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Steven Sampson

Steven Sampson

Professor emeritus

Steven Sampson

Business Ethics: A Double Bind

Author

  • Steven Sampson
  • Ghislaine Gallenga
  • Jérôme Soldani

Summary, in English

Introduction to special issue on Business Ethics, in the Journal of Business Anthropology. Today, business ethics can be found everywhere. But how can we define it intellectually? What does this concept include? How can we define it in explicitly anthropological terms? For the manager as well as the anthropologist, business ethics – in thoughts or in actions – involves dealing with opposing notions, often constructed as an opposition between efficiency versus ethics. As a matter of fact, an ethical approach can only grow out of a situation of double bind (Bateson 1972) in which a fine balance should be found between injunctions that are technically contradictory: being “good” according to one actor means being “bad” according to the other. This introduction to a set of papers sets out business ethics as an ethical practice that must be explored as part of moral anthropology.

Department/s

  • Social Anthropology

Publishing year

2016-05

Language

English

Pages

1-9

Publication/Series

Journal of Business Anthropology

Volume

10

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Journal of Business Anthropology

Topic

  • Social Anthropology

Keywords

  • business ethics
  • social anthropology
  • moral anthropology
  • ethics
  • business anthropology

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 2245-4217