Or­gan­iz­a­tions and So­ci­ety

Course content

Business is a contested institution. While some emphasize that growing productivity and innovation has led to improving the economic conditions of many people, others worry about the social and environmental costs of business activities. At the core of these intense debates, there are different views about the current and ideal interactions between organizations and society.

In this course, we will adopt a broader view for understanding the role that business organizations play in society. We believe this role is expected to expand and is indispensable for society. Yet, the recent wave of questionable business practices and scandals has caused serious economic, social, and environmental damage and may threaten the legitimacy of business organizations.

Accordingly, this course focuses on organizations and society, and intends to prepare students to understand, identify and shape the responsibility of businesses vis-à-vis society and the future generations. It seeks to develop independent critical thinking about ethical issues that arise during the course of business operations, both internally and externally, and help students analyze the impact of business decisions on a variety of stakeholders. While there are no easy recipes for what corporations should and must do, our departing assumption is that learning to understand and effectively manage ethical, social, and environmental issues can produce positive results for the employees, the manager, for the company, and for society that large.

To do so, several business case studies will be used to provide a clear practitioner perspective and to connect theories to practice. The course assignment will enable students to investigate the social and/or environmental responsibility of business in the context of a chosen organization, and to identify the roles and interactions of ethics, strategy, and stakeholder management.