The Ethics of Organizational Ethics

Abstract

This Perspectives article reviews research on organizational ethics presented in a select group of articles from Organization Studies, each of which draws inspiration, directly or indirectly, from the ethical philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. This work is commended for how it has wrestled the locus of ethicality away from organizational authority and instead examined ethics in relation to the actions and interactions of those subject to that authority. Collectively, these articles articulate the ethics of organization as an affective, relational and embodied response to the needs of others. Such ethics motivates political engagement in resistance to oppression and domination meted out by organizational authority. Acknowledging the significance of this contribution, the article examines how the research is remiss for its latent humanism and the attendant risk of assuming that the actions of individual ethical subjects are morally superior to organized forms of ethics. The source of this ethical privileging of individual subjects comes from a failure to distinguish between the practice of ethics in organizations and the originary ethics of ethics. Following Levinas, the latter is understood as the passive and pre-subjective call to responsibility for the other with whom one is organized and that precedes any concrete proposal for an organizational ethics. By acknowledging the ethics of ethics, we see that affective, interpersonal ethics and more formally organized ethics can both be translations of the ethics of ethics, each being necessarily imperfect. The tension between authoritative and interpersonal forms of ethics in organizations is not a problem for ethics, but rather a condition of the possibility of organizational ethics itself.

Escaping transparent, asymmetrical and agentive accountability? Entrepreneurial accounts and researchers' countertransference

“…Therefore, our research encounter with entrepreneurs leads us to consider the ethics of the demand for accounts we make from others, whether personally or in the context of organisations. This issue concerns the (non-)relationship between a more authoritarian organisational ethics and a more affective, interpersonal and humanistic ethics (Rhodes, 2022). Possibly, it pertains to a more “intelligent” form of accountability (Roberts, 2009), where we realize that we do not transparently know the reasons for what we do and recognise the collective and contextual dimension to our agency.…”

Sociological contributions to the study of social innovation: A critical review

“…Scholarship on institutional work (Lawrence et al., 2010) likewise points to the importance of these actors. It suggests that the personalized care these workers provide may not bring about the type of large scale change desired by institutional entrepreneurs, but it may change institutions in less conspicuous ways by creating “provisional institutions” or temporary solutions that mitigate the suffering and indignities brought on by modern society's technical and bureaucratic structures (see also Rhodes, 2023; Rhodes & Pughes, 2018; Grant forthcoming).…”

Advancing Ethics within Public Administration

“…Organization is essential to ethics. The organizational ethics is necessary (Rhodes, 2022). Organizations support the role of management as a driver for effective and ethical performances of employees at work (Grigorescu et al, 2020).…”