Rethinking responsible agency in corporations : perspectives from Deleuze and Guattari

The notion of ‘‘responsibility’’ can be understood in a number of different ways, namely as being accountable for one’s actions, as a personal trait, or as a task or duty that results from one’s role. In this article we will challenge the assumptions that underpin each of these employments of the word ‘‘responsibility’’ and seek to redefine the concept as such. The main thrust of the argument is that we need to critically interrogate the idea of ‘‘identity’’ and deliberate decision-making that inform the use of all three of these notions of ‘‘responsibility’’. By drawing on selected concepts emanating from the oeuvre of Gilles Deleuze and Fe´lix Guattari, our understanding of agency moves away from ‘‘identity’’ towards ‘‘multiplicity’’. In fact, it will be argued that our sense of ‘‘agency’’ is a side-product of our own desiring-production as it operates in and through our interactions with other human beings and organizational structures. The article therefore contends that ‘‘responsible management’’ requires ongoing re-articulations of moral responsiveness.http://www.springerlink.com/content/100281/cp201

Dealing with moral values in pluralistic working environments

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this documentThesis (PhD (Systematic Theology and Christian Ethics))--University of Pretoria, 2007.Dogmatics and Christian Ethicsunrestricte

The development of responsible & sustainable business practice: value, mind-sets, business-models

The main goal of this Special Issue (SI) of the Journal of Business Ethics is to explore the changes in values and mind-sets that are required for new, sustainable and ethical business models and consumption practices to flourish. Notable manifestations of efforts to embody an ethical perspective within business practices are seen in recent attempts to rethink business models (Bocken, Short, Rana and Evans, 2014, Linder and Williander, 2015) and to develop hybrid organisations (e.g., social enterprises) and collaborations (Defourney and Nissens, 2006) more likely to balance economic, social and environmental needs. Changes in consumption range from selecting more ethical and sustainable options, e.g., fair trade, renewable energy etc. (De Pelsmacker and Janssens, 2007; Bang, Ellinger, Hadjimarcou and Traichal, 2000) and slowing the acquisition and replacement of goods (Cooper, 2005, 2010) to more radical shifts in lifestyles such as voluntary simplicity (Marchand, Walker and Cooper, 2010; Shaw and Riach, 2011). It is widely recognised that embedded practices and beliefs constrain change, but there is a keenness to investigate the emergence of business and consumption practices that shift away from traditional resource-depleting forms of capitalism. We are delighted to guest edit this special issue and present a set of papers that illustrates the appetite to generate this insight by examining diverse forms of enterprise and consumption, evidencing efforts to embed more ethical and sustainable approaches. Though the papers vary in the conceptual lenses that they adopt, the trend towards a process-based perspective of valuation is evident among them. Hence we start our editorial by articulating some of the changing conceptions of value and the potential to explore how evolving mind-sets and mental models can influence responsible and sustainable business

Reconceptualizing CSR in the media industry as relational accountability

In this paper, we reconceptualize CSR in the media industries by combining empirical data with theoretical perspectives emerging from the communication studies and business ethics literature. We develop a new conception of what corporate responsibility in media organizations may mean in real terms by bringing Bardoel and d’Haenens’ (European Journal of Communication 19 165–194 2004) discussion of the different dimensions of media accountability into conversation with the empirical results from three international focus group studies, conducted in France, the USA and South Africa. To enable a critical perspective on our findings, we perform a philosophical analysis of its implications for professional, public, market, and political accountability in the media, drawing on the insights of Paul Virilio. We come to the conclusion that though some serious challenges to media accountability exist, the battle for responsible media industries is not lost. In fact, the speed characterizing the contemporary media environment may hold some promise for fostering the kind of relational accountability that could underpin a new understanding of CSR in the media

Overlapping Agencies: The Collision of Cancer, Consumers, and Corporations in Richard Powers’s Gain

Richard Powers\u27s 1998 novel Gain establishes a complicated relationship between its two main characters, a corporation called Clare International and suburban mom named Laura Bodey. Readers, assuming the malignity of such corporations, mistake the hints Laura encounters that Clare is responsible for her ovarian cancer for facts. Such readings overlook the science of ovarian cancer as well as how Powers depicts Laura\u27s relation to her disease. I analyze Laura\u27s understudied half of the novel, framing it as a cancer narrative that reworks conventions of that genre. In placing her cancer in broad social and environmental contexts, Powers eschews the individualist strain that characterizes many illness narratives. In so doing, the novel demands engagement with consumer agency and bodily frailty in the face of corporate dominance

Sharing vocabularies: towards horizontal alignment of values-driven business functions

This paper highlights the emergence of different ‘vocabularies’ that describe various values-driven business functions within large organisations and argues for improved horizontal alignment between them. We investigate two established functions that have long-standing organisational histories: Ethics and Compliance (E&C) and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). By drawing upon research on organisational alignment, we explain both the need for and the potential benefit of greater alignment between these values-driven functions. We then examine the structural and socio-cultural dimensions of organisational systems through which E&C and CSR horizontal alignment can be coordinated to improve synergies, address tensions, and generate insight to inform future research and practice in the field of Business and Society. The paper concludes with research questions that can inform future scholarly research and a practical model to guide organizations’ efforts towards inter-functional, horizontal alignment of values-driven organizational practice

Sustainable development and well-being: a philosophical challenge

This paper aims at gaining a better understanding of the inherent paradoxes within sustainability discourses by investigating its basic assumptions. Drawing on a study of the metaphoric references operative in moral language, we reveal the predominance of the 'well-being = wealth' construct, which may explain the dominance of the 'business case' cognitive frame in sustainability discourses (Hahn et al. in Acad Manag Rev 4015:18–42, 2015a). We incorporate economic well-being variables within a philosophical model of becoming well (Küpers in Cult Organ 11(3):221–231, 2005), highlighting the way in which these variables consistently articulate a combination of 'objective' and 'subjective' concerns. We then compare this broad understanding of well-being with the metaphors operative in the sustainable development discourse and argue that the sustainability discourse has fallen prey to an overemphasis on the 'business case'. We proceed to draw on Georges Bataille to challenge the predominance of these value priorities and to explore which mindshifts are required to develop a more comprehensive understanding of what is needed to enable 'sustainable development'

Dealing with difference and dissensus within the church as organisation

This paper wants to propose a way of dealing with the reality of difference within churches that allows for unity amidst diversity. It argues for the adoption of institutional frameworks that function as guiding and unifying forces without becoming repressing, totalising structures. The presence of dissensus and difference does not necessarily have to result in the fragmentation of churches. In fact, when harnessed effectively, difference and dissensus can become a valuable resource for renewal and realignment within churches. The paper develops a framework for dealing with diversity that binds people to the church as organisation in a way that respects their individual value-configurations and input. In the first place, it argues for a holistic view of the relationship between bodiliness, nature, technology, language, and truth statements. In the second place, it insists that confessional, spiritual and moral guidelines should neither be totalising structures that repress difference, nor oppositional differences that exclude commonality. In the third place, it argues that ongoing connectedness between individual members of the church is necessary. Individuals must see themselves as part of an everchanging, ever-evolving web of relations. Guidelines for dialogue within the church therefore become essential.http://explore.up.ac.za/record=b152516