Essay - Legal Business Environment Legal Environment of Business Modern Businesses Have...

legal business environment

***** Environment of Business

Modern businesses have to operate under a v*****riety ***** laws and regulations. The business manger has to ensure that all federal and state mandate laws are followed ***** avoid litigation and penalties. In addition to the laws on the books the businesses also have ***** be sensitive to ***** public opinion ***** ethics. Some of the ethical issues are covered by law but others may be related to the public image of the company and may be of equal importance to some businesses.

TRENDS IN LEGAL DECISION-MAKING

Interaction between Ethics and Law

***** ethics and law increasingly become interwoven, it is becoming more ***** ***** difficult ***** create distinction between ***** two. Both ethics and law deal with right and wrong both lay down rules for social cooperation and business conduct. Ethics practiced ***** the society ***** often incorporated into the law through legislation or court decisions ***** are thus ***** as a p*****rt of the law [Reed et al, 2005].

Ethics are learnt from the soci*****y and ***** often imposed upon an individual by the norms of ***** society. What is permissible ***** behavior in a society is determined by the society; the f*****mily, the comp*****y or even the ***** which incorporates the ethics of the society into ***** leg*****lation. The motivation to follows *****, which are not a part of the law, comes from within. Even if the law contains a matter ***** we may ***** consider ethically correct, the ***** to follow the ***** comes from outside the individual in ***** shape of compliance with the ***** law. Most people knew that slavery was unethical ***** as it ***** not sanctioned illegal, ***** cont*****ued until it was declared illegal.

***** morals tell us ***** ethics, we know now as we knew before, that discrimination on the grounds of race, color, sex and religion in bus*****ess transaction is ethically in***** but the force of law was required to curb the selfishness that is present in all of us.

Moral*****y and ethics do ***** necessarily have the ***** of ***** behind them and ***** not be ***** ***** everyone ***** the fear of the law makes everybody pay attention to his/her legal duty. As Justice Holmes said, "A bad man who cares nothing for an ethical rule which is *****lieved and practiced by his neighbors is likely never*****less ***** care a good deal to ***** being made ***** ***** money, and will want to keep out of jail ***** he can" [Reed et al, *****].

Legal system, ho*****ver attempts to set a basic minimum, while ethics may demand us to do more. The logic behind ***** approach in bus*****ess ***** sometime divided into two categories; *****malism and consequentialism. Formalism advocates absolute morality, a *****icular act is wrong whatever the justification ***** the philosophy of formalist (deontologist) ethics. ***** formalist would ***** lying as wrong, no matter what the circumstances. On ***** other hand, a consequenti*****list (teleologist) focuses on the consequences ***** actions,