Ethics of Risk Management: Taking Compliance Seriously

The Federal Sentencing Guidelines for Organizations, enacted in 1991, specify a reduced fine for a corporation convicted of a regulatory offense if the corporation had an 'effective compliance and ethics program' at the time of the offense. Prior to their enactment, very few Fortune 500 companies had such programs; within a few years, they all did. This sudden growth points to a financial motive. After all, if compliance had been driven by ethics, these programs should have already been in place. Ethics of Risk Management highlights how corporate practice tends to focus on the firm's financial risks, leaving little to no role for ethical reflection. The book finds this financial approach to compliance lacking and brings ethical issues to the fore. Drawing on multiple case studies, it offers an alternative approach to compliance that tempers risk management with a nuanced jurisprudential view coupled with robust notions of the firm's political obligations.