Kapaligiran, Etika at Negosyo
Authors: Mabaquiao Napoleon Jr 
Published: October 2022

The causes of the environmental crisis are many and diverse, and so are the possible ways to handle and eventually resolve this crisis. This essay advances one of such possible ways which results from relating the following two considerations. On the one hand, a fundamental kind of cause attributed to this crisis, on a theoretical level, concerns the perspectives used to determine or weigh the value of nature for humans. The analysis of these perspectives is the primary task of environmental ethics. On the other hand, on a practical level, the usual causes of the environmental damages of great magnitude are the business acts of corporations. Corporations, for instance, are the ones extracting enormous resources from nature and likewise the ones dumping wastes into it on a large scale. These considerations give rise to the question of which theory in environmental ethics will  appropriately serve as a moral guide for corporations in their dealings with the natural environment. In accordance with the type of ethical standing that can be attributed to corporations, this essay endorses a rationalist ethical perspective in the Kantian form to address the said question.

References

Callicot, J. Baird. “An Ecocentric Environmental Ethic.” Applying Ethics. 6th edition. Ed. Jeffrey Olen and Vincent Barry, 485-491. New York: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1999.

Coates, John. “The Environmental Crisis: Implications for Social Work.” Journal of Progressive Human Services 16, no. 1 (2005): 25-49.

_______. “Exploring the Roots of the Environmental Crisis: Opportunity for Social Transformation. Critical Social Work 4, no. 1 (2003). Retrieved from: <http://www1.uwindsor.ca/criticalsocialwork/exploring-the-roots-ofthe-environmental-crisis-opportunity-for-social-transformation.>

Dobson, John. “Defending the Stakeholder Model: A Comment on Hasnas, and on a Dunfee’s MOM.” Business Ethics Quarterly 9, no. 2 (1999): 337-345.

Elliot, Alexander, James Cullis, and Vinita Damodaran, eds. Climate Change and the Humanities: Historical, Philosophical and Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Contemporary Environmental Crisis. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.

French, Peter. “The Corporation as a Moral Person.” In Business Ethics: A Philosophical Reader, edited by Thomas White, 228-235. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1993.

__________. Corporate Ethics. New York: Harcourt Brace and Company, 1995.

Hoffman, Michael. “Business and Environmental Ethics.” In Business Ethics: A Philosophical Reader, edited by Thomas White, 830-839. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1993.

Hollander, Jack. The Real Environmental Crisis: Why Poverty, Not affluence, is the Environment’s Number One Enemy. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.

Jamieson, Dale. A Companion to Environmental Philosophy. Oxford: Balckwell, 2001.

Kant, Immanuel. “The Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals.” In Basic Writings of Kant, trans. Thomas Abbot, edited by Allan Wood, New York: The Modern Library, 2001.

_________.“The Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals.” In Great Books of the World. Vol. 42 Kant, edited by Robert Maynard Hutchins. Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1952a.

_________. Critique of Practical Reason. In Great Books of the Western World, edited by Robert Maynard Hutchins, Colorado: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1952b.

Leopold, Aldo. “The Land Ethic.” In Applying Ethics, 6th edition, edited by Jeffrey Olen and Vincent Barry, 460-469. New York: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1999.

Mabaquiao, Napoleon Jr. “Ang Mabuting Kalooban at Sukdulang Prinsipyo ng Etika: Mula sa Pananaw ni Immanuel Kant.” Malay 17, no. 1 (2006): 25-39.

_________. “Corporations and the Cause of Environmental Protection.” Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12 (2002): 11-15.

_________. “Ang Kapaligiran at mga Korporasyon: Mula sa Rasyonalismong Pananaw.” Malay 23, no. 1 (2010): 111-125.

_________. Making Life Worth Living: An Introduction to the Philosophy of the Human Person. Quezon City: Phoenix Publishing House (2017).

Meyers, Christopher. “The Corporation, its Members, and Moral Accountability.” In Business Ethics: A Philosophical Reader, edited by Thomas White. 251-260. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1993.

Shaw, William, H. Business Ethics. California: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 2002.

Singer, Peter. “The Place of Nonhumans in Environmental Issues.” In Business Ethics: A Philosophical Reader, edited by Thomas White. 849-854. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1993.

__________. 2011. Practical Ethics. 3rd Edition. New York: Cambridge University Press.

__________. “All animals are equal… or why supporters of liberation for blacks and women should support animal liberation too.” In Applying Ethics, 6th edition, edited by Jeffrey Olen and Vincent Barry, 411-423. New York: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1999.

Steinbock, Bonnie. “Speciecism and the Idea of Equality.” In Applying Ethics, 6th edition, edited by Jeffrey Olen and Vincent Barry. 438-445. New York:Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1999.

Taylor, Paul. “The Ethics of Respect for Nature.” Applying Ethics, 6th edition, edited by Jeffrey Olen and Vincent Barry. 469-480.

New York: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1999. Velasquez, Manuel. Business Ethics: Concepts and Cases. New Jersey: PrenticeHall, 2000.

Mula sa Internet

“Marinduque Mining Disaster” <http://www.socialwatch.org/sites/default/files/pdf/en/marinduque2005_phi.pdf>

“Top 10 Environmental Disasters”<http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1986457,00.html>

“25 Biggest Man Made Environmental Disasters In History” <http://list25.com/25-biggest-man-made-environmental-disasters-in-history/>