To read this content please select one of the options below:

Ethical paradigms as potential foundations of diversity management initiatives in business organizations

George Gotsis (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece)
Zoe Kortezi (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece)

Journal of Organizational Change Management

ISSN: 0953-4814

Article publication date: 14 October 2013

5667

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the elaboration of a comprehensive moral framework for designing and implementing diversity practices. In so doing, it employs distinct ethical theories that not only elevate respect for differences to an end, but also provide a set of principles, virtues or values conducive to the formation of an inclusive work environment.

Design/methodology/approach

A literature review, in particular contributions critical to current implementations of diversity management, may provide the basis of a non-instrumental approach to diversity issues, allowing for an inclusive and participative workplace. The paper suggests that such an endeavor can be founded on the concepts of organizational virtue, care or human dignity alternatively. In this respect, a theoretical context demonstrating the very way these concepts influence and inform diversity issues, is elaborated, analyzed and properly discussed.

Findings

Three distinct theoretical frameworks capturing the importance of major ethical traditions based on dignity, organizational virtue and care, for reconceptualizing diversity issues, are introduced. It is proposed that non-utilitarian philosophical ethics (and more specifically, Kantian deontology, Aristotelian virtue ethics or ethics of care) is in a position to provide a rationale for diversity policies that affirm the diverse other as a valued end.

Practical implications

The authors argue that a corporation is in a position to develop ethically-informed diversity initiatives that may effectively combine performance with an affirmation of the value of the diverse other.

Social implications

The authors argue that a corporation is in a position to develop ethically-informed diversity initiatives that may effectively combine performance with an affirmation of the value of the diverse other.

Originality value

The paper offers certain insights into the particular conditions that may help organizations design and implement a diversity strategy facilitating thriving and fulfillment of diverse others, grounded on the priority of dignity, virtue or care respectively. Such a perspective, permeating vision, culture and leadership, is invested with a potential that overcomes the managerial instrumentality, so strongly denounced by the majority of critical diversity scholars.

Keywords

Citation

Gotsis, G. and Kortezi, Z. (2013), "Ethical paradigms as potential foundations of diversity management initiatives in business organizations", Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 26 No. 6, pp. 948-976. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOCM-11-2012-0183

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2013, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Related articles