Business Ethical Perceptions of Business People in East China: An Empirical Study

This paper deals with the ethical perceptions of business people and the current state of business ethics in east China. After surveying 800 business people in 59 enterprises and interviewing 42 chief executive officers, chairs and senior managers among them, the following conclusions can be drawn: First of all, business ethics has become a new and popular topic in east China. Second, quite a lot of business people are pessimistic about the ethical standards of their superiors and co-workers, and about the ethical climate of their enterprises. Third, more and more business leaders begin to realize the importance of business ethics. Finally, in east China, the establishment of the market economy and the improvement of business ethics will depend on each other. In short, business people in east China have various ethical perceptions, and the current state of business ethics in east China is also complex and changeable. Introduction 2 usiness nowadays plays an ever more important role in the People's Republic IJ of China. With the fast-growing economy, a multitude of ethical problems arises such as kickbacks, bribery, fraud? environmental pollution, unethical sales practices, violating employee rights, false or misleading advertising, and so forth. Thus public concern for business ethics is quite widespread. In the fall of 1995, an empirical study was conducted in several cities of east China: Shanghai, Qingdao, Jinan, Changzhou, Hangzhou, and Tianjin. Its purpose was to collect data on business peoples' ethical perceptions of the social transition, and to comment on the current and expected future state of business ethics in east China. The study was jointly sponsored by the Philosophy Department and the Centre for Applied Ethics at Fudan University, Shanghai. The research group included four faculty, of whom the author was one, and 26 undergraduate students of the two institutions. This study used a combination of a survey and personal interviews. (C)1999. Business Ethics Quarterly, filolume 9, Issue 3. ISSN 1052-1SOX. pp. 541-558 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.114 on Thu, 26 May 2016 06:08:17 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms