Economics, Ethics, and the Mediating Function of Corporate Organization

Abstract

The study features the problem of the relationship between economics and ethics, highlights the ethical aspects related to economy, and raises the question on its self-ethicizing in a way which is compatible with the objectives of economy. By referring to Hegel's Economic-Philosophical Theory, it stresses the fundamental function ascribed to corporate organizations which can overcome the deficiencies and the potential of conflict which accompanies an economic behaviour exclusively guided by rationally calculated self-interest. Corporate organizations are considered as partly institutionalized structures and represent an effective form of mediation between particular and general interests, production and consumption. Additionally, they bring about forms of cooperation, subsidiary, and corporate responsibility which are at the same time to be performed through the active contribution of the individuals. From this perspective, some relevant issues of the order ethics, the stakeholder theory, and the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are also taken into account and evaluated. In particular, the idea of responsibility can be conceived in a more articulated way, being concerned with central questions such as environment, human self-development, securing of work, and the search for a good quality of life.