XLRI 2013 - Managerial Ethics - Chapter 02 - The Foundation of Corporate Ethics - The Human Person

7/22/2019 XLRI 2013 - Managerial Ethics - Chapter 02 - The Foundation of Corporate Ethics - The Human Person

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Chapter 02:

The Foundation of Corporate Ethics:

The Human PersonFr. Ozzie Mascarenhas SJ

June 10, 2013

Recent advances in the physical, biological and social sciences have not only spawned radicaltechnological and market breakthroughs, but have, more importantly, unearthed tremendous human

potentiality for design, creativity and innovation, for invention, discovery, venture and entrepreneurship,for capital accumulation and wealth creation, for individual self-actualization and collective common

good. We are experiencing a growing consciousness of the increased power that human beings have overnature, and over the future development of the human race. This power can be both a blessing and a

curse: it is a blessing if harnessed to do good, to preserve and respect human dignity, to bring aboutjustice, and to promote peace and human solidarity; it can be a curse if the same power is abused to do

evil, destroy human worth, generate unjust structures, and provoke war and terrorism, global destructionand disintegration. We can make or mar our destiny.

More than at any other period in human history, humankind is currently at the cross-roads of war orpeace, growth or decline, progress or regress, life or death, hell or heaven. We cannot leave these opposite

polarities and possibilities to chance. We must design and invent, plan and predict, monitor and controlour future and that of our posterity. In this regard, the concept of human personhood cum humanresponsibility is a fundamental part of this new self understanding and undertaking. Ethics and morality

are a critical component on this creative journey to destiny. Corporate ethics, in particular, requires thedevelopment of a clear understanding of the relationship between executive autonomy and freedom,

between human creativity and market innovation, and between human culture and corporate socialresponsibility. In this chapter we explore three crucial concepts in this endeavor: the corporate human

personhood, the corporate human act, and the corporate human judgment. Other critical concepts such as

accountability and responsibility, the ethics of rights and duties, the executive virtue of moral and ethical

reasoning, the building of trusting and caring relationships, and the like will be discussed in subsequentchapters.

We explore the awesome domain of the human person, the foundation of all ethics, particularly

corporate ethics, under three Parts with the following topics:

Part I : The Ethi cs of Corporate Human Personhood

What is Human Personhood?

The Value of Executive Human Personhood

What Constitutes our Human Personhood?

Our Unique Immanence

Our Unique Individuality

Our Unique SocialityOur Unique Transcendence

Executive Freedom and Human Acts

Part I I : The Ethi cs of Corporate Human Act

What is an Executive Human Act?

The Phenomenology of the Executive Human Act

The Order of Intention versus the Order of Execution

Theory of Action: The Volitionalist Tradition


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Executive Human Act versus Human Operations and Actions

The Intrinsic Social Nature of Executive Action

Executive Personhood and Executive Agency

Agent Causality versus Event Causality

The Human Act as a Creative Act

Part I I I : The Eth ics of Corporate JudgmentThe Intrinsic Task of Executive Morality

Moral Discourse, Language and Reasoning

Scientific, Practical, Ethical and Moral Judgments

Deliberation, Explanation and Justification

The Nature of Moral Deliberation

The Social Factor of Moral Reasoning

Quadri-Ethical-moral Reasoning

Part I: The Ethics of Corporate Human Personhood

In responding to the questions raised in the introductory paragraph of Chapter 01, our common

ground, regardless of our religion and religious beliefs, ethnic and national composition or persuasion, isour recognition of the value of the human person and human personhood. The centrality of the question

of human personhood is common to theology and philosophy, morals and ethics, and even laws andvalues. Corporate ethics and morals deal not only with executive decisions and actions, but even raise themore fundamental questions: What ought I to do? What ought I to be? What kind of executive person doI want to become? Even those who consider basing ethics on a set of universal and absolute values

presuppose the necessity of the human personhood. We can never predicate moral goodness or moral

badness of beings that are not human persons (Hring1978: 85; Hildebrand 1953: 167). We are humanpersons every moment of our being (this is the fixed nature of human personhood); yet humanpersonhood means that we go beyond or transcend what we are at a given moment (this is the dynamic

nature of human personhood). Both aspects of human personhood are necessary; they make us what wearehuman, personal, ethical, moral, accountable and responsible persons and personalities.

What is Human Personhood?

What is man? What is being human? What is human personhood? What is corporate humanpersonhood? A related philosophical and more fundamental question is: what is human? Aristotlesbalanced formula for man was: man is a rational animal. Within ancient Greek philosophical thought

and categorization this definition meant that the human being is endowed with the highest of three typesof souls: as a vegetative soul, the human is capable of nutrition, growth, and reproduction; as an animalsoul, the human is capable of movement and experiences; as a rational soul that unites the other two, thehuman is capable of knowledge and choice. That is, this rational soul expresses itself in the twofoldactivity of thinking and willing. We are even more: our knowledge is reflective (i.e., we know that we

know) and our choices are informed and reflective (i.e., we know what we are choosing, and we know

why we are choosing it). Our skills and potential for knowledge and choice empower us to be causes orauthors of our own action, and hence, to be accountable and responsible for the consequences of ouractions. Thus, being and action are intrinsically linked in the rational and voluntary nature of our humanbeing. In the Aristotelian vision of human nature, corporeal matter is informed by the spiritual principle

of the rational soul (Rehrauer 1996: 23-25). [See Business Executive Exercise 2.1].

On the surface, human behavior is basically a set of actions that are governed by one's feelings,emotions, attitudes and beliefs regarding proposed ends, ideals, goals and objectives. In general, most

actions stem from and are affected by one's personality or character. To the extent that these actions are


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human, they are usually assessed by several dyadic qualifications such as right or wrong, good or bad,ethical or unethical, moral or immoral, just or unjust, and fair or unfair. In general, actions are

praiseworthy if good, and blameworthy, if bad. If good, one should be credited for them; if bad, one mustaccept blame and responsibility for the intended and unintended consequences.

Ethics is concerned with responsible human behavior. Corporate ethics is concerned with responsible

human behavior in relation to executive decisions, actions and their outcomes. Good business executivesexecute good decisions and actions that generate good outcomes, and avoid bad decisions and actions thatresult in bad or harmful consequences.

The Value and Function of Executive Personhood

Human behavior, however, cannot be reduced to a set of decisions and actions. There is a profoundunity and interrelatedness that affects four basic characteristics of what it means to be human:

We are uniquely sensitive or sense human beings fed by our five senses that are nuanced byobservation, perception, internalization and pleasure;

We are affective and feeli ng human beingsalso fed by our five senses, empowered and reinforced byour attitudes, beliefs, instincts and drives, needs and wants, desires and aspirations, ambitions anddreams;

We are cognitive or knowing human beings with unique capacities for thinking, reasoning,explanation, experimentation, creativity and innovation, imagination and intuition, judgment and

decisions; and

We are volitive. voluntary and intentional human beingswho can deliberate, determine, use free will,choose, select or elect among competing courses of actions, subjects, objects, properties and events.

The unity of these activities (i.e., sensitive, cognitive, affective, and volitive) has been identified bymany scientists as the nexus of human personhood, the fundamental unity of activity. Contemporaryscience insists on the transcending unity of the human being brought about by different powers. Our

thinking is an activity that is highly dependent upon choice and intimately affected by our emotional state(Strawson 1959). According to Lopez Ibor (1964: 157ff), feeling is the bridge which enables biological

data of sensory perception to reach the mind of evaluation, classification, and choice of a response. Ichoose to accept or reject ideas based upon how I feel about them, about their source, and about theirrelationship to my experience and manner of thinking. That is, I feel something, I quickly interpret my

feelings intellectually, and react to both by choosing a course of action. We are publicly identified by thepossession of a cluster of different attributes, some bodily, some behavioral, and some mental and some

volitional. [See Business Executive Exercise 2.2].

In the scholastic tradition, this human personhood is represented by the soul that unifies the body

and spirit, the physical and the mental, the understanding and the will, the voluntary and the involuntary,and human instincts and human drives (Harr and Shorter 1983; Strawson 1959). Whether one holds with

Socrates that all knowledge is innate ready to be drawn out through education (e-ducere in Latin), or withPlato that all knowledge is fundamentally remembering, or with Aristotle that all knowledge begins with

sensation, in any case, the raw data for our reasoning is given through our sensory organs of the bodyworking in harmony with the soul (Thomas Aquinas: Summa Theologiae, Ia: 77-78, 84-85). Theunifying principle and power is the human person.

While on the one hand, our human personhood is fed and molded by the internal stimuli of oursensitive, cognitive, affective, and volitive lives, on the other, it is also influenced by external stimuli

whether they come from:


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Our fami ly and school stimu li: our childhood experiences of our parents, nursery school, siblings,grandparents and relatives, our adolescent experiences of peers and teachers at middle- and high-

schools, colleges and universities.

Our ergonomic Stimul i: experiences of the workplace in relation to gainful work, meaningful work, co-workers and labor unions, native talent perfected, new skills picked up, new sources of income and

rewards merited, and the like.

Our market stimu li: the whole world of supply and demand, consumer buying power and shopping, anexpanding world of thousands of brands, products, services, stores, malls, supermarkets,

transportation, logistics, newspapers, magazines, radio, television, movies, music, brick-and-mortar

markets, internet markets, www, blogs, e-bulletins, Facebook, search, purchase and consumption

experiences, our planned and unplanned shopping, our impulsive and compulsive buying, and the

like.

Our ideological stimul i: our unique value-experiences derived from our society, art and poetry,language and literature, science and fiction, textbooks and novels, libraries and art galleries, local,

national and global governments, law and order systems, religion and religious institutions, politics

and political agenda, history and culture, philosophy and theology.

Our human personhood receives, internalizes, filters, sorts, unifies, blends, lives and relives all theinternal and external stimuli in a mysterious, transcending synthesis and unity that really defines us.

Given the internal and external stimuli, that is, our physical, spatial and temporal worlds, our humanpersonhood develops certain personality characteristics,behavior patterns, cultivates certain virtues (or

vices), capacities or limitations, needs and wants, desires and dreams, habits and passions of heart, ethicsand morals, and transforms us into responsible (or irresponsible) persons. [See Business Executive

Exercise 2.3].

How this mysterious unity or self-attribution is done is still debated. Various religions attribute this to

a superior power in us that some call the soul, the spirit, the mind, the atman, the transcendent, theimmanent, or the divine in us. Others trace this power to our genes and chromosomes, or the mysteriousneural-physical body that we are endowed and engineered with. It is because of this unity that we say: I

feel, I speak, I did this, and not that our body feels, body speaks or that our body does something. Moreimportantly, we say: I own certain actions and their consequences, and hence we assert: I did this, I chose

this, I am accountable for this choice and the deed that follows, and I am responsible for the effects oroutcomes. It is because of this superior power in us that we can formulate a mission (personal, corporate,social or political) for ourselves that is beyond ourselves, a vision to realize this mission, and accordingly,we can spell ideals, ends, goals, objectives and the means to achieve this mission. It is because of this

body-spirit, matter-mind unity, the body becomes the home of the soul, the home of our intelligence, the

home of our virtue or vice, the home of ethics and morals, and the home of our responsibility . Hence, thebody becomes human, is humanized, and is sacred.

Figure 2.1is a rudimentary attempt to sketch this great phenomenon of human personhood formed bythe internal (organic) and external (environmental) stimuli or influences of our daily life. As indicated by

the two-way arrows linking all the stimuli, the internal and external stimuli influence and reinforce eachother circularly (not necessarily linearly), and systematically impact and mold our human personhood.

Ethics and morals, and therefore, corporate ethics and corporate morals, deal with both internal andexternal stimuli that affect the human person.

What Constitutes our Human Personhood?

Obviously, the human person is not a simple or random byproduct of the internal and external stimuli,


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such as those depicted in Figure 2.1. Our human personhood is a unique combination of four internal-external forces that unify, interpret, internalize and respond to the internal-external stimuli: our

immanence, our individuality, our sociality, and our transcendence. We explore each of these fourhuman vectors from the view point of corporate executive ethics.

Our Unique Immanence

Etymologically, immanence (in + manere in Latin) means to remain in, or to be operating and livingwithin something. We are living within our state that is within our country that is within this earth, which

is within the solar system that is within the universe. We are immanent in the world and in the universe.The human person dwells in immanence. That is we are incarnated in a world that is physical; both

humans and the world are characterized as dwelling in the universe that is in time, space, motion andgravitation.

Our immanence has two aspects: a) we are corporeal-material in nature; b) we are living physicalorganisms made up of flesh and blood. Because of our immanence we have needs, wants and desires; we

have also thereby capacities and limitations. Our needs and limitations are sourced in the interactions andunity that exist between each human being and its environment. We are bound by the physical laws of the

universe, and we are limited by the physical capabilities of our muscular and skeletal structure. Needsand limitations change and differ depending upon our age, gender, education, occupation, culture,religion, and where we are at any given moment.

Needs and limitations, however, do not define us. There is a unity between our corporeality and the

flesh and blood living organism that we are. The body is the way in which the person is; it is the sourceof our being in the world. The body is the foundation for feeling and the place where feelings areexperienced. It is the home of the intelligence. Without the body there cannot be a human person. On the

other hand, our body cannot be the sole source and locus of our human personhood. There is a unitybetween the human person and the body, but also a distinction. The body needs a principle to vivify it

and provide a source of unity for the body with its corporeal function, activities and processes of humannature. The Greeks and several religions call this principle of unity the soul (atman in Sanskrit, pneuma

in Greek, anima in Latin). Without the soul as the unifying principle we cannot be human persons, andwithout the body we cannot be human persons either; we need a unique combination of the two. Onlyhuman beings composed of spirit and body, mind and matter can be human persons; to be human beings

is to be both spiritual and corporeal.

The soul when joined to the body becomes the unifying principle of all activities, and becomes theseat of intelligence and will. Because of this soul or spirit we are immanent in the world in a unique way:we can sense the world, feel the world, love the world, explore, study and know the world, experiment,

change and manipulate the world, and control, forecast and predict the world. It is precisely thisinterconnectedness between the spiritual principle of the soul and the unique corporeality of our body thatgives rise to the unique individuality by which we identify the presence of the human person, a nd that

we own our actions as not performed by the body or by the soul in isolation, but as an unity and

immanent combination of the body and the soul whereby we say I did it or we did it. In the uniquejoining of the soul and the body something new comes into being that is greater than the mere sum of theparts (soul and body) added togetherthis is the unique human person.

This is systems thinking applied to the human person: we are more than the efficiency of the body orthe spirit, taken individually; we are an interactive whole that has energy, direction, drive, power and

passion far beyond the power of the body and soul taken individually. Ethics must see the human personnot only in our universal aspects but in our unique combination of mind and matter, body and soul, time

and eternity, and unique immanence.


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The discussion on our unique immanence as body and soul as human persons can be applied, mutatis

mutandis, to the corporation as a whole, since it is composed of real human persons. Thus, we need tounderstand, interpret and apply the concept and construct of corporate immanence as body and soul to thecorporate body and soul, reflecting on various propositions that can describe the corporation as animmanent body and an immanent soul.

[See Business Executi ve Exercises 2.4 and 2.5].

Our Unique Individuality

We are a unique combination of body and soul, mind and matter, faculties and powers, the consciousand the unconscious, the physical and the emotional, the intellectual and the spiritual, the individual and

the social, and the ethical and moral parts of our human personality.1 Such a unique combination makesknowledge, thought, talent and skills, choice and freedom possible. Such a unique process ofindividuation is not a simple or random byproduct of our body and genes, or a victim of biological and

economic exigencies of our human world. All these (including our genes and genetic compositions) willnot determine and control who we are and who we will become. Nor will our talents and skills,knowledge and thoughts, willed actions and behaviors totally determine the outcome of our individualdevelopment. They all contribute to our specific personality and uniqueness.

Our unique, non-repeatable, irreducible and irreplaceable individuality cannot be fully understood andexplained unless we accept that our uniqueness comes from being uniquely shaped and molded into theimage of God (or some such superior being) who made us into this unique and historical (i.e., originatedin specific combinations of space, time, motion and gravitation) composition of the body and soul, mind

and matter, family, social and historical environments. We are a unique meeting point between soul andbody, the corporeal and the spiritual, the physical and the social that we call the human personality orindividuality. Each of us, accordingly, is born with a unique destiny that forges and converges each one

of us into a unique transcendent openness of possibility that translates (from a near infinite number ofpossibilities) into a unique combination of talents and skills, knowledge and ideologies, thoughts and

actions, moral qualities and events, virtues and values. That is, we are a limited but immanent andtranscendent expression of unique human personhood we claim as our personal mission, vision, characterand self-identity. This particular course of our growth and change, consciously or unconsciously, leads to

the development of our personality, and within the structure of this personality will eventually emerge acertain character by which we designate ourselves as I, Ego, Me and experience consciously,

express and project externally in society as self.

As Raymond Niebuhr (1964: 55) expressed it compactly, every impulse of nature in man can be

modified, extended, repressed and combined with other impulses in countless variations. In consequence,no human individual is like another, no matter how similar their heredity and environment. To apply

systems thinking, the interactions of the various parts of the human person reflect and reveal the structure

1 I prefer to speak of individuality than the equivocal word personality. There is hardly any convergence amongpsychological or human resources (HR) theories and theorists in relation to the precise meaning behind words such as ego, self,personality, character, and the like. Solomon Asch (1946: 276-289) defines ego as the psychophysical organization of theorganism that refers to the individual, and defines the self as the phenomenal representation of the ego (i.e., the ego become

conscious). William James, Sigmund Freud, and William McDougal, among many others, define character to represent a patternof acts, rather consistent through time that may be said to characterize and define the human individual. This definition isobviously tautological; moreover, it does not explain what makes these actions and behavior consistent through time. Thesescholars, in general, emphasize the inward elements of motivation and intent as the major determinants of character (See Peck, R.

and R. Havighurst (1960: 1), The Psychology of Character Development, New York: John Wiley & Sons).


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of the whole. The nature of ones personality is greater that its expression in the ego; the human person isgreater than its individual expression at any given moment2 this is because human personhood

transcends both, a point we will discuss shortly. Like the body and the soul, the individual personalitywith its ego, self, and character can be a locus or the revelation of personhood, but it cannot be its onlysource (Rehrauer 1996: 34-36).

Our human personhood characterizes this profound unity between all our powers - bodily, mental,emotional and spiritualthis unity defines us (Covey 2004). For instance, perception is a combinationof sense perception, intellectual abstraction and evaluation, and affective attraction. That is, choice,thought, and feelings combine to move the will to action. A human being functions as a unity whenever itacts as a human being (Rehrauer 1996). Human personhood, therefore, entails a dynamic unity of theactivities of affection, cognition, and choice (Thomas Aquinas). The particular forms and patterns of

interaction of these three activities congeal over time into certain more or less integrated self-structure ofhabits or virtues (or vices) which in turn generate or manifest as a combination we call our personality

characteristics such as attitudes, beliefs, tendencies, motivations or psychological traits (Allport 1955).These behavior patterns are tested and reified over time and space and stored in human memory to form a

part of the personal infrastructure for future activity within the unity of the human person. This personalinfrastructure provides the foundation of an individuated personal disposition that in turn provides a

source of integration for all future activity (Rehrauer 1996: 25-27). This process is individuation, theformation of an individual style of life that is self-aware, self-critical and self-enhancing (Allport 1955:27-28).

The discussion on our unique human individuality as a unique image of God can be applied, mutatismutandis, to the corporation as a whole, since it is composed of real human persons, all made in the image

of God. This is the foundation for corporate executive spirituality. Thus, we can understand, interpretand apply the concept and construct of unique individuality made in the image of God to define and live

our corporate spiritual individualityand personality. [See Business Executive Exercises 2.6 to 2.8].

Our Unique Sociality

We do not live, move and have our being in isolation. Because of our unique immanence andindividuality we are social creatures, members of a common human species. We can sense, feel and

manipulate the world around as animals do. But far more than animals we have knowledge,becausethe activity of knowing is dependent upon a deeper reality, that of sharing. Knowledge by its very essenceis relational. Psychologists, philosophers, and sociologists are all in agreement that our immanence and

individuality are inseparable from our sociality. That is, unless there is another who is like me yet distinctfrom me, I can never come to a full understanding of who I am and what I am. Our very existence is

dependent upon this social quality of human personhood.3

2Eysenck (1947: 27) provides a rather comprehensive description of elements that construct human personality it is a sum

total of the actual and potential behavior patterns of the organism as determined by heredity and environment; personality

originates and develops through the functional interaction of the four main sectors into which these behavior patterns areorganized: the cognitive (intelligence), the conative (character), the affective (temperament) and the somatic (physicalconstitution) sectors. All these definitions of personality or character describe behavioral elements that compose them withoutexplaining how these disparate elements get organized into the individual unity that defines ones personality, character orindividuality.

3Even at the biological level, the physical structure of our body or corporeality is fundamentally social. Thus, our genes exist instrands of DNA that form pairs of chromosomes; our birth is conditioned on two individuals coming together; the basic geneticmaterial of our corporeality comes to us from others. Human reproduction, unlike animal reproduction, is not merely instinctual,

but a profound social experience of courting, conceiving, nesting, birthing, parenting, nurturing, and other family activities, eachof which contributes to our sociality of nurturance and dependence. From the first moment of human existence until the last,


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As human beings we have two major sources of information: genetic and cultural. These two sources

come together for us because of a highly specialized central nervous system. Our human nature hasevolved in a unique way such that we can and must communicate in a special way with other human

beings. We develop language of signs and symbols, pictography and hieroglyphics, and all these can onlyhappen within a social nexus (Asch 1987). Language enables us to share and communicate knowledge

with each other, and also to externalize our personality and our own personal experiences. Languagemakes interpersonal sharing of meaning possible, and so also a sharing of being in deeper humanrelationships. The fact that man is a speaking animal determines that we will be culturally shapeddistinctly different from the animals. The rational animal (of Aristotle) can be rational precisely becausehe is an animal that invents and uses words.

We are individuals precisely because we are social beings. By our very nature we are gregariousbeings. We need contact with other beings like ourselves in order to understand that we are human and

what this means. Without sociali ty there is no individuali ty. We are born and inserted into society. We

cannot be personali zed human persons in isolati on. I t is through our social contacts that we activate

and develop the abil i ty to be individual and social, to be ethi cal and moral. The child becomes aware asa person, as a human being of a particular individuality, as a function of its relations with other human

beings. Social action precedes the self and provides the materials for it (Asch 1987: 286; Flanagan 1991:122). In this sense, our sociality precedes and grounds our individuality.

Human personhood is more than our personality. We primarily develop our human personalitiesprecisely because all human beings share a common social being. Our fundamental nature of humanpersonhood (expressed as being sensitive, affective, cognitive and volitive) becomes alive through our

sociality. The nature and development of our individuality is a social product of both the social nature ofour genetic heritage and the quality of our social interactions with others and with our cultural heritage as

a whole. We carry in our bones and in our minds, in our genetic and cultural sources, something of all ofthose who have gone ahead of us and those who have been part of our lives. Our basic sociality takes usfrom the nuclear family we are born into broader groups such as ethnic, cultural, linguistic, national,

religious, ergonomic, political, and other group affiliations. We learn to be a member of a given society

by coming to know and practice the norms, rules, conventions and mores of that society. Societies andsocial regulations develop, pattern and shape our thinking, action and behavior. We not only learn aboutsocial regulations, but also learn to live within the framework and under the guidance of these socialregulations (Heller 1988: 19).

Social contact is necessary for our very survival as a species. Without social contact and interactions,be they physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual, we cannot develop our personality and ourindividuality, our community and society, and our culture and civilization. The rudiments of language,

signs and symbols, expressed in data, facts, figures, subjects and objects, properties, events, knowledge

and skills, virtues and vices, conversations and conflicts - are all very necessary for the development ofour self-identity and self-expression, our egoism and altruism, our ethical and moral values, our

leadership and followership, our personal and executive behavior. To us to be human beings is to be

social beings. Our individuality and sociality are grounded on and thrive upon our shared commonality ofnature and lives, our inherent and constant need for social interactions and exchanges. Ourdistinctiveness and individuation come into being when we are perceived by the other. As individuals wemake ourselves known against the background of our sociality and universality. Without human beings

around us with whom to compare ourselves, who perceive us and interact with us, our individuality reallyhas no meaning. Our ego is fundamentally other-directed. It needs and wants to be connected, to beconcerned with its surroundings, to bind itself to others, and to work with them (Asch 1987: 320).

human life is profoundly social(Rehrauer 1996: 37-38).


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This is the metaphysical and transcendent foundation of our individuality and immanence, our

parenthood and sociality. Our family and society, our history and culture, our values and religion, ourinterpersonal networking with others around us, all of these contribute to the make-up of who we are andwho we are becoming, of how ethical and moral we are and can become (Flanagan 1991). In particular,social systems of language, tradition, technology and communication, signs and symbols, leaders, values

and history, culture and civilization, morals and mores form an important part of our social and individualworld. It is within the context of this specific community that our individuality and sociality, immanenceand transcendence are situated and contextualized.

The discussion on our unique and essential human sociality can be applied, mutatis mutandis, to thecorporation as a whole, since it is composed of real human persons, all of whom are radically social in

being and becoming. Sociality can be built into our otherwise competitive and anti-social corporatepersonality and strategy. This is the foundation for corporate executive social spirituality. Thus, we can

understand, interpret and apply the construct of our unique and necessary sociality to define and live ourcorporate spiritual individualityand sociality. [See Business Executive Exercises 2.9 to 2.11].

Our Unique Transcendence

Etymologically (from Latin ascendere = to climb; transcendere = to go beyond, to surpass),transcendence implies going beyond ones sense and experience, emotions and feelings, knowledge and

skills, capacities and limitations, in order to achieve excellence, moral integrity, and extraordinary heightsof self-actualization. In Kantian philosophy, transcendence means going beyond sense data andhypothetical imperatives to categorical moral imperatives inherent in the organizing function of the mindand the will, and which are necessary conditions for human knowledge. Accordingly, transcendentalism

is a philosophy (attributed to 18thcentury German philosophers Kant, Hegel and Fichte) that proposes todiscover the nature of reality by investigating the process of thought rather than the objects of senseexperience. By extension, Emerson and other 19th century New England philosophers, defined

transcendentalism as a search for reality through spiritual intuition.

Human transcendence is founded on our nature as human beings, the inherent nature of our self-awareness as I am and as distinct from others, the transpersonal nature of human personhood, theexternalizing expression of underlying personhood through the process of character formation, and with a

world in which we are immersed yet which is totally other than us all these reveal the foundationalreality or human transcendence. Human transcendence is rooted in several dichotomies that relate to our

human personhood: mind-matter, soul-body, conscious-unconscious, subject-object, self-other,subjectivity-objectivity, subjectification-objectification, personal-transpersonal, individual-social,internal-external, temporal-eternal, spatial-universal, hypothetical-categorical, and the like. Our self-

awareness makes us subjects; others observing us make us objects. When others study us it makes usobjects, events or properties. Even when I treat myself as an object in self-reflection, I do not cease to be

a subject; but it is only through my objectification that I self-reflect and understand myself that Iunderstand my subjectification. Our self-understanding is not purely individualistic; it is relational; that

is, in contact with other persons and with the world of other human beings do I begin to understandmyself (Fuchs 1983: 177). As Erich Fromm (1955: 62) notes, it is only after we have conceived of theouter world as being separate and different from ourselves that we come to self-awareness as a distinct

being from others.

Our self-awareness and self-identity are beyond the sum total of our experiences. We do not identify

ourselves with our experiences, even though they may be engaging and memorable; neither do we defineourselves by what we see since we see, understand and identify ourselves beyond and beneath our day-to-


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day experiences. That is, we transcend our experiences; our self-awareness and self-identity are beyondthe totality of our experiences of sensing, feeling, perceiving, observing, believing, choosing, acting and

accomplishing. This is because our human being-ness and our human personhood underlie ourexperiences and unify them. This underlying personal being is transcendence even of our own personalidentity. Our personhood as personhood is often inaccessible even to us because it is a creative realitywith continuous possibility for change. But our immanence and transcendence unify all our changes and

experiences into a meaningful whole which we call our character or personality or self-identity.

Our transcendence also grounds are ability to hope, to dream, to design, to create, to invent, toinnovate, to discover and ventureall these we do for what is not yet accomplished. Our transcendencealso empowers us to plan our future, to make plans not only for what we will do, but for what we will notdo, and for what we want to become and not become. We are transcendent because we are temporal

beings who are aware of our temporality. Our very nature as temporal beings leads to define and plan ourlives in terms of meaningful past, present, and future. Our capacity for the future is the recognition of the

reality of our transcendence. It is because of our transcendence we have a future, or better, we are afuture, or that we can reinvent our future. In our actions we extend ourselves over a span of time from

past into the future. But in our moral act and behavior we transcend even the mere span of time, as wetouch on the divine and eternal in us.

All human acts and actions, activities and planned actions are stemming from our human person as individuality,

sociality, immanence and transcendence. How do our individuality, sociality, immanence andtranscendence ground corporate ethical and moral decisions actions?

Our individuality as corporate executives makes our actions (decisions and strategies) personal,with obligations of due ownership of the choices of inputs, processes and outputs we make.

Our sociality as corporate executives makes our acts and actions (decisions and strategies) socialand society- or common-good-oriented, with summons for due diligence of the choices of inputs,

processes and outputs we make.

Our human immanence as corporate executives makes our decisions and strategies, acts, actions,activities concrete, historical, geographical, contextual, bounded by concrete space (spatiality) and

time (temporality), and hence, uniquely situational, irreversible, existential, and accountable for

their consequences. Our human transcendence as corporate executives makes our decisions and strategies, actions,

activities, acts and planned actions meta-individual, trans-social and trans-organizational in

relation to the choices of inputs, processes and outputs we make.

As temporal beings we are capable of many actions and choose many alternatives; we have within ourgrasp an enormous range of events with their specific inputs, processes and outputs. We choose some of

these, and reject other competing alternatives.In the search, deliberation, choice, and subsequent actionslies our transcendencethe power to bring unity, consistency and continuity in our thoughts, desires andactions, to bring forth order in otherwise chaotic choices and environments, and correspondingly, intoour relationships with others (Asch 1987: 122-123). As subjects who are temporal, we transcend ouractivity, and this demands of us that we actively integrate every moment of our existence into a broader

pattern of self-conscious awareness (Rehrauer 1996: 45-47).

We often argue: I am not a bad person; I only did a bad thing. This excuse and distinction will nottake us far. Most of our activities center around feeling, thinking, and choosing, and all three areconnected. In every act of reason, in every act of affect or experience, and in every act of choice there is

a link between the activities and the one who performs them and owns them. We are more than ourthoughts, experiences and choices, even though all three activities are ours . Our transcendence unites

them, owns them, and takes responsibility for them. There is an intimate connection between what we doand what we are. We transcend our actions while they still remain our actions (Flanagan 1991: 134-


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136). There is a unity between the person who acts and the actions performed that lasts over time andintegrates them all into the context of what we have been before, what now, and what we will be in the

future. The condition for the possibility of this abiding unity between us and all that we do over time isthe transcendent principle of human personhood. This principle brings unity to our life and actions, andgives coherence and meaning to what we do and what we become. Personhood as transcendence is anexistential condition for the possibility and interpretation of our personal unity, individuality, sociality,

ethicality and morality (Hildebrand and Hildebrand 1966: 88).

The discussion on our unique and essential experience of transcendence, in the midst of ourimmanence, individuality and sociality, can be applied, mutatis mutandis, to the corporation as a whole,since it is composed of real human persons, all of whom are radically individual immanent and social in

being and becoming. Transcendence can be experienced and incorporated into our otherwise mundane

and materialistic, competitive and aggressive corporate personality and strategy. This is the foundationfor corporate executive transcendent spirituality. Thus, we can understand, interpret and apply the

construct of our unique and necessary transcendence to define and live our corporate spiritualindividuality and immanence, individuality and sociality. [See Business Executive Exercises 2.12 to

2.14].

Executive Freedom and Human Acts

An important aspect of our transcendence and our nature as executive human persons is our free willor the realm of our freedom. Our executive freedom is twofold: a) we are free to make choices; b) we are

free to determine the direction and meaning of our existence. When we categorically exercise thistwofold freedom, we exercise the basic transcendental freedom, which is the freedom to create ourselves.Freedom of choice is largely dependent upon the domain and situation of choices it is situational. Ourtranscendental freedom whereby we determine the meaning and direction of our existence is theautonomy of character which expresses the person behind the character. My choices may be limited, but I

can still be free in the autonomy of personhood that makes the choices. As Agnes Heller (1988: 54) putsit: the referent of liberty (liberum arbitrium) is action; the referent of autonomy is character. A completely

autonomous person may have no choices whatever owing to circumstances, but still be totally

autonomous. Often, there might be no external (e.g., market or economic or political) choiceswhatsoever; but there are real choices from within: to do or not to do, to become or not to become, to be

or not to be. This is autonomy at its best.

Personal executive autonomy is our transcendence over situations; it is mind over matter, soul overbody, the absolute over relative, the eternal over temporal, and life over death. We cannot choose ourbirth, our genetics, our parents, our gender, our race, our nationality and culturethey are the givens

of our immanence. But still our transcendence enables us to go beyond these constraints to exercise ourautonomous freedom to create a meaningful existence and personal history. Human transcendence may

not be absolute transcendence, but it is transcendence nevertheless(John Paul II: Veritatis Splendor, 35-53).

All these are aspects or dimensions of our individuality and sociality, transcendence and immanence.But, in the final analysis, human transcendence is grounded primarily in its openness to the absolute

transcendence of God. The human person possesses a dignity precisely in that it is a created reality whichis able to open itself to the One who creates. That is, our human transcendence is properly understoodonly in relationship to Gods absolute transcendence(John Paul II: Veritatis Splendor: pp. 28, 67, 72, 73,and 87). Thus, our human personhood as a reality is individual and social, immanent and transcendent.

Hence, given our individuality, sociality, immanence and transcendence, major values and


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responsibilities accrue. There is a multidirectional responsibility involved in being human. There is,additionally, a multidirectional responsibility involved in being an executive. We are responsible not

only for what we are (immanence), but who we are (individuality), what we do (sociality), and what wehave become (transcendence). That is, we are responsible for our individuality, sociality, immanence andtranscendence, individually and collectively; that is, we are responsible to ourselves (individuality), toothers, our community, society and culture (sociality), to the world and the universe we are immersed and

living in (immanence), and to God who created us and whose absolute transcendence we share, and tosomething beyond ourselves, society and the universe (transcendence).

Given our individuality and sociality, immanence and transcendence, several rights and duties,obligations and responsibilities follow, such as:

As corporate executives, we are responsible to our uni que immanence, the way we are uniquelystructured and engineered, our genetics and demographics, our psychographics (consumer

lifestyles) and ergographics (work-styles), our geographics (our unique position on the planet) and

cosmographics (our unique position in the solar system or the universe). While we expect others

to respect our unique immanence and particularity, we must also learn to respect the unique

immanence, individualization and personalization of those whom we serve as an organization and

of those whom we chose to be served.

As corporate executives, we are responsible to our unique individuality of talents and skills,passions and drives, attitudes and perceptions, feelings and emotions, and that is specifically

individuated about us. While we expect others to respect our individuality, we must also learn to

respect the unique individuality of our employees, customers, distributors, creditors, suppliers,

local and national communities, and even our competitors.

As corporate executives, we are responsible to our uni que sociality, our social talents and skills,and our unique capacity to interact, network, bargain, negotiate, argue, persuade, and lead

people. While we expect others to respect our sociality, we must also learn to respect the unique

sociality of our subjects and reports, customers and partners, competitors and regulators,

shareholders and all stakeholders alike.

Lastly, as corporate executives, we are responsible to our unique transcendence, our uniquemystique and philosophy, our unique vision and mission, our unique ideals and ideologies, our

unique values and virtues, our unique brand of inspiring and moral leadership, and our unique

ministry of servant leadership. While we expect others to respect our unique transcendence, we

must also learn to respect the unique and inaccessible transcendence of others, our subjects and

reports, our customers and partners, our employees and their families, our local and global

stakeholders alike.

Figure 2.2captures this dynamic quadric-directional moral responsibility of our human personhood.The challenge ofFigure 2.1 isFigure 2.2given our lives influenced by multiple internal and externalstimuli, how do we humanize and divinize ourselves for others. All five major constituents of executivehuman personhood and responsibility have starry boundaries to indicate ever widening scope, scale and

domain of responsibilities under individuality, sociality, immanence and transcendence, and therefore,under executive human personhood. [See Business Executi ve Exercises 2.15 to 2.16].

Further, we have a responsibility to actualize human personhood in a truly human way, to be trulycreative and innovative, to be value-driven, be free but empowered by moral and ethical imperatives, and

in sum, to be truly human. We investigate what it means to be truly human in Part II.

Part II: The Ethics of Corporate Human Act


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From our previous discussion, it should be clear that the human person (as a singular piece of creation

and image of God) is a multi-polar unity of several faculties and powers:

Sensitive(5 senses, instincts, drives, passions), Affective(emotions, feelings, attitudes, beliefs), Cognitive (perceiving and conceiving, thinking and reasoning, intuition and imagination,

exploration and experimentation),

Volitive(deliberation and will, choice and freedom); Personhood: a unique immanent and transcendent combination and composition of the body and

soul, mind and matter, self and others;

Environment: a planned and highly engineered product of the internal and external stimuli andworlds.

From this unique composition and engineering of the human personhood arise certain properties such

as human acts and actions that define human behavior and personality, self-identity and self-transcendence, and a strong and persistent need for self-actualization. The human person acts, and often,the actions are efficient and effective. In the process of acts and actions, the human person becomes

something, often beyond oneself, and achieves higher levels of human being the final destiny of humanacts being the perfection of the image of God and transcendence in us. We examine this human act as a

proximate foundation for human ethics and morality in general, and for executive and corporate ethics inparticular. In assessing the quality of a human act, moral or otherwise, we also make a judgmentconcerning the quality and identity of the person who acts.

What is an Executive Human Act?

Human acts are those that stem from human actors as human beings. Since the human personhood isbasically constituted of body and soul, mind and matter, emotion and spirit, intellect and will, and because

of this unique composition, it has immanence, individuality, sociality, and transcendence, it reasonablyfollows that human acts are those that define the human person as person, are acts that are characterized

by knowledge (derived from ones intellect and rationality) and freedom (capacity for choices based onones will). Human acts are thus freely willed acts.

Two elements are essential to human acts: an element of reason and ones volition.

Human reasoning is the combined effect of the intellect via thinking, intuition, imagination,explanation and experimentation on the sense and affective stimuli.

Human willing or volition is the combined effect of commitment, deliberation, and choice on thesense, affective and cognitive stimuli.

Human acts are deliberate; hence, they imply human control through rationality and will; theyare willed.

A truly human act is deliberate and voluntary; it is not forced or unduly constrained. Deliberationimplies knowledge of what one is doing, and Voluntaryimplies a free choice on the part of the human person to act. Hence, executive human acts are those corporate acts that are deliberate and voluntary.

They are those acts where the executive is the direct causal agent of an activity. In an executive

human act, the executive in some way chooses to perform that activity. Not all acts come under the full


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control of the human person; to the extent they do not, they are called actions, activities, reflexive actionswe will discuss these distinctions in a later section.

The human person is whole. We are our choices, our feelings and our thoughts, our aspirations andour dreams. We are also our relationships with other persons. Our relationships with others form andmould our personality, our character, our temperament, and our self. The human person in us brings this

profound unity between the internal and external parts and influences of our life; the human personhood isthe reason why they fit together the way they do.

But this does not define us fully. Our transcendental freedom empowers us to change ourselves, toredefine ourselves, even to reinvent ourselves and the image of God in us. We are, therefore, responsiblenot only for our individual acts and their consequences, but through these acts, responsible for our human

personhood. This is because we image ourselves through our choices, decisions, values, acts and actions;we image ourselves through our character, personality and temperament.

Hence, a creative human corporate or executive act must represent a powerful combination of our

personal and organizational creativity and innovation, invention and discovery, venture andentrepreneurship, reasoning and volition, freedom and autonomy, individuality and sociality, and

immanence and transcendence. The more of these elements we include in the corporate human act, themore unique it is, the more rare, non-imitable and nontransferable, and hence, generating a highersustainable competitive advantage for ourselves and the organization (Barney 1991).

Obviously, no one choice or thought or act or action can perfectly and totally image the person behindit. As human person we are wholes. As a society we image ourselves through our values, culture,

history and civilization. As executives we image ourselves through our corporation, its vision andmission, its goals and objectives, its values and reasons for existence.

Although the executive human person behind the action can never be fully known (qua person), wemay be able to analyze the executives actions using the four classical (Aristotelian) causes:

Formal cause that gives shape (form) and identity to executive undertakings and corporateentities; Materi al causethat represents the stuff from which organizational things are made; F inal cause, the reason for which organizations exist or are created; Ef fi cient cause, the organizational power which brings the corporate effect.

That is, we can understand the executive human person as an agent of his actions, the reasons forthese actions (the final cause), the internal dynamic of the action itself (the formal cause), the nature of

what physically happens (the material cause), and the connection between the executive person and hisactivity (the efficient cause). All four causes can be partially known, as the human person in hisexecutive agency can reveal something of himself as a person, because the person and the agency are one.

Since the person and agent are one, our actions also define the nature of our personhood. The executiveperson and the executive agency are one; the one reveals the other, and vice versa. [See BusinessExecutive Exercises 2.17 to 2.18].

The Phenomenology of the Executive Human Act

How does the corporate executive execute a human act? What happens when an executive acts, andhow does it happen? In assessing the morality or ethicality of the executive act we must understand the

phenomenological (structural-existential) process in which the act originates, progresses and is finallyposited. Morality and ethics are implied along the entire value-chain of the executive human act.


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An act or action is specified in terms of its purpose. Most action theories consider this action to be

adaptive, and rooted in our biological and ethological (history of behavioral mores and patterns) drivemechanisms. Every human act or action has typical human inputs (ends, ideals, goals), human processes(choices of means constrained by regulation, resolution and evaluation) and human outputs (social effects,outcomes, consequences and social externalities) in relation to the internal and external environments the

action is situated.

The epistemological/anthropological model of action theory emphasizes a data-gathering processing ofthe human organism. Interacting with the external and social world, the actor gathers data and receivesfeedback that is then compared and correlated with other data stored in the memory, and accordingly, datais classified and stored in hierarchical structures for use in future actions and interactions. Essential to

this model is the ethologicalinsight that the mechanisms and processes for gathering and processing dataefficiently, on both the physiological and social levels, are developed and altered in a manner dependent

on the efficacy of the processes themselves. That is, for our physiological, biological and social survival,we develop specific physiological and cognitive and volitive capacities that enable us better adapt to the

environment and meet its evolutionary challenges (Reynolds 1980: 89-165).

Our human motivated behavior is differentiated from that of the animal world by the level ofhierarchical sophistication, and specially, by our capacity to represent. A representation is a mapping ofone system into the attributes of another system for the purpose of facilitating interaction between the

representation-making system and the represented system (Gallistel 1985: 54). These mappings can bequite simple (e.g., tracing memory) or highly complex (e.g., a language system). Human beings represent

both their own motivational states (as experienced emotions and emotional behavior) and the

consequences of their actions. Emotion in both its aspects (emotional behavior and experienced emotion)is a representational phenomenon, with motivation being the thing that is represented (Gallistel 1985: 61).

This representation enables us to sense that our motivational activity stems from within ourselves and toanticipate the consequences of their action sequences. The potentiation (i.e., elevation of a units potentialfor becoming active; depotentiation is the opposite) of a given act-sequence by the processes governing it

make use of these representations. The potentiation-depotentiation theory of human representation makes

the following assumptions-based definitions:

Intentional Acts: Acts potentiated at higher levels by virtue of act-outcome (anticipatory)representations are denominated as intentionalacts.

I ntentional Motivated Actions: These are intentional acts primarily driven by motivation. Once weare able on a higher level to formulate a plan for the attainment of a goal via cognitive (anticipatory)

representations, we are capable of intentional motivated actions. Intentional actions are subset of

motivated behavior.

Automatic M otivated Behavior: An intentional action differs from automatic motivated behavior byits force of self-regulation and self-initiation. Intentions are motivated formulations of plans; they are

plans for the attainment of specific goals.

Intentionality: Is the formulation of a plan of action for the attainment of a goal that is heavilydependent upon the perceptual capacity and motivation of the one formulating the plan.

Voli tional Power: Motivation is converted to intention and an intention to action or behavior by ourvolitional power that is the power of our will aided by experience, cognition and memory.

Valences: These are motivational forces surrounding the cognitive representations and are critical inmoving the actor to transform the intention into behavior. This is the paradigm of motivated

behavior grounding action.

Motivated Behavior Acti on Theory: In this tradition, an action = motivation + intention + behavior, ina unified whole.

As a contrast, the social-interactionist paradigm of action traces the origin of any action to its socialheredity, history and environment, and only secondarily to motivation (see Rehrauer 1996: 99-114).


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Similarly, the determinist paradigm of action denies free will and reduces all acts and actions tohistorical determinism (George Hegel, Karl Marx), social determinism (David Hume, John Stewart

Mill), or bio-psychological determinism (Sigmund Freud, Jeremy Bentham).

The paradigm of motivated action theory postulates: a) Motivation (the setting of goals and theapportioning of energy for action toward the attainment of goals), b) Intention(transforming goals into

action plans), and c)plan performance (translate intention to conduct or outcomes). How motivation istranslated into intention, and how intention translates into action with desired outcomes are explained byvarious action theories such as follows (see Rehrauer 1996: 99-114):

The Voliti onalist Paradigm: The oldest theory of human action is the voliti onalist paradigmproposedby Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century. This paradigm of human action theory was followed

by several competing and complementary paradigms, such as the motivated behavior theory.

The Moti vation Paradigm: According to the motivation paradigm of human action, motivation isconverted to intention and an intention to action or behavior by the power of our will aided by

experience, cognition and memory.

The Social-I nteractionist Paradigm: As a contrast, the social-in teractioni st paradigmof action tracesthe origin of any action to its social heredity, history and environment, and only secondarily to

motivation.

The Epistemological/An thropological Paradigm: Thisparadigmor model of action theory emphasizesa data-gathering processing of the human organism; that is, human action is conditioned and definedby ones data gathering, processing, and interpreting capacities;

The determini st paradigm of action denies free will and reduces all acts and actions to historicaldeterminism (George Hegel, Karl Marx), social determinism (David Hume, John Stewart Mill), or

bio-psychological determinism or genetic heredity (Sigmund Freud, Jeremy Bentham).

In this book, we follow the volitionalist paradigm since it best safeguards the human personhood andhuman acts defined by the capacities of intellection, volition, and free will. Accordingly, we borrow some

elements of the motivation paradigm of action. We assume executive motivation is a function ofintellectual perception and judgment regarding ends and goals we choose for ourselves and/or for theorganization. We assume executive intention follows and accepts the perception and judgment. We next

assume that the executive fulfills his motivation by choosing appropriate means for realizing the ends and

goals using the intellectual processes of deliberation and decision, and that the executive volition wills themeans and chooses them. [See Business Executive Exercise 2.19].

Table 2.1 summarizes the volitionalist paradigm action theory model. In Table 2.1, we describe the

phenomenology of the human act as propounded by Thomas Aquinas and subsequently endorsed byseveral current ethical scholars. Thomas Aquinas analyzes the structure of the human act according to

two basic types of activities: those internal to the agent, and those external to the agent. To be human, theact must proceed from both the executive intellect and the executive will (Summa Theologiae, 1a, 2ae, 1a;1c). The action is primarily related to the will and the volitive powers. Hence, this action theory is also

called the volitionalist theory. Act and actions are represented as events that occur at the interface of themental and the physical; volitions are the way the person gets things to happen in the physical world

(Simon 1982: 18). The knowledge of what I choose to do, the state of change I intend to bring about

when I choose to perform this act or action, is extremely important in determining the meaning andmorality of this act or action (White 1968: 9).

The Order of Intention versus the Order of Execution

Corresponding to each of these internal faculties or powers (intellect and will) of the executive, there isan immanent/transcendence domain (Order of Intention) and external individuality/sociality domain of

activity (Order of Execution). The executive act may be said to originate in the order of intention and


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terminate in the order of execution. In the domain of the order of intention and execution, both theintellect (reason) and the will have specific roles. The executive human intellect (or reasoning capacity)

studies the act-situation, its context, variables, contingencies, facts and figures, antecedents, concomitantsand consequences of the possible human act, and in conjunction with the will (volitive power or faculty),does two things: a) choosing ends; b)proposing means to achieve the end.

The Order of Intention:

First, under choosing ends, the executive act may go through at least four tasks:

1) Intellectual perception of the entire context of the act/action situation;2) Volitive acceptance of the act given its perception;3) Intellectual judgment about critical variables of the act/action situation, their antecedents,

concomitants and consequences;

4) Volitive intention of the act/action given its perception and judgment.Secondly, underproposing means, the executive act may also go through at least four tasks:

5) Intellectual deliberation over means to the end chosen and studied under stages 1-4.6) Volitive consenting to act given deliberation over means to the end under stage 5.7) Intellectual decision or judgment or choice over means to the end given stages 1-6.8) Volitive choosing to act given deliberation, consent and decision over means to the end under

stages 5-7.

The Order of Execution: Thirdly, given stages 1-8, there follows the choosing of strategies andtactics given ends and means. Human behavior is directed toward the accomplishment of goals.Behavior is directed toward these goals by plans, which themselves are hierarchically arranged. Feedback

from the environment streamlines with these plans for a seamless guidance and control of an action.Hence, this and the following stages may also each go through four execution tasks:

9) Given organizational skills, talent and resources, intellectual investigation of competingalternative strategies for realizing chosen ends and means under stages 1-8.

10) Given organizational skills, talent and resources, volitive assessment of the desirability andviability of the investigated alternative strategies under stage 9.

11) Intellectual selection of the best alternative strategy that best realizes chosen ends and means.12) Volitive electionof the best alternative strategy under stage 11 and being committed to it.Fourthly, and lastly, is the implementation stage. Corporate behavior can be considered as the

consequence of an internal guidance system inherently present in the bioengineering of the human

organism. That is, the executive act or action is goal-oriented, planned, interactive, and self-regulatedbehavior. Given stages 1-12, the executive could finalize the execution act through the following fourstages:

13) Intellectual planning of the elected strategy implementation in terms of identifying, assessing andallocating resources.

14) Volitive election of the strategic plan of implementation under stage 13.15) Intellectual announcement and commencement and concrete execution of the implementation

plan elected under stage 14.16) Continuous monitoring, assessment, and completion of the implementation plan and assessing

the social consequences.


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Stages 1-16 may be said to characterize the value-action chain of the executive human act. Each

stage, whether intellectual or volitive, has its own moral content and obligation. Table 2.1summarizes allthe sixteen steps described above under the title: The Phenomenology of the Executive Act. Everycorporate executive act is human, critical, and has serious consequences to the company, the customers,and all the stakeholders. Instead of judging the act only by its consequences towards the very end of the

executive act, Table 2.1suggests a methodology to ethically and morally assess the executive human actalong all its 16 intellectual and volitive executive act-in-progressstages.

Table 2.1 suggests specific ethical and moral concerns for assessment along the 32 (intellectual-volitive) points or stages of the executive act. We assume that if ethics and moral content of the executiveact are safeguarded at the earlier stages, say stages 1-8 along both intellectual and volitive components,

the higher is the chance that the executive act will be ethical and moral in the subsequent eight stages,intellectual and moral. In general, stages 1-8 are very crucial; they define and specify the executive

human act. Table 2.1suggests a continuous ethical and moral assessment of the executive act. This is theadvantage of a phenomenological approach to corporate ethics. [See Business Executive Exercise 2.20].

These sixteen stages of the executive human act must not be considered as rigid bounded sequenced

actions or processes along the executive decision ladder. They are not mutually exclusive or collectivelyexhaustive (MECE) categories. They are best understood as flexible and fluid stages, with much backand forth between stages. They are dynamic, interactive and feedback processes within the contextual

whole of the executive act, each stage influencing the others. Each stage, however, may be fraught withexecutive passions, impulses and instinctual drives, not to speak of stakeholder pressures and Wall Streetdemands. But the transcendent human personhood of the corporate executive can synthesize and

harmonize these diverse polarities of human experience along the multiple stages of the executive humanact-in-progress.

Theory of Action: The Volitionalist Tradition

The model in Table 2.1 assumes that humans are endowed with the intellect and volitive faculties,

each characterized by autonomy or freedom. The model roots the executive act in the powers of his will(hence, called volitionalism), thus providing the executive a sense of power, agency and control along all

the stages of the human act, an experience of a transcendent internal-external unity in his decisions, and asense of responsible ownership of all the 16 stages and their consequences. Nothing is left to vagariesand chance occurrences common to the external physical world. The model reveals the basic executiveaction, the action that causes other actions but which in itself is uncaused (and hence, explained away)

by other antecedent or concomitant actions.4 To act is to be a cause uncaused, and every executive must

be capable of certain basic actions where the corporate executive is the sole author and cause. Themodel thus grounds executive personal ownership, accountability, and responsibility of his acts or

actions.

In the volitionalist paradigm depicted under Table 2.1, acts and actions primarily consist in willing;

4Contemporary physics believes that every physical change must be the result of a prior event causally related to it. If everyaction is directly and physically caused by some other action previous to it, argued Arthur Danto, then no action is possible sinceevery action is really nothing more than a cumulative effect of prior cause or causes in an infinite regression. Hence, we need to

affirm a basic action" that cannot be totally explained by appeal to any other antecedent actions as cause to effect; it is aninstance of a direct capacity to act. The volitionalist model of executive action portrayed in Table 2.1 explains the

phenomenological ground for the basic action (Danto 1965). In this sense, acts and actions are different from occurrences. The former are often uncaused; the latter are caused or happenstances without much human intervention. An act, in its generic

sense, is the exercise of human power to make it happen.


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events are caused by volitions based in desire, and the volitions are themselves uncaused (Prichard 1968:60-65).5 That is, the central characteristic of specifically human acts and actions is that they are both

willed and intentional (Taylor 1964). However, the nature of volition and how it translates into action isstill vague among volitionalists and non-volitionalists alike. By whatever name we call it, volition orintellection or bodily motion, or whatever combination thereof, there must exist in us a fundamentalmotivational (kinetic and potential) energy or power that is rationally released into action when triggered

by certain internal and external factors. This energy is directed by reason in response to certainsituational stimuli (Audi 1993: 101-104). [See Business Executive Exercise 2.21].

Table 2.1 incorporates all the four aspects of a human act: immanence, transcendence, individualityand sociality, thus making it a complete human act with both internal and external orders of execution.Further, Table 2.1is a descriptive model, not a prescriptive one. It reflects adequately how we experience

ourselves as masters of our own acts, as causes of change in the world, and how we describe our creativeexperiences regarding human acts. It is a phenomenological analysis and not a noumenological (as

required by human being-ness and human personhood). It illustrates how the human act can becharacterized as an intellectual and volitive process in a given situation. The intellectual component must

be supplemented by para-intellectual powers humans have such as perception, emotion, intuition,imagination, intellectual passion, exploration and experimentation. Similarly, the volitive process must

be complemented by other human processes such as instinctual drives, volitive passion, will power,genetics, impulsive and compulsive behaviors, the unconscious and the preconscious.

Stages 1-16 and their total 32 process points correspond to the volitionalist action theory. An actiontheory should explain and emphasize the immediate interaction between the individual and his context interms of specific situational demands and the agents current states or dispositions (Chapman and Skinner

1985: 203). The biology, psychology, sociology, and ethology of human action is still studied andspeculated upon with no definitive answers.

For instance, the human infant is born not fully developed; hence, in order to maximize its potentialityfor survival, the human species, wittingly or unwittingly, creates, develops transmits certain bio-

physiological and social structures, certain emotional and cognitive response patterns within the human

organism, which move adults to care for helpless infants (Berger and Luckman 1966: 48-50). Similarly,in childhood, adolescence, and later development into adulthood, our educational, religious and socialstructures help our capacity for selective perception and defensive cognition, and for cognitiveinteractions with the world and others (Margolis 1987).

Human Act versus Human Operations and Actions

5There is much debate about attributing causality of an act or action to a given power of the human actor. Thus, Frankfurt

(1993) argues that volition and will interact in making decisions concerning second-order choices of first-order values. Davidson

(1963) claims that personal agency does not require agent causation, and so reduces actions to bodily motions caused by aprimary volitional reason. Hornsby (1980) characterizes volition as a combination of trying and consequences, as an exercise of

internal forces resulting in external consequences. Charles Taylor (1964) argues that action consists in rationally (intentionally)directed behavior, while Richard Taylor (1973) defines an action in terms of direct purposeful activation of personal agency or

power. For Hart (1968), action is merely a generic description term for a conjunction of the minimum qualities required to makea social contribution of responsibility. Velleman (1993) sees action as the activation of agency, agency being nothing more than

the possession of a motive to act according to reason. Finally, Thalberg (1977) believes action to consist in a conjunction of sub-events logically and causally related, each of which is replaceable by others without altering the fundamental nature of thespecific action itself. These are different understandings of human action. But they share a common commitment to personalagency or causality, and they all rely upon the existence of volition. Whatever this term volition may mean to each author,

they all are trying to explain how it is that an intention formulated inside the individual is translated into physical action oractivity outside the actor (see Rehrauer 1996: 90-94).


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All along, thus far, we have been using the word act and actions interchangeably. Philosophers andethical scholars, however, distinguish between human acts, human reflexes, human activities, human

operations and human actions.6 These concepts, their definitions and boundaries are still debated among

ethical scholars. Since these distinctions are useful for executive moral assessment, we discuss thembriefly at this juncture.

Human beings generate varied responses some which we call acts, some as reflexes, some asoperations and some as actions. In general, we may distinguish the following:

Human acts: these are specifically human, and we do not share them with the animal world.These are willed and deliberate human responses to the internal and external stimuli. In these

human acts the human actors are in dominant control because of their rationality, freedom and

free will. In order to be human acts, they must proceed from both the intellect and the will.

Human acts are freely willed acts; they are deliberate because of our capacity for reasoning and

willing them. They proceed from reasoning about identify and investigating alternative choices

and their consequences, and accordingly, we deliberately choose the best alternative. Human acts

are deliberate and voluntary choices. Deliberation implies knowledge of what one is doing, and

voluntary implies a free choice on our part to perform this act. Morality can be predicated

primarily about human acts since we are the direct causal agents of such acts.

Human Actions: These come from human beings but in conjunction with the internal and externalenvironment. Some actions are involuntary (e.g., reflexiveactions or highly habitual, impulsive or

compulsive actions); other responses are voluntary and are internal to us (we call these human

operations) while other responses are external to us (and we call them human actions). Human

actions do not define us as human acts do. While human acts are under dominant human control,

human actions are not. Situations and contingencies, resources or lack of resources, condition

and constrain these actions more than our role in them. Human acts belong to us; we own them;

they are internal to us; they are ouracts. Human actions, on the other hand, do not define us; we

do not fully own them; they are external to us; we just do them given shareholder pressures and

market opportunities, competitive threats and creditor problems.

Actions often happen to us despite ourselves. In acts we make things happen; we perform acts despite

odds and oppositions from the world. Actions are events that we are involved in; acts are volitions thatwe originate. In this chapter, we understand a human act7 as a human blend of thought, feeling,

6Scholars of psychology and empirical sciences distinguish between activity and behavior. The terms are used interchangeably,

but often have different connotation. Thus, human actions that are overt, something externally manifested and observable, andobjectively measurable, are called by the empirical sciences as behavior, in relations to animals and human beings alike.

Actions that are internal (often unobservable) are called activity. Thus, according to this understanding, intellection, volition,experiencing, imagining and dreaming will be designated as activities, while externally expressed counterparts such as thoughts,choices, experience of satisfaction/dissatisfaction, expressions of dreams and imagination will be called behavior. Thesedistinctions, however, are hardly adequate to understand some phenomena that are both externally manifest but originated from

within, such as motivation, intention, freedom, judgment, decisions, shared value and interpersonal reactions and meanings.Similar is the distinction between a movement and an action. Consider the entire movement of throwing a pitch in baseball there are tens of movements of the body, arms, head, eyes, leg and hand muscles, hips, fingers and the like. Which of these are

mere movements and which are human actions? According to Simon (1982: 9), movements become actions only when they areexecuted in appropriate contexts. Such actions are composite units of several coordinated and purposive movements. Similarly,playing a subtle classical piano etude, carving an intricate statue, painting an outdoor exquisite scene, or cooking an exotic dishare many movements that are disciplined but complex composite of meanings, purpose and deliberate actions. Human creativityis evidenced in these activities. These are created logical patterns that become a part of who we are and how we interpret our

human creativity. They become part of our world and professionalism. On the other hand, the distinction between human actand human action is much more nuanced, and we follow this discussion in the main text for a better understanding of its moralimplications.

7An act is distinct from an action. According to Thomas Aquinas, an act is a state of being (actus in Latin); God is absolute Act

in this sense; we participate in his state of being when we act. Act is realized potentiality, and hence, it is the polar opposite of


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perception and choice posited with full will; an act is always intentional; actions, on the other hand, aremore mechanistic, routine, habitual, and not always intentional. Thus, acts define us; actions describe us.

In this sense, an act is to bring about something, to cause it to happen; while an action is the bringingabout of something (White 1968: 2). A human act is part of the self who acts. Francis Bradley (1876: 33)argued thus: In a human act the human will must be in the act and the human act must be in the will; asthe will is the self which remains the same self before, during and after the act, the human act, which was

part of the self, is now part of the self.

Table 2.2 describes and distinguishes executive human acts, human reflexes, human operations andhuman actions across four constitutive dimensions of human personhood: individuality, sociality,immanence and transcendence, and some of their two-way combinations. Not every action brought about

by a human executive agent is self-revelatory, deliberate or expressive of our executive human

personhood. For instance, our heartbeat, breathing, pulse, blood circulation, metabolism and other motormovements are involuntary and reflexive. Some responses to the internal or external stimuli are

generated from within, such as sensing, perceiving, feeling, loving, knowing, willing, and the like; theseare operations reflecting our internal worlds of faculties, powers and senses. Some of our responses are

voluntary reactions to the external world or actions these are transactional responses of speaking,communicating, bargaining, negotiating, giving, receiving and the like. Morality and ethicality can be

primarily predicated of human acts, and derivatively about human operations and human actions.

Human act is different from human behavior. Human behavior is composed of human acts, human

operations and human actions. Human acts originate from us as human actors; human actions originatefrom us as human agents. This distinction presupposes there is a difference between the human person as

person, and the human person acting as agent (Simon 1982: 11). The human person is a transcendental

whole, and as such cannot be the object of study; on the other hand, the human agent as part of this wholeis observable and can be studied. Human actions belong to the agent, and no single or collective human

actions can totally define the human person. Only a portion of his personhood is expressed and revealedwithin a particular configuration of his actions and activities (Heller 1

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XLRI 2013 - Managerial Ethics - Chapter 02 - The Foundation of Corporate Ethics - The Human Person

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