Bill Shaw

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: A legal and moral analysis

The author examines the categories of bribes that are prohibited under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act from the perspective of three significant moral theories: utility, rights and justice. He concludes that the Act does not go too far in demanding ethical behaviors from U.S. business people doing business in foreign markets, therefore, it is not in need of a major revision. With regard to accounting provisions, movement from a reasonableness standard to one of materiality would be appropriate however.

Affirmative action: An ethical evaluation

This paper examines four major arguments advanced by opponents of race and gender conscious affirmative action and rebuts them on the basis of moral considerations. It is clear that the problem of past racial/gender discrimination has not disappeared; its effects linger, resulting in a wide disparity in opportunities and attainments between minorities/women and whites/males. Affirmative action, although not the “perfect solution,” is by far the most viable method of redressing the effects of past discrimination. Thus it cannot be dismissed lightly by way of arguing for mere colorblindness.

A reply to Thomas Mulligan's “critique of Milton Friedman's essay ‘The Social Responsibility of Business to Increase Its Profits’”

Professor Thomas Mulligan undertakes to discredit Milton Friedmans thesis that “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits.” He attempts to do this by moving from Friedmans paradigm characterizing a socially responsible executive as willful and disloyal to a different paradigm, i.e., one emphasizing the consultative and consensus-building role of a socially responsible executive. Mulligans critique misses the point, first, because even consensus-building executives act contrary to the will of minority shareholders, but even more importantly, because he assumes that the mandate of a shareholder majority brings legitimacy to efforts of corporate managers to utilize corporate wealth in solving social problems. It is the role of our democratic institutions to deal with national agenda issues such as inflation, unemployment, and pollution, not that of the private sector. Corporations and private individuals do have a role to play in enhancing the quality of the human environment, however, and the author suggests a coherent means of developing that role in an effort “rescue” corporate social responsibility from Mulligan no less than from Friedman.

Shareholder authorized inside trading: A legal and moral analysis

This article evaluates inside trading from a legal and a moral perspective. From both of these points of view, the practice of inside trading is fraudulent whether it occurs in the traditional format or in the variation known as “misappropriation.” Fraud is a legal tort and a moral wrong consisting of a breach of duty that intentionally causes harm to persons that the insider can reasonably foresee. In defense against allegations of fraudulent inside trading, the defendant may argue that one or more elements of fraud are not evident, or, if the elements are clear, that the fraud was a justified means of avoiding some worse evil or of achieving some greater good. The article concludes that inside trading, under circumstances approved by shareholders, is neither fraudulent nor unfair.

Design of switching power supplies for improved reliability and maintainability

A new power supply has been developed employing both functional and component redundancy for improved reliability. Modular construction and noncatastrophic failure modes provide the capability for this supply to remain on-line until repairs can be made during regular scheduled maintenance periods.