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Moral Education for Sustainable Development: Exploring Morally Challenging Business Situations within the Global Supply Chain Context
Sustainability
  • Jung Ha-Brookshire, University of Missouri
  • Laura McAndrews, University of Georgia
  • Jooyoun Kim, Seoul National University
  • Charles Freeman, Jr, Mississippi State University
  • Byoungho Jin, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
  • Pamela Norum, University of Missouri
  • Melody L.A. LeHew, Kansas State University
  • Elena E. Karpova, Iowa State University
  • Lesya M Hassall, Iowa State University
  • Sara Marcketti, Iowa State University
Document Type
Article
Publication Version
Published Version
Publication Date
9-15-2017
DOI
10.3390/su9091641
Abstract

This study presents the need for moral development education of current and future professionals so they can help build sustainable companies and global supply chains. Grounded in Ha-Brookshire’s moral responsibility theory of corporate sustainability, the authors explored a set of real-life business situations where business professionals experienced morally challenging dilemmas. The study was conducted within the context of the textile and apparel (TA) industry because of the global and fragmented supply chain nature of the industry. The real-life business situations were interpreted using Kohlberg’s moral development stage theory. The results of in-depth individual interviews followed by three focus groups of industry professionals in spring 2017 showed that participants have experienced a variety of morally challenging business situations throughout their careers. This includes simple problems at the individual and firm levels, as well as wicked and complex problems at the industry and global levels. The study concludes that for TA businesses to be truly sustainable, professionals’ moral ability is critical and, therefore, appropriate moral development education is necessary.

Comments

This article is published as Ha-Brookshire, J., McAndrews, L., Kim, J., Freeman, C., Jin, B., Norum, P., LeHew, M., Hassal, L., Karpova, E., & Marcketti, S. Moral Education for Sustainable Development:Exploration of morally challenging business situations within the context of corporate sustainability in the global textile and apparel industry. Sustainability, 9, 1-17. Sustainability 2017, 9, 1641; doi:10.3390/su9091641

Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International
Copyright Owner
MDPI
Language
en
File Format
application/pdf
Citation Information
Jung Ha-Brookshire, Laura McAndrews, Jooyoun Kim, Charles Freeman, et al.. "Moral Education for Sustainable Development: Exploring Morally Challenging Business Situations within the Global Supply Chain Context" Sustainability Vol. 9 Iss. 9 (2017) p. 1641
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/elena_karpova/51/