Papers

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘The Morality of Economic Man.’ European Business Review , 2004, pp. 449-454 Economic behavior is multifaceted and context-dependent. In the “I & We” paradigm developed by Amitai Etzioni, economic behavior is co-determined by utility calculations and moral considerations. Two major factors can explain the ethicality of economic behavior; namely, the moral character of the agents and the relative cost of ethical behavior. Economic agents are moral beings, but the ethical fabric of the economy determines which… Read More »The Morality of Economic Man

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Honesty versus Cooperation: A Reinterpretation of the Moral Behavior of Economics Students.’ American Journal of Economics & Sociology, 2003, vol.62, no. 4, pp. 707-712 A variety of empirical evidence suggests that economics students are less co-operative than students in other disciplines are. Anthony M. Yezer and his colleagues have recently provided a strong counter-example claiming that economics students behave in a more honest way than non-economics students do. Since honesty and co-operation are not the same… Read More »Honesty versus Cooperation: A Reinterpretation of the Moral Behavior of Economics Students

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Future of Capitalism.’ , in Ethics in the Economy – Handbook of Business Ethics, ed. Laszlo Zsolnai, Peter Lang, Oxford, Bern, Berlin, 2002. (This book may be available at: Amazon) The moral foundation of capitalism should be reconsidered. Modern capitalism is disembedded from the social and cultural norms of society. Reciprocity and social capital play vital roles in providing public goods in advanced market economies. The stakeholder relationship is a key in the functioning of business in… Read More »Future of Capitalism

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Transatlantic Business Ethics.’ Business Ethics: A European Review, 2002, vol.11, no. 1, pp. 97-105 The American and the European business cultures are considerably different and business ethics practiced on the two sides of the Atlantic reflects this difference. Since there is a lot of cooperation and merger between American and European companies the cross-fertilization of the American and European business and ethical values seems to be unavoidable. To meet the technological, ecological, and social requirements of the 21st century combining the best of European… Read More »Transatlantic Business Ethics

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Identity Management.’ European Business Forum, 2002, pp. 89-90 Based on his decades long consulting experience with big companies (Alcoa, Fidelity, Xerox, Korn/Ferry International, Maytag, etc.) Ackerman explores the laws of identity in business. In a nutshell, identity governs value, which produces wealth, which fuels identity. He breaks with the narrow interpretation of corporate identity (names, logotypes, and advertising tag lines) and provides a broad conception that puts identity at the heart of corporate functioning. Identity… Read More »Identity Management

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Plurality of Values in Environmental Decision Making.’ OCEES Research Papers, Mansfield College, University of Oxford, 2000 The paper tries to demonstrate that we can acknowledge the environment as a site of conflicting values and, at the same time, we can hold the strong comparability assumption in the form of weak commensurability that leads to algorithmic solution of complex and multifaceted environmental decision problems. Responsibility is at the heart of such an approach. Plurality of Values in Environmental Decision Making

Albert Bandura, Gian-Vittorio Caprara, & Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Corporate Transgressions through Moral Disengagement.’ Journal of Human Values , 2000, vol.6, no. 1, pp. 57-64 Corporate transgression is a well-known phenomenon in today’s business world. Some corporations are involved in violations of law and moral rules that produce organizational practices and products that take a toll on the public. Social cognitive theory of moral agency provides a conceptual framework for analyzing how otherwise pro-social managers adopt socially injurious corporate practices. This… Read More »Corporate Transgressions through Moral Disengagement

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Limited Wants – Unlimited Means.’ International Journal of Social Economics, 1999, vol.26, no. 5, pp. 832-833 Western Economic Man lives in a world of scarcity because his/her wants are unlimited. However, scarcity is not a natural state of affairs, it is socially constructed. The concept of Homo Oeconomicus does not adequately reflect the totality of economic experiences of mankind since humans lived as hunter-gatherers for about 99 % of our entire existence as a species. Hunter-gatherers… Read More »Limited Wants – Unlimited Means

P.J.M. Verschuren, & Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Norms, Goals, and Stakeholders in Program Evaluation.’ Human Systems Management , 1998, vol.17, no. 2, pp. 155-160 Evaluation research favours goal based evalu­ation. However, the achieve­ment of the stated goals of interventionists, problem solvers or program managers is not a sufficient condition for a good decision or a successful program implementation. The value of a program, an intervention or a decision is determined not only by the achievement of its stated goals but also… Read More »Norms, Goals, and Stakeholders in Program Evaluation

Laszlo Zsolnai ‘Rationality Choice and the Diversity of Choices.’ Journal of Socio-Economics, 1998, vol.27, no. 5, pp. 613-622 The rational choice model has been criticised both on normative and descriptive grounds. It is obvious that self-interest maximising is not a universal rather a specific pattern of human choice behaviour. In economic and political life a great variation in people’s choice behaviour can be found. Using a broader analytic framework than the standard rational choice modelling, a rich typology… Read More »Rationality Choice and the Diversity of Choices