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Joseph Heath presents his market failures approach to business ethics as a happy medium between cynicism and the idealism of traditional moral theories such as Kantian ethics, which Heath believes to be incompatible with important forms of competition. The market failures approach defends some real ethical limits in business, beyond following the law, but it condones certain deviations from the norms of everyday morality in the interest of economic efficiency. On this view, a certain level of sleaziness in business is permissible and inevitable, even if it is regrettable. I argue that Kantian ethics provides a better account of the ethics of competition than the market failures approach does. Kantian ethics is in fact compatible with competition, both on the market and in the workplace. On some key issues, notably including the issue of truthfulness and disclosure, Kantian ethics permits competitive strategies that the market failures approach forbids. Moreover, when Kantian ethics deems the reasoning behind a competitive strategy morally acceptable, it endorses the strategy without any ethical reservations. There is no reason to regard justified business practices as regrettable or sleazy.

Bio:
Robert Hughes is an associate professor of professional practice at Rutgers Business School--Newark and New Brunswick. His research in moral, legal, and political philosophy addresses ethical issues that arise in business, such as the ethics of lawbreaking, competitive pressures to do wrong, and the possibility of consensual yet wrongful exploitation.