Empirical Business Ethics Research

and Paradigm Analysis V. Brand

ABSTRACT. Despite the so-called ‘paradigm wars’ in

many social sciences disciplines in recent decades, debate

as to the appropriate philosophical basis for research in

business ethics has been comparatively non-existent. Any

consideration of paradigm issues in the theoretical busi-

ness ethics literature is rare and only very occasional ref-

erences to relevant issues have been made in the empirical

journal literature. This is very much the case in the

growing fields of cross-cultural business ethics and

undergraduate student attitudes, and examples from these

fields are used in this article. No typology of the major

paradigms available for, or relied upon in, business ethics

has been undertaken in the wider journal literature, and

this article addresses that gap. It contributes a synthesis of

three models of paradigms and a tabulated comparison of

ontological, epistemological and methodological

assumptions in the context of empirical business ethics

research. The author also suggests the likely (and usually

unidentified) positivist paradigm assumptions underlying

the vast majority of empirical business ethics research

published in academic journals and also argues for an

increased reliance on less positivist assumptions moving

forward.

KEY WORDS: cross-cultural business ethics, empirical

business ethics research, ontologies, epistemologies and

methodologies, paradigm analysis, paradigm typologies,

undergraduate student attitudes

Introduction

Paradigm issues are crucial; no inquirer, we maintain,

ought to go about the business of inquiry without

being clear about just what paradigm informs and

guides his or her approach (Guba and Lincoln, 1994,

p. 116).

Academic business ethics research is significantly

multidisciplinarian in character, and perhaps because

of this, a coherent or shared research methodology

has not emerged. Researchers often have a business

school background, but the subject can be engaged

with from within a range of alternative disciplines,

depending on the way issues are framed. The Journal

of Business Ethics describes its aim as ‘‘to improve the

human condition by providing a public forum for

discussion and debate about ethical issues related to

business’’, and notes that it publishes ‘‘original arti-

cles written from a wide variety of methodological

and disciplinary perspectives’’ (Journal of Business

Ethics, 2007). The website for Business Ethics Quar-

terly notes that ‘‘submissions are encouraged from all

relevant disciplines, including accounting, anthro-

pology, economics, finance, history, law, manage-

ment, marketing, philosophy, political science,

psychology, sociology and religious studies/theol-

ogy’’ (Society for Business Ethics, 2007). Given this

diversity, it is relevant that business ethics research

methodology appears at times to be influenced more

strongly by the disciplinary background of the

researcher than by an openness to the multiplicity of

available research frameworks. Business school aca-

demics have commonly employed the quantitative

empirical methods familiar to them from financial

and accounting concepts, and psychologists similarly

may be inclined to use quantitative techniques

common within psychology research. Philosophers

and legal academics, on the other hand, may be

more likely to contribute to the normative stream of

business ethics debates.

The lack of a shared methodology is perhaps

apparent in the way the research agenda has

unfolded. Early emphasis on normative develop-

ments has given way to a heavier focus on empirical

work, although greater emphasis could still be given

to this approach (Spence and Rutherfoord, 2003).

Overall, the majority of empirical studies have used

quantitative methodologies (Brand and Slater, 2003;

Journal of Business Ethics (2009) 86:429–449 � Springer 2008DOI 10.1007/s10551-008-9856-3

Crane, 1999). Qualitative studies are becoming

more common, but remain a much smaller per-

centage of the work undertaken by business ethics

researchers, despite the existence of some highly

influential qualitative work, such as Jackall’s Moral

Mazes (1988). Interestingly, the approach taken by

the majority of empirical work contrasts strongly

with the methods employed by two moral devel-

opment researchers whose work has been important

in the development of business ethics research. Both

Kohlberg (1981, 1984) and Gilligan (1982) made use

of in-depth interviews with a small number of

individual research subjects when formulating their

highly influential theories. Insufficient attention has

been given to business ethics methodological issues

despite influential articles and calls for increased

efforts in this respect (Crane, 1999; Robertson,

1993; Randall and Gibson, 1990).

The gradual but slight shift to increased qualitative

methodology in more recent years has been

accompanied by a very limited acknowledgement of

the importance of identification of underlying

philosophical paradigms in business ethics research.

‘Paradigm’ is used here to connote a group of basic

beliefs that is concerned with ‘ultimates’ or ‘first

principles’ and that delineates for a person their

understanding of the world they inhabit, including

their place in that world and ‘‘the range of possible

relationships to that world and its parts’’ (Guba and

Lincoln, 1994, p. 107). Whether express or implicit,

a researcher’s beliefs about both the nature of busi-

ness ethics knowledge and what it is possible to

know will influence what researchers try to discover

and how they attempt to discover it. These are

matters which ought to be consistent with each

other and to be explicable within a cohesive body of

theory (or ‘paradigm’), if the research is to have

integrity. In other social science disciplines, it has

become a matter of assumption that good research

involves an analysis of the nature of knowledge in a

particular field and debate as to the most suitable

mechanisms for obtaining that knowledge, yet the

absence of discussion of more philosophical concepts

underpinning a given piece of research in business

ethics is almost complete. No significant body of

work has been developed to address the links

between underlying paradigms, research meth-

odology and methods in business ethics. There have

been isolated but important contributions in the

non-empirical journal literature (Collier, 1995;

Crane, 1999), but empirical journal references to

relevant concepts are sparse, and the debate has not

developed. Curiously, the virtual absence of ‘para-

digm wars’ from the business ethics literature can be

contrasted with the activity in relatively closely allied

fields, such as management and accounting, disci-

plines in which many business ethics researchers are

located, and where 10 years ago it was commented

that ‘‘[a] review of major accounting and manage-

ment journals over the past 10 years could give the

impression that accounting researchers and theore-

ticians will not rest until the last remaining positivist

has been strangled with the entrails of the last

remaining critical theorist’’ (Parker and Roffey,

1997, p. 1). Nothing approaching this level of

passion has been evident in the empirical business

ethics literature. Yet, when compared with general

social sciences research, the special contextual and

sensitive nature of empirical business ethics investi-

gation makes a thorough consideration of the

philosophical assumptions underlying that research

critical.

Examples from the field

Examples from two subfields of the extant empirical

journal business ethics literature illustrate the lack of

existing attention to, and identification of, under-

lying research paradigm assumptions. The ethics

perceptions of undergraduate business students and

the impact of culture on ethics attitudes are two

concerns identifiable from the fast-growing empiri-

cal business ethics literature published in academic

journals. Corporate scandals, such as Enron and

Worldcom, focused attention on the ethics educa-

tion of business students. While a popular (and

convenient) subject of study as proxies for business

practitioners, surprisingly scant evidence exists in

general in relation to the ethical perceptions of

business students as students (D’Aquila et al., 2004).

Qualitative work in relation to this group is almost

non-existent. In-depth analysis of undergraduates’

ethics perceptions that might assist in understanding

how business leaders of the future develop their

ethical thinking is, for example, completely lacking.

Despite the potential sensitivity of students in rela-

tion to their ethical attitudes, and the complexity of

430 V. Brand

unbundling the influence of factors such as peer

pressure, life stage and social desirability bias in

student responses, little attention has been given to

the nature of the kinds of knowledge that might be

collected in relation to student opinions, and to the

methodologies that might best fit aggregation of

knowledge of that kind. Similarly, in the complex

and subtle sub-field of cross-cultural business ethics,

qualitative work has been rare, and positivist

assumptions have been relied upon implicitly in the

vast majority of studies. This point is developed

further in a later section of this article.

Business ethics research involves investigating a

social phenomenon with its own peculiar difficulties.

The subject matter is intrinsically sensitive, decisions

are often strongly context-specific, and distorting

effects such as social desirability bias are reportedly

particularly strong (Randall and Fernandes, 1991;

Randall et al., 1993). Explicit and careful enuncia-

tion of underlying frameworks is important to the

development of effective business ethics research. A

clear understanding of the philosophical ground on

which a business ethics research study rests is a

critical step in the research process. Assumptions as

to the nature of available business ethics knowledge

and the ways in which that knowledge might be

obtained are not minor matters to be glossed over,

but rather essential factors to be incorporated in

effective research design. Despite this, such

assumptions are commonly not revealed in reports of

business ethics research.

Quantitative work has predominated in business

ethics research to date. Heavy reliance on this

methodology suggests an underlying but unidenti-

fied positivist (or post-positivist) paradigm has

influenced most research work in business ethics.

Consistent with this positivist emphasis, business

ethics investigation in the empirical journal literature

has tended to focus on outcomes rather than the

mechanisms by which those outcomes are reached,

or the contexts in which they occur (although

underlying theoretical frameworks may be directed

to these issues). Large-scale questionnaires com-

monly have elicited responses to questions, such as

‘Would you do x?’, with or without limited quan-

titative analysis of reasons. Questions about the

‘how’ and ‘why’ of respondents’ perceptions are

much less common. Yet answers to these kinds of

question are at least as interesting as answers to the

first (Crane, 1999), and are likely to be of greater

interest to a range of parties. Non-positivist

approaches have much to offer, a point implicit in calls

for more qualitative work (e.g. Robertson, 1993).

Those who have a potential interest in discovering

and influencing ethical attitudes, such as university

educators and professional bodies, are likely to find

this second kind of data of particular value. Quan-

titative approaches in business ethics are also limiting

in the extent to which they foreclose the range of

potential answers. Where the question to be inves-

tigated is ‘Would you do x?’, alternative responses

are precluded. Open-ended, particularly in-depth,

questioning offers the possibility that respondents

will nominate outcomes not envisioned by the

researcher. These alternative outcomes are potentially

of great relevance, not least because they have not

been anticipated by the investigator. Existing theo-

retical frameworks may not suggest that a particular

issue exists or is particularly pertinent. In-depth

investigation of only a few cases may generate

insights into the presence of the issue and in relation

to its potential significance.

Over a decade ago, Denzin and Lincoln (1994)

described social research as being in a messy and

uncertain new age (see also Crotty, 1998). In con-

trast, business ethics has remained, in its apparently

heavy reliance on the positivist/post-positivist para-

digm(s), quite neat. This article argues that a

‘messing up’ of that order might benefit the disci-

pline. Identification of potentially relevant paradigms

is one step in that direction.

The paucity of non-positivist work in certain

subfields of empirical business ethics research is

reflected in the relative lack of such work in the

wider field of business ethics generally. Greater

attention to the paradigms underlying empirical

work in business ethics is a step on the path to

redressing this imbalance. In order to facilitate

developments in this area, increased discussion of

relevant issues would be useful. But what shared

terms and concepts can be used for this purpose?

Lack of attention to these issues in business ethics

journals limits the facility with which relevant ideas

can be considered. In particular, a gap exists in the

literature in relation to a typology of the major

paradigms available for business ethics empirical

research. This is critical, because without a common

language for discussion, debate about paradigms in

Empirical Business Ethics Research 431

business ethics is unlikely to flourish, and without

adequate attention to the paradigms underlying

current research important questions and issues are

likely to be left unexplored.

This article defines the available useful paradigms

that can assist in a study of paradigm reliance in

business ethics research. It then delineates various

typologies of paradigms that are available to the

social sciences and suggests a synthesis that allows for

the use of a common language. The article then

explores what applications of that synthesised

typology can be made in empirical business ethics

research, and shares some thoughts about the future

use of such a synthesised typology of paradigms.

Defining some key terms

Discussion of paradigms in the general literature is

beset by complex terminology. The term ‘paradigm’

is widely used to describe the ultimate framework

within which a piece of research is located, but there

is no complete agreement amongst commentators as

to what paradigms are available to underpin social

research, and different typologies exist. Descriptions

of paradigms invariably rely, to a greater or lesser

extent, upon what might be called their ‘compo-

nents’: contrasting ontological, epistemological and

methodological beliefs. Brief definitions of these

terms are offered in a glossary in Appendix 1. A wide

range of alternative paradigms has been featured in

debates in other disciplines, particularly in relation to

qualitative research (Denzin and Lincoln, 1994).

This makes analysing the paradigms of potential

relevance to business ethics a difficult task. The

following discussion identifies the way that key

paradigms of interest are understood in this article,

and provides a description of each that then enables

tabulated analysis of research paradigms in empirical

business ethics activity in academic journals.

Positivism and post-positivism

Positivism is the mode of thought that most naturally

falls first for discussion in any review of research

paradigms, particularly in the context of business

ethics. It, and its offspring post-positivism, are the

models which have the longest ancestry in modern

research practice and are the basis for the majority of

empirical business ethics work which has occurred

to date (although this has undergone some change in

more recent years). Positivism is a belief system

arising out of practices in the natural sciences which

assume that matters that are the subject of research

are susceptible of being investigated objectively, and

that their veracity can be established with a reason-

able degree of certainty. By implication, business

ethics’ heavy reliance on positivist assumptions has

imported this presumption of available certainty.

Verification in this sense requires application of the

scientific method either through analysis in the case

of those matters which are capable of internal veri-

fication (e.g. mathematical equations), or through

the gathering of data in the case of those things

which cannot be verified from their own terms

(Crotty, 1998, p. 25).

In contrast, post-positivism has evolved to deal

with some of the more artificial aspects of positivism.

It embraces the idea that a principle may be estab-

lished not by proving it to be so but by the inability

to prove it to be not so – an approach enunciated in

Popper’s Principle of Falsification (Popper, 1972).

Rather than science advancing ‘by way of observa-

tion and experimentation’ it relies upon ‘a continual

process of conjecture and falsification’ (Crotty, 1998,

p. 31). Post-positivism has all but subsumed the field

of positivist-based research theory. It is a central

tenet of post-positivism that all knowledge is tenta-

tive, and remains provisionally ‘known’ until some

evidence of its falseness arises. This represents an evo-

lution from positivism’s assumption of an ‘apprehen-

dable reality’ to a sense of a reality that is ‘assumed to

exist but to be only imperfectly apprehendable because

of basically flawed human intellectual mechanisms and

the fundamentally intractable nature of phenomena’

(Guba and Lincoln, 1994, pp. 109–110). The majority

of business ethics empirical research sits somewhere

on the positivist/post-positivist spectrum.

In an ontological sense, post-positivism assumes

that reality exists, but in an epistemological context

that we are only able to arrive at an approximation of

that reality; there are natural limits on what we can

know (due to those essentially ‘‘flawed human

intellectual mechanisms’’ and the ‘‘fundamentally

intractable nature of phenomena’’ (Guba and Lincoln,

1994, p. 110). By contrast, positivism assumes the

existence of a ‘real’ world; and in an epistemological

432 V. Brand

sense the positivist investigation assumes it is also

capable of ‘discovering’ that world. A post-positivist

researcher would not assume that any such discovery

was possible.

Methodologically, positivism is concerned with

experimentation and manipulation; verification of

hypotheses forms the basis of this model. The vast

majority of empirical business ethics research

undertaken to date has employed hypothesis test-

ing. By comparison, post-positivism allows for the

use of natural settings and the collection of more

situational information. Increased reliance is placed

on qualitative methodologies (Guba and Lincoln,

1994). Methods most commonly associated with

positivism and post-positivism are recognisable in

much empirical business ethics research published

in academic journals. While there is no necessary

link between any particular set of methods and a

given paradigm, certain linkages are more ‘typical’

than others (Crotty, 1998, p. 12). The Likert scale

and other closed question techniques (with or

without accompanying hypotheses for verification)

that are common in business ethics research are

characteristic of methods often employed in

the service of the positivist and post-positivist

paradigms.

The non-positivist paradigms

The certainty and clarity which are the hallmarks of

positivism, and to a lesser extent of post-positivism,

are not associated with ‘non-positivist’ approaches.

Enunciation of the philosophical bases of inquiry is

usually considered more important in these para-

digms and an increased complexity in both the

number of available models and in descriptions of

them is probably unsurprising. Three such paradigms

are identified here; they are not the only potential

paradigms, but loosely cover the range of views

subsumable within the non-positivist heading.

First, a non-positivist paradigm called constructivism

has been identified (Guba and Lincoln, 1994). Allied

to constructivism, but clearly separable on some

analyses, is a framework that may be labelled inter-

pretivism or the interpretive paradigm (Burrell and

Morgan, 1979; Crotty, 1998; Schwandt, 1994). The

third major framework can be labelled the critical

paradigm (and related perspectives), involving Marxist,

feminist and other critiques of the prevailing

orthodoxy. Again, the exact components of the

paradigm are far from agreed [see for instance the

differing treatment by Crotty (1998), Guba and

Lincoln (1994), Burrell and Morgan (1979)].

Constructivism

Constructivism has been described as ‘‘an alternative

paradigm whose break-away assumption is the move

from ontological realism to ontological relativism’’

(Guba and Lincoln, 1994, p. 109). No particular

construction is ‘true’ or ‘untrue’ in the sense a pos-

itivist might assert, but rather the product of its time

and place and of the people who ‘hold’ the con-

struction (Guba and Lincoln, 1994, p. 111). Its

epistemology is one of created outcomes – what we

can know is the subjective product of the context in

which it occurs, and outcomes are created as the

research is undertaken. Methodology turns on a

transactional approach, emphasising interaction

between investigator and respondents. Historically,

business ethics has seen little emphasis on these

perspectives.

Interpretive approaches

Interpretivism, with its roots in the attempt to

understand or grasp meaning, and with strong links

to the idealist German intellectual tradition as

‘Verstehen’, contrasts with the focus of the (positivist)

scientific tradition on explanation (‘Erklaren’)

(Burrell and Morgan, 1979; Schwandt, 1994).

Interpretivism’s ontological stance is to assume all

meanings are contextual. Epistemologically, inter-

pretivism (like constructivism) is anti-positivist; it

assumes that we cannot study the world of human

affairs in the way that the hard sciences pursue their

investigations. How we can know, for the interpre-

tivist, is from the inside, in context, and no hard,

unchanging reality can be identified. In methodo-

logical terms, interpretivism is concerned with

understanding, often on an individual level (Burrell

and Morgan, 1979). A range of names may be given

to the individual methods employed for a particular

inquiry, but attention to detail, to complexity and to

the particular situation’s meanings are crucial

(Schwandt, 1994, p. 119). In business ethics

research, attention to detail and complexity has more

commonly been subsumed in an effort to offer

certainty and generalisability.

Empirical Business Ethics Research 433

This paradigm is home to a large group of

research philosophies. Symbolic interactionism,

phenomenology and hermeneutics might all be

discussed in this category (Crotty, 1998), although

here, as in other places, rival taxonomies would not

arrange things in the same way (compare, for

instance, the approach taken by Guba and Lincoln

(1994), who do not include an interpretivist para-

digm in their structure at all).

Critical theory and related perspectives

Various names might be used for the third subset of

the non-positivist paradigms. ‘Critical theory’ is

one term (Kincheloe and McLaren, 1994, p. 138),

‘critical inquiry’ another (Crotty, 1998), while in

Burrell and Morgan’s (1979) treatise on sociological

paradigms the authors identify frameworks they call

‘radical structuralism’ and ‘radical humanism’, both

of which encompass critical perspectives. In addi-

tion, significant and distinct categories have evolved

within the critical tradition, particularly postmod-

ernism and feminism. Critical theory is a form of

research which is unhappy with the status quo.

Unlike the constructivist and interpretivist models,

the critical approaches begin from a refusal to accept

things the way they are, and are clearly distin-

guishable from the search for understanding that

defines, for instance, the interpretivist approaches.

Thus, interpretivism compared with critical inquiry

‘‘is a contrast between a research that seeks merely to

understand and a research that challenges’’ (Crotty,

1998, p. 113).

Ontologically, critical theory treats what we can

know as, for all intents and purposes, real, even

though it views that ‘reality’ as the product of his-

torical factors, falsely believed to be ‘natural and

immutable’. How we can know that false ‘reality’ is by

transactions between the researcher and the

researched. As with constructivism, the two are

assumed to be ‘interactively linked’, with the

researcher’s values inevitably influencing outcomes

(Guba and Lincoln, 1994). Epistemologically, critical

theory emphasises the subjective and transactional

nature of inquiry. From a methodological point of

view, critical approaches emphasise a dialogue

between investigator and investigated, with a view

to transcending ignorance and misapprehension and

attaining a more informed consciousness (Guba and

Lincoln, 1994). This perspective is rarely, if ever,

visible in the business ethics empirical journal lit-

erature, where little or no attention has been given

to subverting the status quo, or to transactional

inquiry.

Paradigm typologies

As noted above, no single account of relevant par-

adigms can easily be given. Due to the difficulty of

identifying a single description of paradigms, three

separate paradigm typologies are relied upon here as

the basis of a synthesised approach. They are not the

only three that could have been considered, or even

necessarily the most important, but they are a diverse

grouping in terms of depth of coverage, age, and

disciplinary background, and offer a snapshot of pre-

occupations in the paradigm interpretation literature.

Three typologies

Burrell and Morgan’s (1979) treatise Sociological

Paradigms and Organisational Analysis has received

wide attention since it was first published, and has

been the dominant paradigm model in organisa-

tional analysis (Hassard, 1993). It is relied upon in

one of the very few discussions of paradigm analysis

in business ethics research (Crane, 1999). The

model is not without its critics; Hassard (1993) has

argued that its flaws have been widely overlooked

by those who have adopted it. He cites Burrell and

Morgan’s use of the key concept of ‘ontology’ as

problematic, and gives other examples. In many

ways, this paradigm model varies more considerably

from the two subsequent typologies discussed here

than they vary from each other. Burrell and Morgan

identify two dominating themes, radical change

versus regulation and subjectivism versus objectiv-

ism, and develop a four-part matrix of paradigms

based on the interaction of those key factors.

Within the subjective/objective dimension of their

matrix they incorporate elements of ontology,

epistemology, human nature and methodology. The

resultant model is sophisticated and multi-dimen-

sional, making it a valuable contribution to any

discussion of paradigms. However, the level of

development has resulted in the model standing

alone rather than in connection with alternative

434 V. Brand

models, and comparison with elements of other

typologies is, as a result, more difficult.

The other authors of typologies considered in this

article take an arguably less ambitious approach to

the categorisation of available models. Their com-

mentaries are also more recent. Guba and Lincoln’s

chapter ‘Competing Paradigms in Qualitative

Research’ appears in Denzin and Lincoln’s Handbook

of Qualitative Research (1994). The Handbook is

widely relied upon as a qualitative research text.

Guba and Lincoln (1994, p. 105) briefly ‘‘analyze

four paradigms that currently are competing, or have

until recently competed, for acceptance as the par-

adigm of choice in informing and guiding inquiry,

especially qualitative inquiry’’. The relative con-

ciseness of their review, its emphasis on drawing

comparisons (and even tabulating differences) among

different paradigms, and its location in a high profile

text, make it valuable for consideration.

The third description of rival paradigms relied

upon in this article occupies a less well-known

position in the social sciences literature, but Crotty’s

1998 text, The Foundations of Social Research, is

more recent than either of Guba and Lincoln’s or

Burrell and Morgan’s discussions. Crotty resists the

‘neat’ tabulations of the other two typologies, and

emphasises the potential for irreconcilable ambigu-

ity. Crotty also provides a very useful consideration

of interpretivism, which he deals with as a paradigm

(or, in his typology, ‘theoretical perspective’) in its

own right. None of the other typologies reviewed in

this article takes this approach; Guba and Lincoln do

not include a category of ‘interpretivism’ at all, while

Burrell and Morgan do not distinguish interpretiv-

ism from constructivism, despite the common cur-

rency of both terms as evidenced by other work in

the area (see Schwandt, 1994). Interestingly, neither

Guba and Lincoln’s nor Crotty’s discussions make

reference to Burrell and Morgan’s earlier framework

despite its apparent relevance.

Inevitably, in any paraphrasing of the sort that

takes place in this article, nuance and detail that

occur in the original are lost. This is even more so

where not one but three – in some cases significantly

different – taxonomies are blended. This review aims

to provide a summary of the major strands of

thought in competing research paradigms, in order

that a consideration of each paradigm’s relevance to

business ethics research can be considered.

Comparison of typologies

In the introduction to the four research paradigms

which occurs in the earlier section of this article,

distinctions between nomenclature and classification

of paradigms were deliberately ‘smoothed away’.

The more detailed consideration which follows does

not allow for this simplicity, and accordingly it is

necessary first to describe each typology briefly on its

own terms.

The Burrell and Morgan typology

Burrell and Morgan use a set of cross-referenced

elements to arrive at a comprehensive system of

paradigm definition. In this article, the phrase

‘divining tools’ is used to describe the concepts on

which each author or set of authors has relied in

defining the differences between paradigms. Burrell

and Morgan use two separate sets of assumptions as

divining tools to enable them to classify theories in

the social sciences. The first of these, assumptions

about the nature of social science, involves distinctions

based on a hierarchy with four levels. They compare

theories on the basis of first, their ontological

assumptions – in their words, on the basis of

‘assumptions which concern the very essence of the

phenomena under investigation’ (1979, p. 1). Sec-

ond come the epistemological assumptions of each

theory; the assumptions which go to what knowl-

edge is – what it is that we are capable of knowing,

and ‘whether knowledge is something which can be

acquired … or is something which has to be per-

sonally experienced’ (1979, p. 1). Here, the key

debate is anti-positivism versus positivism. The third

category relates to human nature. For Burrell and

Morgan, all social science research implicitly or

explicitly takes a position on human beings and their

relationship with their environment. Finally, Burrell

and Morgan look at the methodological assumptions

that are made by researchers. For Burrell and

Morgan, combinations of particular assumptions

about ontology, epistemology and human nature

entail certain necessary assumptions about which

methodology should be employed.

Burrell and Morgan’s second set of divining tools

relies on various assumptions about the nature of society,

and a distinction between social researchers who

Empirical Business Ethics Research 435

adhere to a theory of radical change and those who

are wedded to an assumption of regulation. Regu-

lation (or ‘order’) is, for Burrell and Morgan, a focus

for ‘‘theorists who are primarily concerned to pro-

vide explanations of society in terms which

emphasise its underlying unity and cohesiveness’’,

whereas radical change (conflict) theorists are

engaged in finding ‘‘explanations for the radical

change, deep-seated structural conflict, modes of

domination and structural contradiction which

[they] see as characterising modern society’’ (1979,

p. 17).

Using this matrix of two dimensions or groups of

assumptions, in each case subdivisible into several

categories (as to the nature of social science on the

one hand, and as to the nature of society on the

other), Burrell and Morgan identify their four key

‘paradigms’ for social sciences research – radical

humanism, radical structuralism, interpretivism and

functionalism. This combination is broadly applica-

ble in the social sciences (including in business eth-

ics), albeit Burrell and Morgan’s work takes a

sociological focus, with a particular emphasis on

organisational theory. Burrell and Morgan’s repre-

sentation of the matrix is reproduced as Figure 1.

Burrell and Morgan’s four paradigms

For Burrell and Morgan, the functionalist paradigm is

the dominant structure within which academic

sociological research has occurred. Had they been

working in the field of business ethics, they would

almost certainly have drawn the same conclusion.

Employing their four-part hierarchy of comparison

based on assumptions about social science, they

describe functionalism as tending to be ‘‘realist,

positivist, determinist and homothetic’’ (1979, p. 26). In

terms of their second ‘divining tool’ – a focus on

regulation and order or conflict and radical change –

this paradigm ‘‘represents a perspective which is

firmly rooted in the sociology of regulation’’ (1979,

p. 25). Once again, this is discernible as the domi-

nant influence in existing empirical business ethics

research visible in the journal literature, where

conflict and change (radical or otherwise) have not

been a primary focus.

The radical humanist paradigm of Burrell and

Morgan’s matrix is a perspective which emphasises

the need to ‘‘develop a sociology of radical change’’

(1979, p. 32). Its focus is the production of a critique

of the status quo; it aims to facilitate escape from

limiting societal arrangements. At the same time they

describe it as a paradigm which shares the subjective

aspect of interpretivism, ‘‘in that it views the social

world from a perspective which tends to be nomi-

nalist, anti-positivist, voluntarist and ideographic’’ (1979,

p. 32).

For Burrell and Morgan, ‘‘the interpretive paradigm

embraces a wide range of philosophical and socio-

logical thought which shares the common charac-

teristic of attempting to understand and explain the

social world primarily from the point of view of the

actors directly involved in the social process’’ (1979,

p. 227). It is nominalist, anti-positivist, voluntarist and

ideographic. It is concerned with the ‘sociology of

regulation’, but from a subjectivist perspective

(1979, p. 28). Ontologically, these writers point to

interpretivism as nominalist; the ‘‘ontological status

of the social world is viewed as extremely ques-

tionable and problematic as far as theorists located

within the interpretive paradigm are concerned’’

(1979, p. 31). Interpretivism is also, they point out,

anti-positivist, rejecting ‘‘the view that the world of

‘Radical humanist’ ‘Radical

structuralist’ SUBJECTIVE

‘Interpretive’ ‘Functionalist’

OBJECTIVE

THE SOCIOLOGY OF RADICAL CHANGE

THE SOCIOLOGY OF REGULATION

Figure 1. Burrell and Morgan’s ‘Four paradigms for the analysis of social theory’ (1979, p. 22).

436 V. Brand

human affairs can be studied in the manner of the

natural sciences’’ (1979, p. 253). It is a perspective

with particular application in the complex context of

individual perceptions, a popular area of business

ethics research.

This final strand of Burrell and Morgan’s taxon-

omy they label radical structuralism, with an emphasis

on subverting the orthodoxy, but from a more

positivist perspective. Radical structuralism shares

with radical humanism an underlying aim to release

society from inherent forms of domination, but in

doing so, places less emphasis than radical humanism

on the role of the individual within society. Rather,

Burrell and Morgan note, writers working ‘‘within

the paradigm tend to view society as composed of

elements which stand in contradiction to each

other’’ (1979, p. 326). It is the interaction of these

contradictions, and the inherent conflict involved,

which interests radical structuralists. The lack of

attention to conflict in business ethics research is

commented on above.

Guba and Lincoln’s typology

Forming a chapter within an encyclopaedic research

text, Guba and Lincoln’s (1994) ‘Competing Para-

digms in Qualitative Research’ represents an analysis

of the paradigms they see as competing for recog-

nition as the dominant paradigms in research, and

particularly in qualitative research. Those four par-

adigms are positivism, post-positivism, critical theory

and related ideological perspectives, and construc-

tivism.

Guba and Lincoln rely on their own ‘divining

tools’. They identify ontology, epistemology and meth-

odology as their bases for contrasting typologies. For

them, ontology is the question of ‘‘[w]hat is the form

and nature of reality and, therefore, what is there

that can be known about it?’’ (1994, p. 108), while

epistemology concerns itself with ‘‘[w]hat is the

nature of the relationship between the knower or

would-be knower and what can be known?’’ (1994,

p. 108). Guba and Lincoln’s (1994, p. 108) meth-

odological question is one of how the inquirer can

go about finding out what they believe can be

known and methods must, in their turn, be fitted to

the methodology. Their table representing their

categories is reproduced as Table I.

TA

BLE

I

Guba

and

Lin

coln

’s‘B

asic

Bel

iefs

(Met

aphysics

)of

Alter

nat

ive

Inquir

yPar

adig

ms’

(1994;

p.

109)

Item

Positivism

Post

-positivism

Cri

tica

lth

eory

etal

.C

onst

ruct

ivism

Onto

logy

Naı

ve

real

ism

–‘r

eal’

real

ity

but

appre

hen

dab

le

Cri

tica

lre

alism

–‘r

eal’

real

ity

but

only

imper

fect

ly

and

pro

bab

ilisti

cally

appre

hen

dab

le

Histo

rica

lre

alism

–vir

tual

real

ity

shap

edby

soci

al,

politica

l,cu

ltura

l,ec

onom

ic,

ethnic

and

gen

der

val

ues

;

cryst

allise

dover

tim

e

Rel

ativ

ism

–lo

cal

and

spec

ific

const

ruct

edre

alitie

s

Episte

molo

gy

Dual

ist/

obje

ctiv

ist;

findin

gs

true

Modifi

eddual

ist/

obje

ctiv

ist;

critic

altr

aditio

n/c

om

munity;

findin

gs

pro

bab

lytr

ue

Tra

nsa

ctio

nal

/subje

ctiv

ist;

val

ue-

med

iate

dfindin

gs

Tra

nsa

ctio

nal

/subje

ctiv

ist;

crea

ted

findin

gs

Met

hodolo

gy

Exper

imen

tal/

man

ipula

tive;

ver

ifica

tion

of

hypoth

eses

;

chie

fly

quan

tita

tive

Modifi

edex

per

imen

tal/

man

ipula

tive;

critic

al

multip

lism

;fa

lsifi

cation

of

hypoth

eses

;m

ayin

clude

qual

itat

ive

appro

aches

Dia

logic

/dia

lect

ical

Her

men

euti

cal/

dia

lect

ical

Empirical Business Ethics Research 437

In Guba and Lincoln’s (1994, p. 109) brief sum-

mation, positivism adopts a realist ontology; ‘‘an

apprehendable reality is assumed to exist’’. Its epis-

temology is objectivist, taking the position that

findings, if replicable, are ‘true’; the knower and the

known exist as separate or ‘dual’ entities, which do

not influence each other. The methodology is reliant

on hypotheses which are rigorously tested, and

technical, measuring style methods are favoured, a

style of research frequently relied upon in business

ethics research, initially overwhelmingly. Guba and

Lincoln’s description of post-positivism emphasises its

‘critical realist’ ontology, in which reality can never

be perfectly apprehended. Assertions about reality

must nonetheless be subjected as far as possible to

critical consideration in an attempt to achieve the

best possible understanding. In an epistemological

sense, Guba and Lincoln refer to the effective

relinquishing of positivism’s ‘dualist’ assumption that

the knower and the known can be separated out.

The methodology of post-positivism is, for Guba

and Lincoln, a modified version of positivist meth-

odology, in which qualitative techniques are

imported in an attempt to address the shortcomings

of a rigidly positivist approach. Observable modifi-

cations of this kind are apparent in business ethics

research. Guba and Lincoln describe post-positivist

methods as heavily based in measuring techniques,

but the limitations of those are attenuated by the

additional use of approaches more commonly asso-

ciated with qualitative methodologies.

Guba and Lincoln’s paradigm of ‘Critical Theory

and Related Ideological Positions’ is described in terms

of inter-linking between subject and object, and

between investigator and investigated. Thus the

assumed distinction between ontology and episte-

mology is clouded, since what is known can only be

defined in relation to what a particular researcher can

know about a particular group of research subjects.

From a methodological point of view, Guba and

Lincoln emphasise the transactional and transfor-

mational nature of the research act. Methodology is

transactional in nature, focusing on the need ‘‘to

transform ignorance and misapprehension … into

more informed consciousness’’ (1994, p. 110).

Methods rely upon an awareness of all paradigms and

draw on techniques associated with both qualitative

and quantitative methodologies. These are concepts

rarely observable in the empirical business ethics

literature. Constructivism, for Guba and Lincoln,

comes from an ontological base which assumes that

realities are ‘constructions’ which ‘are not more or

less ‘‘true’’ in any absolute sense’, and which depend

for their existence on those who hold the con-

struction (1994, p. 111). Hence, the investigator and

the subject are linked in an epistemology of trans-

action; findings are ‘created’ between these elements

of the investigation. The methodology of con-

structivism is reliant on distilling as informed and

sophisticated a construction as possible. Methods

used share many of the characteristics of those

adopted in critical theory approaches.

Crotty’s typology

The final paradigm typology is represented by

Crotty’s 1998 text, The Foundations of Social Research.

Unlike Burrell and Morgan’s matrix, or Guba and

Lincoln’s tabulated typology, Crotty is careful to

avoid firm classification of his ‘perspectives’. He does

provide a visual representation of potential catego-

ries, but it contains illustrative lists rather than cross-

referenced tabulated data. This approach serves to

remind us that the labels applied elsewhere are not

immutable and that the issues under consideration

are open to a range of interpretations and repre-

sentations. Crotty’s table is reproduced as Table II.

The list of potential theoretical perspectives pro-

vided by Crotty contains many of the same terms

used by Guba and Lincoln in their typology of

paradigms. This apparent similarity however con-

ceals underlying distinctions. Differences exist both

in the hierarchy within which terms are used and in

the naming of ‘paradigms’ themselves. ‘Paradigm’ is

not a description Crotty uses, and he talks instead of

‘theoretical perspectives’, which exist as a second-

order concept to ‘epistemologies’. Categories that

Guba and Lincoln locate within their list of ‘para-

digms’ are spread, in Crotty’s treatment, between

theoretical perspectives and epistemologies. Thus

Crotty places constructionism in the same field as

objectivism and subjectivism, while Guba and Lin-

coln locate it alongside positivism, post-positivism

and critical theory. Crotty lists interpretivism

alongside positivism and post-positivism, while

Guba and Lincoln make no mention of interpre-

tivism at all. Crotty (1998, p. 5) is also careful to note

438 V. Brand

that his list is not exhaustive; he describes it as a

‘representative sampling of each category’. It may

even be that, if he were pressed to identify para-

digms, Crotty would point to the first column of his

table, his ‘epistemologies’, where he lists ‘objectiv-

ism, constructionism and subjectivism (and their

variants)’. However, it is in his second column,

‘theoretical perspectives’, that the closest match is

achieved with the concepts discussed by Burrell and

Morgan and Guba and Lincoln as ‘paradigms’, and it

is here that attention is focused for the purposes of

this comparison. Overall, Crotty’s approach offers a

timely reminder that paradigm definition is not a

precise science, and that over-simplification needs to

be avoided.

Similarly to Burrell and Morgan and Guba and

Lincoln, Crotty lists epistemology, theoretical perspec-

tives, methodology and methods as four issues that

constitute basic elements of the research process

(1998, p. 2), where epistemology is the theory of

knowledge that is inherent in a theoretical perspec-

tive and hence in a methodology; a theoretical

perspective is a philosophical position that informs

methodology and provides context for the research

process, and the methodology is the strategy or plan

of action that underpins the use of a particular

method; it links the choice and use of methods to

desired outcomes; and the methods are the actual

procedures that the researcher uses to gather and

analyse data (1998, p. 3). Drawing on these factors,

Crotty lists five (non-exhaustive) examples of pos-

sible theoretical perspectives: positivism and post-

positivism (as one category), interpretivism, critical

inquiry, feminism and postmodernism. The epistemol-

ogies identified by Crotty are constructionism,

objectivism and subjectivism. For Crotty, objectivism

implies the existence of an external, fixed reality. In

contrast, constructionism involves the belief that

meaning is constructed, and comes into existence

through the development of meaning by the actors

TABLE II

Crotty’s ‘Representative Sampling’ table (1998, p. 5)

Epistemology Theoretical perspective Methodology Methods

Objectivism

Constructionism

Subjectivism

(and their variants)

Positivism (and post-positivism)

Interpretivism

– symbolic interactionism;

– phenomenology;

– hermeneutics.

Critical inquiry

Feminism

Postmodernism

etc.

Experimental research

Survey research

Ethnography

Phenomenological research

Grounded theory

Heuristic inquiry

Action research

Discourse analysis

Feminist standpoint

research, etc.

Sampling

Measurement

and scaling

Questionnaire

Observation

– participant;

– non-participant.

Interview

Focus group

Case study

Life history

Narrative

Visual ethnographic

methods

Statistical analysis

Data reduction

Theme identification

Comparative analysis

Cognitive mapping

Interpretive methods

Document analysis

Content analysis

Conversation analysis

etc.

Empirical Business Ethics Research 439

concerned. Subjectivism, in contrast, involves the

imposition of meaning onto an object.

While Crotty discounts any absolute connections

between a given epistemology and certain perspec-

tives and methodologies, he identifies positivism as

part of a very commonly occurring string, beginning

with objectivism as an epistemology, moving

through positivism and informing much social

research methodology (1998, p. 18) (and, almost

certainly, the vast majority of business ethics research

methodology). Positivism offers us the certainty of

accurate knowledge, Crotty tells us. A key issue for

Crotty is the relevance of the positivist (or post-

positivist) perspective versus the non-positivist

approach to how we present our research rather than the

methods we choose. Crotty describes interpretivism as

concerned with ‘culturally derived and historically

situated interpretations of the social life-world’

(1998, p. 67); its emergence took place in reaction to

attempts to colonise social inquiry with positivist

approaches. Critical inquiry is, for Crotty, the

‘Marxist heritage’. It is a critical form of inquiry,

distinguishable from, for instance, the largely

uncritical interpretivism. It is a research that seeks to

challenge prevailing orthodoxy and wishes to use the

power of ideas to bring about change. The discipline

is concerned, Crotty asserts, with the calling into

question of current ideology, from a basis of

assumption that issues of power and oppression are

centrally relevant to inquiry.

Merging typologies and arriving at a working synthesis

No clear-cut, defined paradigm summary can be

arrived at, whether the context is business ethics

inquiry in particular or research activity generally.

Differences in detail and in major characterisations

arise. Most similarity exists in relation to descriptions

of positivist and post-positivist thought, for which all

authors surveyed here have a relevant category or

categories. At the other end of the relativist/non-

relativist spectrum, Crotty’s more recent work

moves into detailed consideration of feminism and

postmodernism that is not mirrored in Guba and

Lincoln’s earlier work to nearly the same degree, and

which essentially does not occur in Burrell and

Morgan’s work at all. In the middle of the spectrum

varying accounts are given of a set of paradigms

which are variously labelled constructionism, con-

structivism, interpretivism and radical humanism.

A synthesis of these typologies offers an oppor-

tunity to provide a broadly based model for under-

standing the contexts in which business ethics

research may take place. Firstly, each typology

describes a paradigm (or in the case of Burrell and

Morgan, more than one paradigm) where assump-

tions are made about the existence of an ontologi-

cally ‘real’ world, in which objective knowledge can

be arrived at by means of an experimental, manip-

ulative methodology (for Guba and Lincoln’s and

Crotty’s models, this is positivism/post-positivism;

for Burrell and Morgan it is functionalism and radical

structuralism). Differences of detail exist, certainly,

but overall unity can be seen.

Much less unity exists in relation to the second

broad category of paradigms. This perhaps can be most

succinctly defined as non-positivist and non-critical

(for Guba and Lincoln this is constructivism, while

Crotty talks of constructionism, constructivism and

interpretivism, and Burrell and Morgan discuss inter-

pretive sociology). Some of the differences between

these paradigms may be a matter of nomenclature.

‘Constructivism’, Guba and Lincoln’s word, appears to

be a relatively recent term (Schwandt, 1994, p. 125).

Clearly, there are strong similarities between the range

of constructivist and interpretivist paradigms described

by the authors. A more detailed review of overlaps and

divisions between the different renderings of these

paradigms is undertaken below, because of the

potential significance of this category for empirical

business ethics research.

Thirdly, and finally, each typology includes a par-

adigm which deals with a critical approach [for Guba

and Lincoln it is ‘critical theory et al.’, for Crotty it is a

group of paradigms represented in his typology by

critical inquiry, feminism and postmodernism, while

Burrell and Morgan show a bifurcation between two

forms of the paradigm (radical humanism and radical

structuralism)]. Guba and Lincoln talk of ‘Critical

Theory and Related Ideological Positions’. Onto-

logically, they describe this movement as ‘historical

realism’, and draw attention to the paradigm’s

assumption of the congealing effect of time, via the

impact of social, political and other factors. They

describe the inter-linking between subject and object,

also identified by Crotty as a key feature, referring to

the assumption that the investigator and the investi-

440 V. Brand

gated are linked, and in such a way that the assumed

distinction between ontology and epistemology is

clouded, since what is known can only be defined by

relation to what a particular researcher can know in

relation to a particular group of research subjects. Like

Crotty and Guba and Lincoln, Burrell and Morgan

draw attention to the premise of the need for change

that underpins a radical or critical approach to re-

search, although they differ from both Crotty and

Guba and Lincoln in seeking to identify two major

streams of radical or transformational research

thought. However, sufficient similarity exists be-

tween each typology’s rendering of its critical para-

digm(s) for them to be treated as a single paradigm for

the purposes of this synthesis.

As noted above, the three paradigm typologies are

least reconcilable in relation to the second broad

category of paradigms, which might be described as

the non-critical, non-positivist paradigm(s). This

paradigm is (or these paradigms are) likely to be of

particular relevance to future business ethics re-

search, if efforts are made to further redress the

existing imbalance between quantitative and quali-

tative work (with their implicit assumptions of

underlying positivist and non-positivist perspec-

tives), since some reliance, at least, on relevant

techniques has already been made. Both Crotty and

Burrell and Morgan describe an interpretive para-

digm that is loosely recognisable as the same animal,

but Guba and Lincoln do not deal with interpre-

tivism at all. However, in the textbook of which

their chapter forms part, interpretivism is treated on

the one hand as closely related to feminism, ethnic

models of inquiry, cultural studies and other critical

perspectives (Denzin and Lincoln, 1994, pp. 101–

103), and on the other as closely aligned to con-

structivism (Schwandt, 1994, p. 119), with its roots

in German idealist thought (similarly to Burrell and

Morgan’s discussion of interpretivism). Indeed,

Schwandt’s chapter is devoted to an elucidation of

both constructivism and interpretivism, and to

drawing distinctions between the two. Schwandt is

cited, with apparent approval, by Crotty in his def-

inition of interpretivism (1998, p. 67).

Crotty himself separates out not just interpretiv-

ism and constructivism but, as noted above, is careful

to define constructivism separately from a paradigm

which he labels as ‘constructionism’. ‘Constructiv-

ism’ is reserved for inquiry which is concerned with

an essentially individualistic understanding – with

meaning-making by individuals, while construc-

tionism is the focus of research that seeks to inves-

tigate social dimensions – meaning making in a

collective sense. To date, the (predominantly

quantitative) work that has been done in business

ethics has investigated individuals and groups with

little distinction being drawn between the two.

Crotty’s analysis offers a way of understanding what

it might mean to differentiate two spheres of business

ethics knowledge, where appropriate recognition is

given to both the ‘meaning-making’ of groups and

of individual respondents. In business ethics research

particularly, where the influence of social desirability

bias is so potentially strong, group responses might

well differ markedly from individual moral choices.

Having an epistemological basis for separating the

two is attractive, and illustrates the contribution that

attention to epistemological concerns can make.

Burrell and Morgan’s interpretive paradigm draws

on the intellectual tradition of the German idealists,

and largely mirrors Crotty’s description of this par-

adigm. Consistent with Burrell and Morgan’s thor-

ough development of their own typology, they have

no category they define as ‘constructionism’ or

‘constructivism’, and no index entry for either term

appears in their text. Taking Guba and Lincoln’s

(1994, pp. 110–111) emphasis on the ontologically

relativist position of constructivism, with realities

being ‘‘dependent for their form and content on the

individual persons or groups holding the construc-

tions’’, and Crotty’s (1998, chapter 3) similar reli-

ance on the ‘making of meaning’, constructivism can

only really have a place in Burrell and Morgan’s

radical humanist and interpretive paradigms at the

subjective end of their matrix. Neither appears a

very comfortable fit, and it seems constructionism/

ivism has no obvious single corollary in Burrell and

Morgan’s synthesis, although the underlying bases of

both of Burrell and Morgan’s non-positivist per-

spectives bear similarities to constructionism/ivism.

Schwandt asserts that ‘‘[c]onstructivist, constructivism,

interpretivist and interpretivism are terms that routinely

appear in the lexicon of social science methodologists

and philosophers. Yet, their particular meanings are

shaped by the intent of their users’’ (1994, p. 118). It is

perhaps possible here to add Burrell and Morgan’s

radical humanism and interpretive sociology to

Schwandt’s statement. Schwandt goes on to describe

Empirical Business Ethics Research 441

interpretivist thinking in distinction to constructivist

thinking, pointing out that the latter is of more recent

origin, and focuses upon related but different concerns

from interpretivism. Where interpretivists reacted

against attempts to apply logical empiricism to human

inquiry, Schwandt describes constructivists as

responding to the perception that truth could be dis-

covered by mind – that is, as reacting to the notion of

objectivism (1994, p. 125). Schwandt’s analysis also

cuts across Crotty’s typology which places construc-

tionism in the epistemological box and puts inter-

pretivism below that. Yet clearly there is overlap

between Burrell and Morgan’s non-positivist posi-

tions, Guba and Lincoln’s constructivism, and Crotty’s

constructionism, constructivism and interpretivism.

An operating resolution of this confusion, and a sum-

mary of the three identified categories of paradigms, is

suggested below (Table III). Guba and Lincoln’s

model underpins this synthesis, both because of its

influential position, because of its convenient tabula-

tion, and because it is relatively easily reconcilable with

Burrell and Morgan’s matrix. The common thread

running through each ‘‘second category’’ typology is

the non-positivist nature of the paradigms and their

essentially non-critical focus. Thus the term ‘non-

positivist, non-critical paradigm(s)’ is used to describe

them. Having arrived at an operating paradigm fra-

mework, attention can turn to the application of that

framework to business ethics research.

Business ethics research and paradigm

identification

Assessing the relevance of the identified paradigm

categories to business ethics research necessitates

addressing two questions: identifying the extent of

existing commentary, and considering what paradigm

assumptions may have occurred commonly in the

empirical business ethics research visible in academic

journals. As to the first, consideration of germane

issues within the specific business ethics journal liter-

ature is rare. Collier (1995) raised the issue of the

significance of ontology and argued that the ontolo-

gies assumed by positivism and hermeneutics are

inappropriate bases for business ethics inquiry,

asserting the relevance of an ontology (‘critical real-

ism’) that sees the world as something that exists, but

that is partially non-observable. This is Collier’s per-

ception of the business ethics reality. Once again, the

lack of uniformity in paradigm description is apparent,

but it seems Collier’s critical realism may be closest to

the post-positivist framework described in this article

(a business ethics world that is real and that is ‘out

there’, but that we may not be able to perfectly access

for reasons associated with the limitations of our ability

to observe business ethics phenomena). Although

Collier’s ontology bears relation to post-positivism,

she also asserts the importance of an ontology that will

ground business ethics research that ‘‘can explain the

‘why’ of happenings’’ (p. 8), since this is what facili-

tates change. Epistemological or methodological

issues do not form part of Collier’s discussion.

A second consideration of paradigm issues in the

context of business ethics is offered by Crane’s

(1999) review of the place of paradigm identification

in the discipline. This treatment relies upon Burrell

and Morgan’s model as a paradigm typology. Crane’s

focus is management research and the investigation

of morality within organisations. Crane highlights

the different ontological assumptions that underlie

the functionalist and interpretivist paradigms within

TABLE III

Summary of paradigms

Paradigm Ontological assumptions Epistemological assumptions

Positivist/post-positivist A reality exists which is:

apprehendable/imperfectly so

Findings true/probably true

Non-positivist, non-critical Relativist; truth is constructed Transactional/to an extent

subjectivist; findings are created

Critical theories Historical realism Transactional/subjectivist

Adapted from Guba and Lincoln (1994); other sources: Burrell and Morgan (1979) and Crotty (1998).

442 V. Brand

Burrell and Morgan’s typology, and argues for a

greater emphasis on interpretivist work in corporate

business ethics investigation, suggesting that ‘‘there is

clearly a need for a shift towards a more interpretive

mode of inquiry in order to inform and complement

the profusion of positivist research in this rapidly

developing field’’ (Crane, 1999, p. 245). Noting that

within the interpretivist paradigm the social world

exists only through the meaning that individuals

apply to it, he argues that ‘‘[a]ccordingly, there is not

an absolute concrete corporate morality, but there is

one that exists through the subjective experience of

various actors and groups of actors inside and outside

of the organisation’’. Thus, it is the meanings that

those individuals apply to ethical issues that are the

focus for research (1999, p. 239).

The second question posed above, as to the para-

digm assumptions that are identifiable within the

existing empirical business ethics literature, is less

easily addressed. So little direct attention has been

given to the issue that any summary necessarily pro-

ceeds on a number of assumptions. Most significantly,

it assumes a likely (but not indissoluble) link between

quantitative work and underlying positive paradigm

approaches. Empirical work in business ethics has

demonstrated (so far) an overwhelmingly quantitative

bias (Brand and Slater, 2003; Crane, 1999), suggesting

a very strong positivist framework for most work in

the field. In part, this situation may be the product of

the disciplines from which empirical researchers in the

field are drawn. A large number of investigators in

business ethics are based in schools of business, which

traditionally have a strong emphasis on quantitative

techniques. Less work has been produced by aca-

demics from disciplines with a qualitative tradition,

such as sociology or anthropology. Business ethics

researchers have rarely, if ever, expressly nominated the

framework within which they are working. Although

not absolute, the likely connection between the

adoption of, for instance, hypothesis testing methods

and an underlying positivist or post-positivist ap-

proach suggests that the vast majority of empirical

business ethics work published in academic journals to

date has relied implicitly on a non-interpretivist or

non-constructivist basis. The point is well illustrated

by an analysis of the work undertaken in the small but

growing sub-field of cross-cultural business ethics. As

globalisation unfolds, the area of cross-cultural

business ethics has become increasingly important.

A relatively new field, it has developed in concert with

increased emphasis on qualitative approaches. It is also

an area in which contextual approaches might be

thought to be of particular relevance given the heavily

context-bound nature of culturally based ethical deci-

sion-making. Despite this, an extensive review of a

comprehensive range of journals for articles dealing

with cross-cultural business ethics over more than a 20-

year period from 1981 to mid-2003 shows that of 124

articles reviewed, 104 (or 84%) were empirical, and of

those only three studies can be identified as qualitative

and only another five as containing some qualitative

element (Brand, 2006). More recent searching con-

firms the on-going pattern of quantitative dominance

in this literature.

Consistently with this heavy bias towards posi-

tivist approaches (where attention to paradigm issues

might be considered less likely to occur), even

within the qualitative component of the cross-

cultural literature there is little attention to paradigm

issues. Only a handful of qualitative empirical journal

articles expressly identify their placement within (for

instance) the phenomenological tradition rather than

the positivist tradition more common in business

ethics research, or refer to the dominant quantita-

tive/positivist paradigm, without (for instance) dis-

cussion of ontological assumptions, or paradigm

typologies (Chikudate, 2000; Lamsa and Takala,

2000; McNeil and Pedigo, 2001a, b). No examples

offer explicit identification of paradigm assumptions

in the sense of contrasting available options and

discussing ontological, epistemological and meth-

odological implications. Explicit (or even implicit)

attention to paradigm considerations has been vir-

tually non-existent. Only one of the existing quali-

tative cross-cultural contributions referred to above

expressly locates itself in a particular paradigm

(McNeil and Pedigo, 2001b). The qualitative aspects

of any non-quantitative work that has been under-

taken have been relatively limited, and non-positivist

frameworks appear to have had little impact on re-

search design. Lack of express attention to paradigm

issues means that the identification of underlying

(implicit) paradigm assumptions in the cross-cultural

literature turns on consideration of the methodology

and methods used, including in relation to analysis of

data, and the apparent assumptions as to broader

philosophical issues that underlie the approach taken.

This includes identifying which studies have made

Empirical Business Ethics Research 443

deliberate use of more inductive approaches of the

kind consistent with non-positivist epistemologies

(where ‘findings are created’: see Table III), and

which have employed categorisation approaches of

the kind that prima facie make less claim to be located

in this paradigm. This is a distinction between

analysis of latent and obvious content, and is a dif-

ferentiation not familiar in the empirical business

ethics journal literature. Among the limited quali-

tative examples that exist in the cross-cultural busi-

ness ethics literature, the only one to explicitly draw

a distinction between analysis of manifest content

and inductive analysis is Trevino et al.’s (2003)

investigation of ethical leadership. These authors

identify two layers in their analysis of interview data

– first, a ‘systematic analysis of the manifest content’

of transcripts and then ‘a more interpretive analysis

of the latent content across … the informants’ (p.

13).

Broader recognition of this distinction is almost

completely lacking in the cross-cultural business

ethics literature (cf. McNeil and Pedigo, 2001a).

This is not to suggest the qualitative contributions

are obviously positivist; hypothesis testing does not

generally occur in the qualitative contributions, for

instance. However, the focus is on analysis of the

manifest content of the relevant data (e.g. codes of

conduct, open-ended responses to vignettes, nego-

tiation transcripts), and on the use of descriptive

statistical techniques and classification systems to

summarise results. For the majority of contributions,

use of qualitative techniques has had a limited impact

on what appear to be underlying positivist perspec-

tives, and is suggestive instead of what might be

called at most a semi-non-positivist position (e.g.

French et al. 2001, 2002; Fritzsche et al., 1995; Su

and Richelieu, 1999). Some examples suggest more

strongly non-positivist inclinations, but remain

essentially descriptive in their analysis of data and do

not purport to address latent content in any depth

(e.g. Brand and Slater, 2003). More interpretivist (in

this article ‘non-positivist’) analyses that go ‘beyond

identifying obvious and visible elements to interpret

the underlying meaning of those elements’ (Trevino

et al., 2003, p. 13) occur only in a handful of studies

(Pedigo and Marshall, 2004; Tan and Snell, 2002 to

some extent, and McNeil and Pedigo, 2001a, b).

Overall, the majority of qualitative contributions

can be classified as being situated on the cusp of the

distinction between positivist and non-positivist,

despite the clear potential for alternative paradigm

perspectives to contribute to a literature drawing on

such complex, multi-dimensional and highly con-

textual data as must occur in cross-cultural business

ethics inquiry. This imbalance is as noteworthy in

this area as it would be in any other subset of

empirical business ethics inquiry. In cross-cultural

business ethics as in many other areas, multi-layered,

complex and unfolding rationales are particularly

likely. Culture is widely acknowledged as a multi-

faceted and subtle concept, and generally regarded as

highly influential in an individual’s ethical reasoning.

Situated, contextual methods of inquiry of the kind

emphasised by qualitative, non-positivist, approaches

will be important. Many of the complexities inher-

ent in cross-cultural business ethics investigation are

unlikely to be captured by the ‘snapshot in time’

methods employed in pursuit of quantitative meth-

odologies. Standard large-scale surveys of the kind

that overwhelmingly dominate cross-cultural busi-

ness ethics research are only able to reveal one,

broad-brush, overview-style aspect of the influence

of culture on respondents’ ethical reasoning. Qual-

itative methodologies employing a slightly non-

positivist stance can provide a little more of the

picture, but leave large sections of territory unex-

plored. What might be called semi-qualitative, semi-

non-positivist approaches (such as fairly rigid coding

of responses to open-ended questions, as occurred in

Fritzsche et al. (1995)) can provide a slightly different

perspective, but both approaches can only reveal part

of the picture. Contextual material, insights into

perceptions and critical detail, nuance and com-

plexity of the kind traditionally offered by qualitative

approaches that can support a non-positivist stance

(such as in-depth interviews) are lost.

The dominance of quantitative approaches has

perhaps ensured that those qualitative contributions

that have been made have positioned themselves

close to the transition point, leaving a wide gap in

the literature in relation to more non-positivist

interpretations of cross-cultural business ethics liter-

ature. This gap presumably extends into other sub-

fields of empirical business ethics, given the dearth of

consideration given to paradigm issues in the wider

empirical business ethics journal literature. Indeed,

comprehensive searching of social sciences databases

for occurrences of key terms (such as ‘paradigm’ and

444 V. Brand

‘business ethics’) yields the most limited of results

(Brand, 2006). Despite the critical importance of

identifying the philosophical assumptions underly-

ing any research act, and particularly any research

in an area as complex and difficult as business

ethics decision-making, this issue has been virtually

overlooked in the empirical journal literature. The

extremely small amount of work undertaken to

date in relation to paradigm identification and

business ethics, and the lack of empirical examples

taking up Collier’s (1995) and Crane’s (1999)

analyses, highlights the need for work in this area.

Critical questions require more attention; particu-

larly: what is the nature of business ethics ‘reality’?

(ontological question); how it is possible to know

those things? (epistemological question); what de-

sign for research is appropriate to capturing those

data? (methodological issue); and what actual

techniques will be employed to obtain the data?

(methods issue).

This article suggests it is the positivist or post-

positivist paradigms that have informed the vast

majority of empirical business ethics research pub-

lished in academic journals so far. This is not to argue

that no use of non-positivist approaches has been

made in empirical business ethics research. Certainly

in some cases at least it is likely that interpretivist,

constructivist or constructionist frameworks were

intended to be employed. However, such approaches

have not received anything approaching the (implicit)

attention given to positivist perspectives, and where

employed, the rationale for the use of such ‘alterna-

tive’ approaches has not often been explained. Critical

inquiry approaches have received even less attention,

and while it is likely or at least possible that critical

approaches have underpinned some of the empirical

work undertaken in the discipline, little evidence of

these approaches exists in journal publications. The

place of each identified paradigm in business ethics

research can be represented by a modified version of

Table III, presented here as Table IV. Additions are

indicated by bold text.

The way forward

How might movement towards clearer identification

of paradigm issues, and towards a broader paradigm

base for empirical business ethics research, play out?

Easy summary of available paradigms is not possible,

but a working synthesis is attempted here in order to

provide a basis on which future work can proceed.

Within that framework, positivist/post-positivist

approaches are identifiable as dominant in existing

business ethics work, while non-critical, non-posi-

tivist approaches are relatively rare but are gaining

ground. Critical paradigms are not yet associated

with business ethics research in any meaningful way.

There is a need for the issue of paradigm identi-

fication to be more fully explored, particularly in an

applied context. A common category of empirical

research is scenario-based, asking respondents what

they would do if placed in a situation giving rise to

apparent business ethics issues. Yet what is the nature

of the information gained from such an inquiry?

While the initial answer might be that the research

will tell us what the respondents would do, very

little thought is necessary to show that this is perhaps

an unlikely outcome. In an ontological sense, we

have to ask what the inherent nature of the

knowledge is. Is there a ‘reality’ of people’s response

to such a situation (positivist ontology) or only the

TABLE IV

Summary of paradigms – use in business ethics

Paradigm Ontological assumptions Epistemological assumptions Existing use in

business ethics

Positivist/post-positivist A reality exists which is:

apprehendable/imperfectly so

Findings true/probably true Heavy

Non-positivist, non-critical Relativist; truth is constructed Transactional/to an extent

subjectivist; findings are created

Growing, but still

relatively slight

Critical theories Historical realism Transactional/subjectivist Negligible

Adapted from Guba and Lincoln (1994); other sources: Burrell and Morgan (1979) and Crotty (1998).

Empirical Business Ethics Research 445

constructions people make in relation to the subject

matter (non-positivist ontology)?

Similarly, if we ask the epistemological question

‘how is it that we can know about people’s reactions

to ethical dilemmas’, we have to reflect on whether

we believe it is ever possible to really find out what

someone else would do (a positivist approach) or

to only imperfectly find out (a post-positivist

approach), or simply to gain insight into how that

person understands the issue (a non-positivist

approach). If we decide the latter is true, we might

conclude that one of the most useful things we could

know about how an individual makes sense of an

ethical scenario is the perceptions the individual

holds about that issue, and something about the way

they arrive at their perceptions. Given the context-

laden and complex nature of ethical decision-

making, underlying perceptions will often be critical

data. Our answer to those two questions of what we

can know, and how we can know it, will inform our

thinking about how we pursue the research. If we

believe that there is a ‘reality’ of an individual’s

reaction to a dilemma, and that we can discover it,

then we will be influenced to use large-scale ques-

tionnaires, even though they provide virtually no

opportunity for gaining insight into a respondent’s

perception of an issue. If we tend, on the other hand,

to the belief that there is no ‘absolute’ or ‘real’

reaction to a dilemma but rather only individual

constructions, which we can attempt to access by

engaging in dialogue, we may be influenced to use

in-depth interviews to gain access to individual

perceptions. This approach may then allow issues to

be raised that were not anticipated (and would

therefore not have formed part of a closed-question

yes/no questionnaire). It also offers the possibility

that significant ‘penumbra’ aspects of the interaction

may be captured, giving important information

about the way a respondent reacted to a question, as

well as their formal response. A student’s anxiety and

uncertainty in responding to a particular scenario

may be noted, for instance, where a questionnaire

format would offer only the black-and-white evi-

dence of the student’s final selection of one of the

possible multiple choice answers. This may be crit-

ical information for educators concerned to under-

stand the perceptions of students they teach. In the

context of cross-cultural business ethics, the ability

to garner surrounding detail through an interview

format offers many potential benefits, including not

least the ability to probe for language or cultural

misunderstandings in relation to questions asked.

Other benefits can easily be imagined, but without

an increased focus on non-positivist approaches, are

unlikely to be realised.

Another layer of difficulty is added by the prob-

lems of accessing data in business ethics. If we pay

attention to the relationship between the researcher

and what can be known (Guba and Lincoln, 1994)

then we may see that in business ethics, this is a

potentially difficult area. Researching some kinds of

data is more difficult than others, and business ethics

represents a particularly challenging category. As

noted, asking what a respondent would do in a given

situation is a common approach. Yet, even using

quantitative approaches, there are a range of reasons

why we might argue where we cannot in any event

find out the ‘real’ answer to the question of what

someone would ‘do’. What we may be able to dis-

cover is perhaps the way respondents feel they ought

to say they would act in a certain business ethics

situation, or the way respondents think they would

act in a certain business ethics situation (although

they may be deceiving themselves or be inadequately

aware of their own likely response). That is, there

may be a number of social, cognitive and other

reasons why we cannot obtain certain business ethics

data [rather as the post-positivists accept that there is

a ‘real’ reality but that it is ‘‘only imperfectly and

probabilistically apprehendable’’ due to the limitations

of our ‘‘human intellectual mechanisms’’ (Guba

and Lincoln, 1994, p. 109)]. Non-positivist-based

qualitative approaches may offer an alternative way

of addressing such issues. What we may well be able

to obtain, in a qualitative sense, is access to the

context of responses, insight into the perceptions

underlying certain decisions, and a broader picture

of the participants’ understanding of an issue.

This issue could be framed as an epistemological

question; i.e. how is it possible for us as researchers to

access this knowledge (always assuming that it even

exists – the ontological question)? Or this may be

treated as a methodological question: what research

design do we need to employ in order to access this

type of knowledge? (see e.g. Crane, 1999, who seems

to take this approach to some extent at least). Several

of the matters listed above might be seen as simply

potential sources of error in this kind of empirical

446 V. Brand

investigation, but there does seem to be something

more going on here. These issues give rise to the risk

of confusion in the process of defining the larger

question of what it is we can find out, and how we

can find it out, when we ask a business ethics ques-

tion. If we are rigorous in identifying our ontological

and epistemological beliefs, then this confusion ought

to be reduced, and a better match obtained between

what we seek to know and how we seek to know it.

Care needs to be taken, in moving away from an

over-emphasis on positivist approaches, to avoid

‘rampant subjectivity’ (Crotty, 1998, p. 48). In a

business ethics research sense, this might be seen as a

warning not to conflate a move away from positivist/

post-positivist epistemologies with a simple render-

ing of research subjects’ subjective experiences. That

is, we need to be careful to understand what it means

to construct meaning in the sense of business ethics

and the researched’s experience, while not simply

reporting ‘this is what subject X thinks about

business ethics’. Table V below attempts to sum-

marise, in tabulated form, a comparison between the

paradigm approach dominating business ethics

journal research currently, and the way in which

things might be done if more attention was paid to

the growing, but still slight, context of non-positivist

(and almost entirely non-critical) approaches.

Conclusion

Empirical business ethics research deals with highly

sensitive and contextual information. Certain types of

questions will be more naturally answerable within

one paradigm than another, and yet the positivist/

post-positivist paradigm continues to form the

dominant basis of work in this area. The key issue is

whether or not the data obtainable are the data the

researcher needed to answer their research question.

Increased attention to paradigm identification facili-

tates analysis of the nature of the knowledge being

sought and of the ways in which it can be arrived at.

To date, an over-emphasis has been placed on the

types of questions that are answerable within a quan-

titative methodology (itself implicitly based in a posi-

tivist or post-positivist paradigm), and commentary on

the need for greater attention to alternative (particu-

larly qualitative) approaches has not yielded an adequate

shift in approach. Increased emphasis needs to be given

to the situated, contextual nature of much significant

and valuable business ethics knowledge, and to more

transactional and constructed findings. There is a

need for increased emphasis on seeking contextual

understanding of the business ethics perceptions of

research participants. Examples from the subfields of

student perceptions and cross-cultural business ethics

illustrate the dearth of contextual data in fields where

non-positivist approaches have clear relevance. Only

so much can be contributed by positivist perspectives.

Where it might be interesting to know how a student

perceives an ethical issue and the ways in which they

construct their own ethical reality, or how respon-

dents from different cultural backgrounds explain the

complexity of their ethical reasoning, an approach

that instead requires a limited, truncated and artifi-

cially concise response can be only partially satisfac-

tory. Approaches that allow for findings to be created

through interactions between the researched and

the researcher offer an alternative to the outcomes

of research that emphasises the discovery, or partial

discovery, of ‘true’ findings. This is not to suggest that

one paradigm’s dominance needs to be replaced by

TABLE V

Summary of positivist/non-positivist paradigms – business ethics context

Paradigm Ontological assumptions Epistemological assumptions Business ethics context

Positivist/post-positivist A reality exists which is:

apprehendable/imperfectly so

Findings true/probably true Hypothesis test propositions

about business ethics ‘reality’

Non-positivist,

non-critical

Relativist; truth is

constructed

Transactional/to an extent

subjectivist; findings

are created

Seek contextual understanding

of business ethics perceptions

of research participants

Adapted from Guba and Lincoln (1994); other sources: Burrell and Morgan. (1979) and Crotty (1998)).

Empirical Business Ethics Research 447

that of another, alternative, paradigm, but that

identification of (and reliance on) a range of para-

digms will enable us to better understand the

business ethics issues with which we, as researchers,

are grappling. Business ethics research has pro-

ceeded largely on implicit underlying paradigm

assumptions that have been, perhaps, artificially

neat and limited. Drawing attention to those

assumptions highlights the need for greater diversity

of approaches and particularly to the need for in-

creased emphasis on non-positivist perspectives.

Business ethics research in the fields of undergraduate

student attitudes and cross-cultural inquiry would be

beneficiaries of this increased emphasis, as would the

wider discipline generally.

Acknowledgements

The author acknowledges the valuable assistance pro-

vided by Assoc Prof Carol Tilt in the development of

this article, and also thanks the anonymous reviewers

for their assistance and comments.

Appendix 1 – Glossary

Epistemology – the issue of how it is possible to know

things; of what the relationship is between the

inquirer and what can be known (Guba and Lincoln,

1994); thus, it concerns the assumptions we make

about ‘‘the grounds of knowledge – about how one

might begin to understand the world and commu-

nicate this as knowledge to fellow human beings’’

(Burrell and Morgan, 1979, p. 1). Each paradigm

implies ‘‘a certain understanding of what is entailed

in knowing, i.e. how we know what we know’’ (Crotty,

1998, p. 8, emphasis in the original). These beliefs

are critical facets of any research activity.

Methodology – the application of ontological and

epistemological beliefs to the carrying out of a piece

of research; it is the research design, linking the

chosen methods to the objectives of the research

(Crotty, 1998). As Guba and Lincoln (1994, p. 108)

put it, ‘‘[h]ow can the inquirer (would-be knower)

go about finding out whatever he or she believes can

be known?’’. Clearly, beliefs as to the nature of what

can be known, and as to how we can know it, will be

critical to the methodology employed.

Methods form a subset of methodology; they

provide the mechanism by which a particular

methodology is enacted, the ‘‘concrete techniques

and procedures’’ that enable us to carry out our

research (Crotty, 1998, p. 6).

Ontology – the question of the nature of reality, of

the nature of existence; it relates to ‘‘assumptions

which concern the very essence of the phenomena

under investigation’’ (Burrell and Morgan, 1979).

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Empirical Business Ethics Research 449