Business Ethics And Globalization Essay

Business Ethics and Globalization

In recent years many policy makers, business executives, and economists have argued for the necessity of global business in promoting economic development and reducing world poverty. "Multinational corporations, the world trade organization, the G8 summit and various international financial institutions are supposed to advance free trade and promote economic development for the people of various participating countries, including those who are less developed" (Ho, 2004)

In a number of different ways the increased globalization of the economies of the United States, Western Europe, and Japan is making business practices more uniform. The structure and organization of firms, manufacturing technologies, the social

During the last decade, highly publicized incidents of misconduct on the part of business managers have occurred in virtually every major industrial economy of the world, as well as nearly every industrial nation in the world.

Globalization will continue to be a challenge to business ethics because globalization reduces the amount of discretion that both individuals and business organizations have in making business decisions. Globalization also brings increased competition which means organizations must rapidly deploy products while also working to keep costs as low as possible. This will require businesses to focus more on profitability than anything else.

As globalization has increased there has been a growing ethics gap between the United States and the rest of the developed world. The United States conducts more research both academically and in an organizational setting than any other country in the world. Also the ethics gap has not decreased in the wake of globalization, rather it has only grown

An example of a law passed because of businesses ethical failures is the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. This act which was created in 2002 covers the responsibilities that an organization’s board of directors has as well as the reporting requirements they have, and it required an overhaul of regulatory standards, which is used to prevent financial fraud and accounting fraud.

Sarbanes-Oxley was created in response to the scandals of three large corporation: Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom. These companies misrepresented their financial information either though acquiring another company, hiding operating expenses, or hiding the amount of debt the business had. These ethical failures led to the complete collapse of Enron and WorldCom, and caused investors to lose millions of dollars in stock value for