Module Code 單元編號 GEC3041 Module Title 單元名稱 BUSINESS ETHICS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 商業倫理與社會公義 Module Synopsis 單元概要 In recent years, people have generally believed that business organizations – like human agents – are ethically accountable for what they do to society. The emergence of this awareness has contributed to a widespread demand for corporations and companies to modify their behavior: Their actions will no longer be justified merely on the grounds of its tendency to maximize profits for stockholders. They should also be justified to other stakeholders, who will include ordinary members of the community, people who will live in the future generations, other species in the natural environment, as well as the cheap labors in developing countries, etc. In this course, we will lay out the theoretical grounds of the debates in business ethics, and most important, connect students to the conflicts and dilemmas that emerge in Hong Kong when, e.g., valuable communities are demolished and destructed in the name of “social progress” and “development,” or when companies and franchised corporations charge the public a higher price for their products whenever it is legally unobjectionable to do so. In short, the students who have taken this course will obtain a broader horizon to investigate into the questions concerning the compatibility of profit and ethics in the present state of the world.