Ethical awareness

Respond to one of the four following discussion questions with at least a paragraph for the answer. Steven F. Goldstone, chairman and CEO of RJR Nabisco (one of the four biggest U.S. cigarette manufacturers), said in a 1998 magazine interview, "I have no moral view of this business ... I viewed it as a legal business. You shouldn't be drawing a moral judgment about a business our country says is perfectly legal and is taxed like crazy by it." Think about Goldstone's statement in terms of ethical awareness. What might happen if he began thinking about his business in ethical, and not just legal, terms? 2. Evaluate yourself in terms of cognitive moral development, locus of control, ethical decision-making style, moral disengagement, and Machiavellianism. What does this evaluation tell you about your own ethical decision making? 3.Answer the question posed in Gioia's "Reflections": Is a person behaving unethically if the situation was not even construed in ethical terms—if there was no ethical awareness? 4. How do you feel about the use of cost–benefit analysis where human life is part of the cost calculation? Might the infusion of moral language have changed the decision makers' thinking? For example, what if decision makers had talked about their responsibility for killing 180 human beings? Finally, conclude your learning journal entry with at least two questions that you still have about the content of the chapter you read this week. These questions can be about something that you did not fully understand or they could be an area you are curious about and would like to know more about.      

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