Business Ethics

ASSIGNMENT
• 2-3 double-spaced pages. • Worth 12% of your final mark. • Use at least one source besides the slides/textbook. • Whatever format you use in other courses is fine. • This is an argumentative paper – You are not just describing something, but taking a stand with respect to an issue.
OBJECTIVES
1. To address an issue in business ethics. 2. To show that you understand why this issue generates moral controversy or disagreement. • You are able to articulate the reasoning or arguments on both sides. 3. You offer your own position on the matter and respond to the opposing side.
Example
• Paper is on the topic of whether corporations that receive assistance from governments in the form of tax breaks or financial assistance have an obligation to reciprocate that community for its assistance, or whether shareholder returns remains the only obligation of that corporation. • You want to argue that they do have an obligation to reciprocate. • Your Argument: 1. Corporations – like any person or organization – have an obligation to reciprocate favours (normative claim). 2. Government assistance accepted by a corporation is acceptance of a favour (factual claim). 3. Consequently, corporations that accept a favour take on a duty to a stakeholder.
CONTENTION
• The normative claim may be the contention. Someone like Friedman might argue that corporations do not have a duty to reciprocate and are different in this respect. • YOUR JOB: to defend the claim that corporations do have a duty to reciprocate. • WHY: It is otherwise committing a form of theft.