusses the attempts taken to improve ethical behavior and presents several views about the outlook for business ethics in the 21st century.