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The Three Types Of Ethical Theories In Business Ethics

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Ethics refers to a sub discipline of philosophy that study about morality (Mersserly, 1995). It is classified into theoretical and applied ethics. Applied ethics is a sub classification of ethics that addresses morality issues of both the public and private life. Thus applied ethics applied to issues in regard to companies or other public institutions is known as business ethics. Thus in this essay I will discuss the different ethics theories and how they are applied in business ethics.
Ethical theories are different moral theories that entail different rules and concepts that can be used in order to arrive at a particular decision (Messerly, 1995). There are different ethical theories but we will address the Katian theory, Mill’s theory, …show more content…

This theory entails three phases that explain the developments involved in making the right decisions (Garz,2009). The first phase is the pre-conventional phase. During this phase an individual differentiates what is right from what is wrong depending on the consequences they experience in when they make a particular choice or dependent on the physical strength or power of the individuals in authority. According to Garz, children are particularly known for making decisions based on what the conventional phase entails (2009). The second phase is known as the conventional phase. In this phase individuals will choose to make the right decisions not necessarily because they perceive them as the right thing to do but because they want to associate with a particular institution. Thus, individuals uphold the rules and regulations of that institution for example a family, company or an educational facility. The third phase is the post conventional or the autonomous level. This level entails that an individual makes their decisions based on their principles. Thus the decisions made may not necessarily be according to the rules of the institution they are in but because they believe that based on their principles the particular choice is right. This may or may not sometimes coincide with the rules and regulations of the

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