Philos

I once went to a philosophy lecture, in which the speaker (I think it was Richard Hare) was arguing that business communities are 'ethically self regulating'. I am wondering whether this claim might be extended to capitalism as a whole?

Common_Cents

Companies have one goal and that is to turn a profit. They will only regulate and change internally if it affects the bottomline in a positive manner. One can't expect a profit driven company to look out for the greater good of anyone not because all CEO's and companies are evil but because that is not their nature nor can you run a business with any other nature. That is why a people ran government is required to regulate and protect the people in an idealistic world. You have the companies maximizing product, profit and production while the government protects the will, interests, and environment of the people. If the government and the business world function as to their natures then a peaceful coexistence of profit and progress with peace and prosperity for all can be reached. Which is why the corporate stranglehold on the Bush admin. has been so tragic.

NearNihil Experience

:rolling: :rolling:

That is a bit rough to back up.


Heres a web page with the man in question, but nothing about business being self-regulated ethically. It starts with this:

here

I think he's banking on the assertions I highlighted in the quote.
1. "ought" does not imply "can", let alone "willing"...
2. morals are universilizable, but the trick is to universalize your morals without contradricting them. But, morals, due to the fact that there are sooooo many people living from soooo many different exeriences, universalization of morals would be impossible on a large scale...especially without becoming superfascist or very, very heavy handed.



Well, the way I see it, capitalism is kind of at the heart of selling...heroin, cigarettes, weapons, cable news, animal tested products, human tested products,logs from extensive de-foresting,oil from excessive resource drilling, everything from plastic and paper and meat for excessive resource consumpition, places to hide crap in cities and towns with a high % of thier new-born's having illnesses and birth defects because of Dupont type Corps or nuclear waste storage, or military base accidents and activities...etc...

All of these have in common that they are harmful...(except maybe cable news, but its total crap anyway :Cheeky: )...


no way to argue against...some might say the benefits outweigh the unfortunate side effects of some of these capitalist activities.
It seems blatantly obvious to me that Capitalists in general can't reign in themselves, let alone each other...let alone, what we have above stands against the idea that Capitalism, even viewed as a mechanism of social necessity, a ghostly bureaucracy of paperwork and physical cooperation
can not mesh with a traditionally accepted ethic. Such as:
"Good of the many, before the few or one," or "Love yourself, but love God above all else."

Capitalism is about being "an economic system based on private ownership of capital.(dictionary.com)". It seems to be an-ethical. let alone self-regulating.
Not that capitalism is all bad, but a few bad apples........and there are alot of them.......

my not invested in capital two cents anyway

Tom Sawyer

On paper, capitalism is self-regulating. If a company is doing something unethical, consumers will not support that company and will take their business elsewhere, thus reducing the company's profit and expanding the profit of the company that operates ethically.

In real life, that isn't the case at all. Most people don't know much about what a company is doing, so if it operates unethically, most consumers won't know and it won't suffer as a result. When they are caught, they hire PR firms to obfusicate the issue and lawyers to shut people up, so consumers aren't too sure what's going on. If that doesn't work, they can just change their name and move to an office down the street, so consumers have difficulty associating them with the previous bad press.

Monopolies make the most profit of anyone, so the goal of every company is to monopolize their business. When you're only judged on the bottom line and not what you do to get to that bottom line, ethical considerations are mainly due to what you think you can get away with. When it's easy to get away with a lot, ethical considerations mainly go out the window.

Nice Squirrel

When your goal is profit. It can be easy to look beyond ethical concerns. There are many examples of businesses violating the law because to pay the fines are cheaper than to upgrade or to stop violating the law.

whichphilosophy

Can the Klu Klux Klan conduct an unbiased investigation into themselves about racist activity?

Most business people are hard working but there are some who are not. At the moment despite world wide government restictions, the huge monopolies continue to merge.

What is needed is more accountability of Corporate Directors and their control of funds. They just cant keep blaming their accountants.

True if a director creates 10,000 jobs, sure she/he deserves perks and lots, but good leaders do not spend lavishly (as this is a first sign of corruption).

y_feldblum

Would you care to explain how these are related?

y_feldblum

Care to explain why hiring people ought to be rewarded?

ZouPrime

Indeed. The goal isn't to create jobs, the goal is to create goods/services. More jobs doesn't mean healthier economy. See "Broken window fallacy"

ex-preacher

I thought the goal was to make a profit.

We don't need to speculate as to whether unregulated capitalism is intrinsically ethical. Just study U.S. history between 1875 and 1900.