This study guide has been compiled to support your learning on this module. The assumption has been made that each module in the Scheme requires a total of about 100 hours work, of which 20 hours are in the classroom in the form of 10 two-hour sessions.

This guide is indicative of the activities that we will expect students to prepare in anticipation of each session in order to maximise the learning potential of the classroom time. The reading and preparation should take you between 30-40 hours, leaving you 40-50 hours for further self-directed research, reading and preparation for the assignment work required for this module.

The material in this guide is to be used in conjunction with the set textbook, the guided reading from the journals and the numerous web-links that will allow you to widen the reach of this eclectic subject.

This module specifically aims to:

Be topical and managerially focused

Acquaint the student with the broad theoretical perspectives that underpin the study of Business Ethics

Enable the student to evaluate a managerial situation in ethical terms

Analyse issues of governance affecting companies

Assess the role that compliance and regulation play in the business and commercial environment

Evaluate the nature and social responsibility of the firm as a corporate citizen.

To understand the theoretical basis behind the study of Business Ethics

Assess the role that stakeholders play in creating ethical policy in an organisation

Be able to assess corporate behaviour using an ethical framework

To understand the role of governance in an organisation

Be aware of the issues involving ethics and profits as trade-offs.

The overall purpose of this module is for you to develop an awareness of the role that ethics plays in management and in management decisions and the way that managers can engage ethical constructs to enable them to come to informed decisions.

The module comprises ten sessions divided into four topics covering this broad and eclectic field. The topics will present you with current thinking on ethics; give you frameworks and models to help to bring an ethical dimension to managerial issues and to expose you to dilemmas faced by management in an ever increasingly accountable world.

We anticipate that each session will take up ten hours of study time. Each lecture session has guided reading and we would hope that you would use your Internet connection to the World Wide Web (WWW) to further add to your research database. The lecturer will guide you on sources that are appropriate and there are links to interesting sites for you to visit within each topic in this guide

The topics are as follows:

Introduction to the theoretical underpinnings in the study of Business Ethics. Business Ethics as moral dilemmas in management. Ethical models and reasoning for managers. Ethical behaviour and the role of natural justice. (Three sessions).

The stakeholder corporation. The role and nature of stakeholders in the development of strategy. Social responsibility models within a stakeholder context. The changing nature of stakeholder power in decision making. Corporate governance - an analysis of the role of the board of directors in a firm. A review of various corporate governance reports - Cadbury, Greenbury and Hampel. Failures of governance. Compliance and regulation. (One Session).

Issues and issues management. Direct action and management response. (Two Sessions).

The final two sessions of the course will be devoted to group research and group presentations to the whole class.