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Business ethics forum opens in Shanghai today

By Wang Yanlin and Chen Mengbi | July 13, 2016, Wednesday | Online Edition

Business ethics is an important and integral part of business that should be put on parallel with laws or market rules, participants said at the 6th World Congress of the International Society of Business, Economics, and Ethics, which was opened in Shanghai today.

Dubbed as the “Olympics of Business Ethics,” it was the first time for the forum, which will last four days, to be held in China.

“Business ethics should be integrated into the life of business,” said Richard T. De George, a professor at University of Kansas in the United States. “In our school, it is taught as a humanities course because we hope to give ethics a human face.”

Cecilia Arruda from Hetica Business Training in Brazil, said the current weak global economy gives the development of business ethics both challenges and opportunities.

“Some schools withdraw programs or syllabi, and only give superficial information to students,” Arruda said. “But we have seen rising citizen awareness of business ethics in tandem of the global financial crisis in 2008.”

For many, business ethics is a vague idea that defines what is right or better to do in business. Su Yong, a management professor at Fudan University, said business ethics is to measure a business moral with one’s own shoes.

“If you want to use child labor, which is legal in some countries, ask yourself whether you are willing to send your own kid to work,” Su said, adding the recent case of IKEA in China was a perfect example of the importance of business ethics.

IKEA China has started recalling more than 1.66 million of chests of drawers, including the popular Malm line series that were found unsafe abroad but was in line with the Chinese standards. The furniture retailer earlier refused to recall the products in China while did so in North America after six children were crushed to death after the furniture toppled over them. IKEA was then criticized for double standards and eventually relented after the Shanghai Quality and Technical Supervision Bureau intervened.

“In this case, IKEA did not break any laws or rules, but it violated business ethics and had its reputation tarnished,” Su said.

Two thirds of the 350 participants of the congress came from overseas countries and regions, while the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences was the partner of the society to organize the congress, which is held every four years since 1996.

This year, the congress will host the first Asia sub-forum to give more coverage of the region.

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