Can We Expect Corporations to Be Virtuous?

Philip Pettit (Australian National University, Princeton University ), Philip Pettit (Princeton University , Australian National University)

The Collective Ethics Seminar: Online Presentation – 11 November 2024 – 15.15 – 16.45 CET / 09.15 – 10.45 EST.

Philip Pettit (Princeton University / Australian National University) – “Can We Expect Corporations to Be Virtuous?”

On Monday 11 November 2024, Philip Pettit will give an online presentation at the Collective Ethics Seminar entitled “Can We Expect Corporations to Be Virtuous?”

Abstract: In order to perform as an agent, pursuing its goals across different scenarios, a corporate body has to be organized to form purposes and representations that its members can rally around. But modes of organization vary enormously and can be more or less restrictive of the range of adjustment and action available to a body. The C17 joint stock company introduced a way of organizing a commercial firm that has proven, partly as a result of later developments, to restrict deeply how such a corporate agent can perform. The restriction is most salient in the way it deprives the normal sort of corporation of the ability to display anything worthy of being described as virtue.

The online seminar is open for all to attend. The session starts at 15.15 CET / 09.15 EST. You can join the session via the following link: https://univienna.zoom.us/j/62736288881?pwd=SndEdTNoNlZtSzJqcmpabm5NaWIyUT09

For more information about the seminar and the schedule for 2024S, please see https://social.univie.ac.at/events/collective-ethics-seminar/.

We hope to see you at the seminar!

Kind regards,

Gunnar Björnsson (Stockholm University), Olle Blomberg (University of Gothenburg), and Niels de Haan (University of Vienna)