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Entrepreneurial Ethics

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Ethicmentality - Ethics in Capitalist Economy, Business, and Society

Part of the book series: Issues in Business Ethics ((IBET,volume 45))

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Abstract

This chapter is concerned with three intersections between ethics and entrepreneurship. The first intersection is related to entrepreneurs’ specific responsibility which is increasingly influencing writings about entrepreneurship. This intersection is about ethical value creation and the values of the entrepreneurs. Important in this intersection is also the role of the entrepreneur vis-à-vis the capitalist. The distinction between the two acquires an ethical importance particularly with regard to how entrepreneurship could be seen as an activity that is perceived as being distinct from capitalist activity. The second and third intersections refer to the application of entrepreneurship to practices that aim to create innovation and social change at the personal level. The importance of these intersections lies in the type of change that the entrepreneurial process brings about consisting either in personal innovation or personal emancipation, which are processes of change captured in the notion of self-entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship has become a critical field for ethics. Through entrepreneurship it is now possible to have ethics focus on what people concretely do, and thus operate as a mentality rather than a distant theory.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Utilitarianism, also known as consequentialism, offers no help here. Utilitarianism is an ethical outlook that refers to making rational choices based on ideas of general welfare. The speculative element inherent in utilitarianism concerns what changes result in greater welfare. It sets in motion preferences of wants without, however, paying attention to the way preferences are going to be satisfied within set states of affairs. Because of its material priorities, utilitarianism has little support. Bernard Williams (1985) once spoke of the “vulgarity of utilitarianism” (p. 8).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Michela Betta

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  1. Michela Betta
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Betta, M. (2016). Entrepreneurial Ethics. In: Ethicmentality - Ethics in Capitalist Economy, Business, and Society. Issues in Business Ethics, vol 45. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-7590-8_8

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