1. The term ethics refers to accepted principles of right or wrong that govern the conduct of
a person, the members of a profession, or the actions of an organization.
2. Many of the ethical issues in international business are rooted in the fact that political
systems, law, economic development, and culture vary significantly from nation to nation.
3. Leon Sullivan argued that it was ethically justified for Western businesses to operate in
South Africa so long as the companies obeyed the apartheid laws.
4. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act outlawed the paying of bribes to foreign government
officials to gain business.
5. Facilitating payments are payments to secure contracts that would not otherwise be
secured.
6. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act does not allow for “facilitating payments.”
7. The Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International
Business Transactions obliges member-states and other signatories to make the bribery of
foreign public officials a criminal offense.
8. The concept of social responsibility refers to the idea that businesspeople should
consider the social consequences of economic actions when making business decisions.
9. The power of a multinational corporation is constrained not only by laws and regulations,
but also by the discipline of the market and the competitive process.
10. Noblesse oblige is a French term referring to those multinationals that have unethically
used their power for private gain.
11. Ethical dilemmas are situations in which only one of the available alternatives seems
ethically acceptable.
12. Societal business ethics are not divorced from personal ethics.
13. Our personal ethical code exerts a profound influence on the way we behave as
businesspeople.
14. The term organization culture refers to the values and norms that are shared among
employees of an organization.
15. An organizational culture that requires all decisions to be purely economic allows
unethical behavior to flourish and persist.
16. Enterprises headquartered in a country which scores high on masculinity and power
distance measures are more likely to behave ethically than enterprises headquartered in a
culture where individualism and uncertainty avoidance are strong.
17. According to Friedman doctrine, the only social responsibility of business is to increase
profits, so long as the company stays within the rules of law.
18. According to Milton Friedman, businesses should undertake social expenditures beyond
those mandated by the law and required for the efficient running of a business.
19. According to the concept of cultural relativism, a firm, while operating in any host
country, should adopt the ethics of the culture that is predominant in its home country.
20. A righteous moralist claims that a while operating in a host country, a multinational
company should follow the ethical standards of that host country.
21. The righteous moralist approach to ethics is typically associated with managers from
developed nations.
22. Kantian ethics assert that if a manager of a multinational sees that firms from other
nations are not following ethical norms in a host nation, that manager should not either.
23. The action that produces the greatest good for the greatest number of people can result
in the unjustified treatment of a minority.
24. Multinational corporations do not qualify to act as moral agents within the framework of
rights theories.
25. John Rawls argues that all economic goods and services should be distributed equally
except when an unequal distribution would work to everyone’s advantage.
26. According to John Rawls difference principle, wide variations in income and wealth can
be considered just if the market-based system that produces this unequal distribution also
benefits the least-advantaged members of society.
27. John Rawls’s veil of ignorance is a conceptual tool that contributes to the moral compass
that managers can use to help them navigate through difficult ethical dilemmas.
28. Business leaders should use every relevant opportunity to stress the importance of
business ethics and make sure that key business decisions not only make good economic sense
but also are ethical.
29. Customers, suppliers, and lenders constitute the internal stakeholders of an
organization.
30. Internal stakeholders of a company do not have an exchange relationship with the
company.
31. The first step in an ethical algorithm is to identify those common resources that are not
owned by any one in particular but are used by everybody.
32. External stakeholders are individuals or groups who have no interest, claim, or stake in a
company.
33. Firms now have ethics officers to penalize those employees who exercise moral
courage.
34. To strengthen the moral courage of employees, companies should not retaliate against
those employees who complain about unethical actions.
35. Ethics officers act as an internal ombudsperson with responsibility for handling
confidential inquiries from employees.
36. Moral courage enables managers to walk away from a decision that is profitable but
unethical.
37. _____ are the accepted principles of right or wrong governing the conduct of
businesspeople.
38. The term _____ refers to accepted principles of right or wrong that govern the conduct of
a person, the members of a profession, or the actions of an organization.