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The purpose of this paper is to understand business students' intention to behave ethically in general, and in particularly in the business context of a developing country, India.

The paper surveyed 250 final semester MBA students from different business schools in Indore city of Madhya Pradesh in India. The study employed the most popular behavioural theory, the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) to understand the intention of business students to behave ethically. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse direct effects of the constructs on behavioural intention, and the overall model.

Findings revealed that attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioural control are positively related and have strong influence on ethical behavioural intention of business students. All constructs together explain 67 percent variance in intention. Attitude alone contributes 46 percent in explaining variance in ethical behavioural intention.

Business ethics field can benefit from this study as it provides an empirical explanation of the contribution of each factor that is, attitude, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control, in ethical behavioural intention of business students. This is directly beneficial for business schools and for education policymakers as the information can help policymakers to understand the potential of existing business ethics education. This study is limited to a data set of 250 business students in the context of a single country which cannot be generalized. So, there is need for research of this type in a more collaborative international context.

To the best of my knowledge, this is the first study in the Indian context to predict the intention of business students to behave ethically, using the TPB model. This study contributes valuable knowledge to the domain of business ethics, behavioural studies as well the field of business education, and suggests to explore ways to strengthen the three constructs attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioural control, as these constructs were found to have a strong influence in forming ethical behavioural intention of business students of business schools in India.

This paper aims to report a case history delivered to MBA students that developed their understanding of corruption and also enhanced their ability to be able to contribute to the anti-curriculum agenda. This case history method selected was innovative, as it was constructed from multi-disciplinary archival sources. The case focus was the egregious affinity fraud of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities (BLMIS), with court documents taken from “United States V. Bernard L. Madoff And Related Cases USAO-SDNY”, including court sentencing records, victim impact statements and the defendant’s “Plea Allocution”. The case study aimed to enhance students’ ability and inclination to recognise and oppose corrupt practices. The longer-term ambition of the case was to contribute to developing the students’ moral awareness, character and facility for self-reflection, in terms of responding to corruption. The case study exercise also addressed rising societal expectations for more robust responses to corruption, in terms of illustrating how business school pedagogy can be expanded to emphasise the centrality of ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) to economic life. The case history was analysed within Carroll’s CSR pyramid and also with themes derived from the developing area of behavioural ethics, including a deontological, justice for its own sake and focus.

This research used the qualitative case method (Stake, 2000; Yin, 2004, 2010, 2011) to investigate lived experience from the viewpoint of those being studied and to provide the case history “experience”, using an analytical lens developed from Carroll’s CSR pyramid (1991) and from behavioural ethics research. Furthermore, following Chell’s recommendation, the case history of the BLMIS fraud was chosen – “[…] for analytical purposes to produce insight into the phenomena in question” (2008). The case was constructed from archival sources, including court records of the sentencing of Bernie Madoff.

The findings of the research are that students gained knowledge and understanding of the nature and practice of corruption, as well as developing their understanding of the anti-corruption agenda. The case also facilitated students to develop their moral awareness, character and facility for self-reflection with reference to corruption. In sum, the findings are that case histories, using archival sources, in this instance taken from the court records, have the potential to enhance teaching and learning in business ethics and responsible management education.

A limitation of this research is that it is reporting on one instance of a classroom delivery of the case study. In consequence, a recommendation for future research is for CSR and ethics focussed educationalist to conduct similar case study teaching to add to and complement the conclusions reached in this paper.

This paper is original in detailing and reflecting on a case history teaching example of global corruption. This case history teaching method was innovative, as it was constructed from archival sources taken from court records to include victim impact statements and the defendant’s “Plea Allocution”.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce, illustrate and explore the use of process recording as a pedagogical tool in behavioural ethics education.

An overview of the nature and components of process recording as a pedagogical tool is provided. Potential challenges and benefits associated with its use are described. The particular relevance of process recording for behavioural ethics education is highlighted. Illustrative examples of ethics-related process records are discussed.

Process recording shows promise as a pedagogical technique for meeting three goals of behavioural ethics education (i.e. Chugh and Kern, 2016). These include: enhancing literacy with research-supported concepts and principles such that these can be applied in “real-world” settings; increasing student awareness of gaps that might exist between their intended and actual ethical behaviour; and, fostering the sense that ethical skills are not static, but rather, open to development.

This paper introduces, illustrates and explores the use of process recording in behavioural ethics education. Additional, more systematic study of process recording in ethics education would be useful.

Process recording shows promise as a tool for supporting learning about behavioural ethics. Practical information on its use and concrete examples are provided.

Despite the need for pedagogical tools in behavioural ethics education, as well as the previously identified relevance of process recording as a potential tool in ethics education, there has been no prior exploration or illustration of process recording within this realm.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of consumers' perception of online retailers' ethical behavior on consumer purchase and revisit intentions.

A sample of 259 online shoppers was employed to test the relationships between perceived ethics of online retailers and the intention to revisit and purchase. The measurement model and structural relationships were estimated using AMOS 18.

Results show that perceived ethics of an Internet retailer's website significantly affect consumers' trust and attitudes to the retailer's website that eventually have positive impacts on purchase and revisit intentions. Website trust was positively related to attitude toward the site. The results do not show support for a direct effect between perceived ethics and behavioral intentions, but attitude and trust toward the website mediate these effects.

The findings support the idea that despite the physical distance between online retailers and customer, behaving ethically has an effect on revisit and purchase intentions. This suggests that online vendors should invest in methods that strengthen consumers' trust of websites. To convey a sense of ethics of the website, websites should ensure that privacy policies are easy to understand, explain clearly how customer information is used, offer secure payment methods, display clearly the terms and conditions of the online transactions, fulfill the orders, and avoid deceptive practices and exaggerations of product characteristics.

Research integrating perceived ethical conduct of retailers and consumer behavior is still in the beginning, and has not explored all outcomes of perceived ethics. This study is an initial attempt to investigate the effects of perceived ethics of retailers on revisit and purchase intentions. This study contributes to the knowledge of consumer perceived ethics and behavioral intentions.

Motivated by the heated discussion with regard to the Chinese milk powder incident, this paper aims to explore the determinants of Chinese managers’ moral judgment. Are Chinese professional managers’ moral judgments on an ethical dilemma influenced by their commitment to the norms and values recognized by a prestigious professional association outside of China? Do Chinese managers’ moral development and level of relativism impact their ethical decisions?

A structured survey was conducted, generating 544 valid responses from Chinese managers.

The results showed that moral maturity and relativism, independently and together, were significantly related to Chinese managers’ moral judgment on a hypothetical business dilemma, though no significant effect was found for their commitment to ethics codes.

The findings confirm the important role of moral development and relativism in Chinese mangers’ moral judgment and suggest the need for further research on the impact of professional ethics codes.

The global financial crisis (GFC) undermined the legitimacy of orthodox economic assumptions, which nevertheless continue to frame business school pedagogy. In consequence, there is an opportunity for socio-economic insights to be more fully incorporated into the business school curriculum. This paper reports and reflects on a socio-economic case study that was delivered to MBA students. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that the developing literature on behavioural economics (BE) has the potential to enhance students’ social economic understanding of key areas of the curriculum.

The paper presents an inter-disciplinary socio-economic teaching case that was informed by insights from BE. The teaching case concerned a socio-economic understanding of corruption and white-collar crime. It was also inter-disciplinary to include inputs from business history and criminology. The aim of the teaching case was to develop an appreciation among students that corruption and white-collar crime can be analysed within a social economics lens.

The teaching case example discussed in this paper offered an alternative socio-economic understanding to core areas of the MBA curriculum, enabling students to apply a behavioural economic approach to corruption and more generally to white-collar crime. The findings derived from this case study are that behavioural economics has the potential to enhance the teaching of socio-economics.

The GFC presents an opportunity to re-shape the business school curriculum to acknowledge the centrality of socio-economics and consequently to offer an alternative to the dominant ontological assumptions – taken from the economic understanding of rationality – that have previously under-pinned business school pedagogy.

The originality of this paper is to apply BE to a socio-economic teaching case studies in core subject areas of the MBA curriculum.

Revisiting Carroll’s classic corporate social responsibility (CSR) pyramid framework, this paper aims to evolve a novel synthesis of ethics and economics. This yielded an “integrative CSR economics”.

This theory paper examined how to conceptually set up CSR theory, argue its ethical nature and establish its practical, social and empirical relevance. Economic analysis reached out from contemporary institutional economics to Smith’s classic studies.

The paper reconstructed all of Carroll’s four dimensions of CSR – economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic responsibilities – through economics. The paper discounted a core assumption of much CSR research that economic approach to CSR, including the instrumental, strategic “business case” approach to CSR, were unethical and lacked any foundations in ethics theory. Integrative CSR economics reframes research on viability and capability requirements for CSR practice; redirecting empirical research on links between CSP (corporate social performance) and CFP (corporate financial performance).

The paper focused on Carroll as the leading champion of CSR research. Future research needs to align other writers with integrative CSR economics. Friedman or Freeman, or the historic contributions of Dodd, Mayo, Bowen or Drucker, are especially interesting.

The paper set out how integrative CSR economics satisfies the “business case” approach to CSR and develops practical implications along: a systemic dimension of the market economy; a legal-constitutional dimension; and the dimension of market exchanges.

Integrative CSR economics creates ethical benefits for society along: a systemic dimension of the market (mutual gains); a legal-constitutional dimension (law-following); and the dimension of market exchange (ethical capital creation). Social benefits are not only aspired to but also are achievable as a business case approach to CSR is followed.

The paper’s main contribution is a new synthesis of economics and ethics that yields an “integrative CSR economics”.

Socially responsible buying/sourcing (SRB) has become a critical issue in many companies. The purpose of this study was to build an exploratory model to describe buying/sourcing professionals' SRB decision‐making process.

Adopting business ethics and attitude theories, the SRB process was hypothesized to be a composite of cognitive processing and affective reactions to personal sources of information (e.g. peers). The mail survey data obtained from buying/sourcing professionals in the US apparel/shoe companies were analyzed using a Structural Equation Modeling technique.

SRB generally followed a cognitive decision framework and was partly influenced by the decision maker's affective reaction to peer buying/sourcing professionals' behaviors. Emotional reaction to top‐management, however, was not significant.

The SRB scale created for this study is focused on the apparel/shoe buying context, which may limit its applicability to other industries. Also, SRB was measured through subjective perceptions of the respondents, which may be subject to some degree of social desirability bias.

The results suggest that changing the organizational environment where employees observe peers and providing standards of what is socially acceptable can improve SRB.

By employing individual decision makers as the unit of analysis, this study advances the field of ethical decision making by providing empirical evidence that SRB decisions are a product of both cognitive processing and emotional responses.

Firms are increasingly required to make ethical choices when selecting suppliers for their supply chains, and the decisions often rest on individual purchasing managers within the firm. This study builds on the literature on ethical decision-making and the concept of decision frames to investigate the decision-making process of purchasing managers in financially distressed firms. Codes of Conduct (CoC) and how they are enforced (financial rewards and codified procedures for oversight) are studied in terms of their effectiveness in informing and guiding purchasing managers in their supplier selection decisions.

Four sequential experiments were conducted with a total of 648 purchasing managers from manufacturing firms.

The results indicate that purchasing managers in firms facing financial distress are more than four times more likely than purchasing managers in the control groups to select the less ethical supplier in favor of better operational performance. As a potential remedy, it is found that enforcing the firm's CoC help to counteract this tendency and increase ethical supplier selection decisions by 2.1- to 2.6-fold. However, CoC enforcement that invokes multiple conflicting decision frames simultaneously is more likely to impair than promote ethical supplier selection decisions, compared to situations where only one enforcement method is present.

These findings develop an improved understanding of purchasers' decision-making processes and shed light on how to effectively use CoCs to guide these decisions.

Examines the influence of computer guidelines and the belief in universal moral rules on ethical intentions regarding the use of computers in the workplace. The results revealed that the interaction between computer guidelines and belief in universal moral rules was significant. Business professionals with a strong belief in universal moral rules exhibited high ethical intentions, regardless of whether or not their organization had clear guidelines concerning the use of company computers. However, for business professionals with a low belief in universal moral rules, the presence of clear computer guidelines had a positive effect on ethical intentions. This investigation provides evidence that computer guidelines are positively related to ethical intentions only for individuals who do not adhere to a belief in universal moral rules.