{"title":"Moral Disjunction and Role Coadunation in Business and the Professions","authors":"Rita Mota, A. Morrison","doi":"10.1017/beq.2022.32","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"We consider the problem of moral disjunction in professional and business activities from a virtue-ethical perspective. Moral disjunction arises when the behavioral demands of a role conflict with personal morality; it is an important problem because most people in modern societies occupy several complex roles that can cause this clash to occur. We argue that moral disjunction, and the psychological mechanisms that people use to cope with it, are problematic because they make it hard to pursue virtue and to live with integrity. We present role coadunation as a process with epistemic and behavioral aspects that people can use to resolve moral disjunction with integrity. When role coadunation is successful, it enables people to live virtuous lives of appropriate narrative disunity and to honor their identity-conferring commitments. We show how role coadunation can be facilitated by interpretive communities and discuss the emergence and ideal features of those communities.","PeriodicalId":48031,"journal":{"name":"Business Ethics Quarterly","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4000,"publicationDate":"2023-01-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Business Ethics Quarterly","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1017/beq.2022.32","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"BUSINESS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
We consider the problem of moral disjunction in professional and business activities from a virtue-ethical perspective. Moral disjunction arises when the behavioral demands of a role conflict with personal morality; it is an important problem because most people in modern societies occupy several complex roles that can cause this clash to occur. We argue that moral disjunction, and the psychological mechanisms that people use to cope with it, are problematic because they make it hard to pursue virtue and to live with integrity. We present role coadunation as a process with epistemic and behavioral aspects that people can use to resolve moral disjunction with integrity. When role coadunation is successful, it enables people to live virtuous lives of appropriate narrative disunity and to honor their identity-conferring commitments. We show how role coadunation can be facilitated by interpretive communities and discuss the emergence and ideal features of those communities.
期刊介绍:
Business Ethics Quarterly (BEQ) is a peer-reviewed scholarly journal that publishes theoretical and empirical research relevant to the ethics of business. Since 1991 this multidisciplinary journal has published articles and reviews on a broad range of topics, including the internal ethics of business organizations, the role of business organizations in larger social, political and cultural frameworks, and the ethical quality of market-based societies and market-based relationships. It recognizes that contributions to the better understanding of business ethics can come from any quarter and therefore publishes scholarship rooted in the humanities, social sciences, and professional fields.