Democratic Business Ethics: Volkswagen’s Emissions Scandal and the Disruption of Corporate Sovereignty

Rhodes, C

Democratic Business Ethics: Volkswagen’s Emissions Scandal and the Disruption of Corporate Sovereignty

Rhodes, C

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Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Organization Studies, 2016, 37 (10), pp. 1501 - 1518
Issue Date:: 2016-10-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Rhodes, C https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6571-2872	en_US
dc.date.issued	2016-10-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Organization Studies, 2016, 37 (10), pp. 1501 - 1518	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	0170-8406	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/62223
dc.description.abstract	© 2016, © The Author(s) 2016. There is an established body of politically informed scholarly work that offers a sustained critique of how corporate business ethics is a form of organizing that acts as a subterfuge to facilitate the expansion of corporate sovereignty. This paper contributes to that work by using its critique as the basis for theorizing an alternative form of ethics for corporations. Using the case of the 2015 Volkswagen emissions scandal as an illustrative example, the paper theorizes an ethics that locates corporations in the democratic sphere so as to defy their professed ability to organize ethics in a self-sufficient and autonomous manner. The Volkswagen scandal shows how established organizational practices of corporate business ethics are no barrier to, and can even serve to enable, the rampant pursuit of business self-interest through well-orchestrated and large-scale conspiracies involving lying, cheating, fraud and lawlessness. The case also shows how society, represented by individuals and institutions, is able to effectively resist such corporate malfeasance. The ‘democratic business ethics’ that this epitomizes is one where civil society holds corporations to account for their actions, and in so doing disrupts corporate sovereignty. This ethics finds practical purchase in forms of dissent that redirect power away from centres of organized wealth and capital, returning it to its democratically rightful place with the people, with society.	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Organization Studies	en_US
dc.relation.isbasedon	10.1177/0170840616641984	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Business & Management	en_US
dc.title	Democratic Business Ethics: Volkswagen’s Emissions Scandal and the Disruption of Corporate Sovereignty	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	10	en_US
utslib.citation.volume	37	en_US
utslib.for	1503 Business and Management	en_US
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Business
utslib.copyright.status	closed_access
pubs.issue	10	en_US
pubs.publication-status	Published	en_US
pubs.volume	37	en_US

Abstract:

© 2016, © The Author(s) 2016. There is an established body of politically informed scholarly work that offers a sustained critique of how corporate business ethics is a form of organizing that acts as a subterfuge to facilitate the expansion of corporate sovereignty. This paper contributes to that work by using its critique as the basis for theorizing an alternative form of ethics for corporations. Using the case of the 2015 Volkswagen emissions scandal as an illustrative example, the paper theorizes an ethics that locates corporations in the democratic sphere so as to defy their professed ability to organize ethics in a self-sufficient and autonomous manner. The Volkswagen scandal shows how established organizational practices of corporate business ethics are no barrier to, and can even serve to enable, the rampant pursuit of business self-interest through well-orchestrated and large-scale conspiracies involving lying, cheating, fraud and lawlessness. The case also shows how society, represented by individuals and institutions, is able to effectively resist such corporate malfeasance. The ‘democratic business ethics’ that this epitomizes is one where civil society holds corporations to account for their actions, and in so doing disrupts corporate sovereignty. This ethics finds practical purchase in forms of dissent that redirect power away from centres of organized wealth and capital, returning it to its democratically rightful place with the people, with society.

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http://hdl.handle.net/10453/62223