Read the case study below and answer ALL the questions that follow Cultural Ethics and International Bribery Gift or Bribe or Both? The Entrepreneur magazine article posed a problem for Americans going overseas to do business. In some places, passing money under the table is necessary to spark negotiations and win contracts. However, bribery is illegal in the United States, and US law makes it illegal for Americans to do that kind of thing abroad. Gifts, on the other hand, are allowed. But, according to the Entrepreneur article, it can be difficult to determine the difference between a gift and a bribe. In some cultures, a gesture may be a gift, and in others it looks like a bribe. Looking at this uncertainty, what a culturalist sees is not ambiguity about whether handing the money over to a potential client is a legal gift or an illegal bribe. That is not it at all. A culturalist sees it as both a gift and a bribe. In one culturea nation overseas where the payment is occurring and where similar payments always occur when business is getting donethere are no moral qualms. It is right to give a cash gift because that is the rule of the country; it is the way things are commonly and properly done there. By contrast, from the perspective of American business culture, the conclusion that is drawn with equal force is that it is an immoral bribe because that is what US customs and normal practices tell us. International Bribery Culturalists see moral rules as fixed onto specific societies, but that does not help anyone to know what to do when confronted with an unfamiliar set of beliefs. How, the important question is, does a culturalist act when forced to make decisions in a place and among people whose beliefs are different and unfamiliar? The Entrepreneur interview with Steve Veltkamp provides one answer. What can you do if your overseas associate demands a bribe? Veltkamp does not recommend asking embassies or consulates for assistance, as they have to stick to the official line. Instead, he believes the best resource in almost every country of the world is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, where you can find Americans who live in the country and understand how things are done. Immediately you can see how different the culturalist approach is to moral dilemmas. The message is: get in touch with the locals and try to do as they would in the same situation. Most traditional ethical theories go in exactly the opposite direction. They say that it does not necessarily matter what people are doing. Stronger, the entire point of studying ethics has normally been to escape conventional wisdom and ingrained habits; the idea of doing what we ought to do requires a step away from those things and a cold, rational look at the situation. So, a morality based on duties sets up guidelines including do not lie, do not steal, and appeals to men and women in business to follow them. Acting in an ethically responsible way in the world means obeying the dictates and refusing to be swayed by what the guy in the next cubicle is up to. Handing someone money under the table, consequently, while publicly insisting that everything is on the up and up cannot be condoned no matter what anyone else does; it cannot be right because it entails at least implicit lying. More specifically for the culturalist, Entrepreneur advises overseas businesspeople to avoid seeking guidance from embassies or consulates because those people must stick to the official line. What is the official line? Presumably, it is 2 the set of practices delineated and approved by the State Department back in Washington, DC. The strength of these practices is that they are formed to be universal, to work at every embassy everywhere in the world. A culturalist, however, looks at that and says it is silly. There are no practices that work everywhere in the world. The advice government bureaucrats give is worthless; it is less than worthless because it departs from the error of conceiving ethics as a set of rules fitting a transnational reality. What people in business should do is get in contact with people who really know something about ethics, and that requires turning to the locals, including the chamber of commerce, because they are on the scene? Conclusion. The culturalist deals with the question about whether a bribe is ethically respectable by ignoring all dictates received from other places and obeying the customs and standard practices of those who live and work where the decision is being made. Moira Allen, Here Comes the Bribe, Entrepreneur, October 2000, accessed May 12, 2011, http://www.entrepreneur.com/magazine/entrepreneur/2000/october/32636.html

QUESTION 1 In this case study, the writer is using the term culturalist. What meaning do you think the writer intends to make with this term in view of the business world? (5 Marks)

QUESTION 2 Explain the meaning of cross-cultural ethics in the business world as described in this case study. (5 Marks)

QUESTION 3 Discuss ethical uncertainty in view of international gifts and bribery for business managers and employees to do business overseas with ethical certainty. (20 Marks)