Business, Ethics, and the Environment: The Public Policy Debate

Business, Ethics and the Environment explores the public policy debate surrounding the issue of business and its role in environmental matters. Unlike other discussions on this subject, the major focus here is not the monetary cost/benefit of environmental protection, but instead, the ethical obligations businesses may have for protecting the environment. A variety of questions are addressed by the contributors, including: Are businesses obligated to protect the environment? Should private enterprises take an active and leading role in solving a national problem? Should the solution be entirely a matter of public policy, involving business only to the extent that businesses are bound by law? The work begins with a brief foreword by W. Michael Hoffman and an introduction by Robert Fredrick that outlines a framework for the debate and the major questions it entails. The essays are grouped in three separate sections, covering business and government interaction, public attitudes and involvement in environmental issues, and environmental problems and solutions. The first of these sections addresses a variety of topics and case studies, including hazardous waste management, low-level radioactive waste facilities, lessons from CPC regulation, and a Massachusetts solid waste dispute. The second section features a range of issues involving the public, such as the world-wide response to the environmental crisis, customers as environmentalists, and community-corporate conflict and the new environmentalism. Finally, the third section highlights such problems as the dolphin-tuna controversy, the use of animals by business, and international toxic waste trade. The work concludes with a comprehensive index. As a companion to The Corporation, Ethics, and the Environment, this volume of essays will be an important resource for courses in business, public policy, and environmental issues, as well as a useful addition to business, academic, and public libraries.

Table of Contents:
Foreword by W. Michael Hoffman Introduction by Robert Frederick Business and Government: Cooperation and Regulation Government-Business Relationships for Environmental Protection by Duane Windsor Making Polluters Pay by Andrew W. Savitz The Civic Society and Hazardous Waste Management by Robert L. Swinth Community Involvement as an Integral Component of Siting: A Case Study of Siting Low-Level Radioactive Waste Facilities by Linda S. Wennerberg Business Responses to Environmental Policy: Lessons from CFC Regulation by Daniel J. Dudek, Alice M. LeBlanc, and Kenneth Sewall Water in the United States: Balancing the Law and Ethics of Environmental Protection and Economic Growth by Richard A. Wehmhoefer Administrative Behavior, Ethics, and Environmental Policy: The Norfolk, Massachusetts, Solid Waste Dispute by Frederic A. Waldstein Promoting Source Reduction Strategies in the Massachusetts Jewelry Manufacturing Industry: The SE Project by Charles Baxter Morality, Money, and Motor Cars by Norman Bowie Public Attitudes and Involvement in Environmental Issues "I Am No Greenpeacer, But . . ." or Environmentalism, Risk Communication, and the Lower Middle Class by Mark Sagoff Environmentalism as a Humanism by Robert C. Solomon Comments on Sagoff's Environmentalism as Populism by James S. Hoyte Customers as Environmentalists by Michael McCloskey An Environmental Agenda for the 1990s by Lynn A. Greenwalt World-wide Responses to the Environmental Crisis by Nancy W. Anderson Community-Corporate Conflict and the New Environmentalism: Four Cases on the Use of Lime Lakes and Mine Cavities for Hazardous Waste Storage and Disposal by Karen Paul and Frances Gotcsik Environmental Problems and Solutions Not in Their Backyards, Either: A Proposal for a Foreign Environmental Practices Act by Alan Neff The Ethics of Development and the Dilemma of Global Environmentalism by David P. Hanson The Improbability of Third World Government Consent in the Coming North-South International Toxic Waste Trade by Thomas F. Slaughter, Jr. Water-Resources, Economic Development, and Species Extinction: A Case Study by Jack Weir Defending the Use of Animals by Business: Animal Liberation and Environmental Ethics by Eric Katz Ethics at Sea: The Dolphin-Tuna Controversy by Thomas I. White Index

About the Author :
W. MICHAEL HOFFMAN is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College. He is the co-author, with Dr. Frederick and Dr. Petry, of the Quorum books The Corporation, Ethics, and the Environment (1990) and The Ethics of Organizational Transformation (1989). ROBERT FREDERICK is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Assistant Director of the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College. He is the co-author, with Dr. Hoffman and Dr. Petry, of the Quorum books The Corporation, Ethics, and the Environment (1990) and The Ethics of Organizational Transformation (1989). EDWARD S. PETRY is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Research Associate of the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College. He is the co-author, with Dr. Hoffman and Dr. Frederick, of the Quorum books The Corporation, Ethics, and the Environment (1990) and The Ethics of Organizational Transformation (1989).