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The Virtue of Governance, the Governance of Virtue

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Geoff Moore
Geoff Moore*
Affiliation:
Durham University
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Abstract:

The current economic and preceding financial crises seem to provide evidence in favour of the self-destruction thesis of capitalism. Responses to the crisis have been polarised. Some suggest that regulatory changes are all that is needed. Others suggest the need to change the economic system by developing a new global economic ethic. The first is too limited, the second too utopian.

This article suggests that a MacIntyrean virtue ethics approach provides both a more convincing diagnosis of the problem and leads to a more workable prescription. First, we need to understand the internal contradictions of the tradition that has developed of how to ’do‘ business. Then we need the virtues to be exercised inside practices and institutions. But virtue itself needs to be institutionalised; we need an appropriate governance of virtue in organizations. Even though governance is usually taken to ‘crowd out’ virtue, this article proposes an approach to governance that ‘crowds in’ virtue.

Keywords

virtuegovernanceorganizational ethicsbusiness ethicsfinancial crisis
Type
Special Issue: Reviving Traditions: Virtue and the Common Good in Business and Management
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , April 2012 , pp. 293 - 318
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 2012

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