Interesting piece on codes of conduct in the December edition of the Harvard Business Review. The researchers identified differences between codes representing multiple sectors of society and business. They also establish a Global Business Standards Codex as a benchmark for companies wanting to set up their own world-class code. The Codex is underpinned by eight ethical principles:

The Fiduciary Principle: By law, the officers and directors of a corporation are fiduciaries for the company and its shareholders. However, all employees stand in a fiduciary relationship to the corporate entity in that they are entrusted to protect its resources and act on its behalf in carrying out their job-related responsibilities.

The Property Principle: Whether justified by arguments from the standpoint of human dignity and liberty or from that of wealth maximization and economic development, the property principle is today regarded as central to individual and societal well-being, the ultimate test of any ethical system. Theft and embezzlement of tangible property are the classic violations of this principle, and injunctions against these behaviors are found across the ages. As intangible property has grown in importance, definitions of theft have expanded to include misappropriation of intellectual property and other types of proprietary information.

The Reliability Principle:Classic violations of the reliability principle include breach of promise, breach of contract, and other less formal types of betrayal or going back on one's word. More generally, the reliability principle implies care in making commitments, not promising more than one can deliver, and in following through on agreements and other obligations that are voluntarily incurred.

The Transparency Principle:A number of directives are concerned with accuracy, truth, and disclosure of information-or what has come to be called "transparency." Although this term does not signify total openness, its core ideas of honesty and respect for truth have been treated as fundamental ethical imperatives from time immemorial. Injunctions against fraud and deceit-the characteristic violations of this precept-are found in many ethical traditions and virtually all legal systems. Transparency also implies taking care to present information accurately and not to mislead. And it may mean correcting misinformation or offering information that is material to the recipient in important ways-affecting personal or financial well-being, for instance.

The Dignity Principle: Although corporate officials and employees have fiduciary obligations to protect and promote the company's interests, they are nonetheless expected to do so in a way that respects other people-whether those people are other employees, customers, supply chain workers, or members of the general public. Indeed, respect for the person is perhaps the starting point for all ethical thought. It leads directly to protections for health, safety, expression, and privacy, and to proscriptions on humiliation, coercion, and offenses against basic human rights.

The Fairness Principle: Four types of fairness have received particular attention: reciprocal fairness, or fairness in exchange; distributive fairness, or equity in allocating benefits and burdens among members of a group; fair competition, which concerns conduct among rivals; and procedural fairness, which entails due process.

The Citizenship Principle: The various codes differ considerably on the degree to which companies should be activists on public and societal issues, but they agree on several basic issues of citizenship. Perhaps the most fundamental civic duty is respect for law, and all the codes call for observation of relevant laws and regulations. In addition, citizens are generally thought to bear some responsibility for maintaining the "commons"-such shared and indivisible goods as the natural environment, public spaces, or legitimate government. Just as individuals should clean up after themselves, companies, too, should repair any damage to the commons resulting from their activities. Beyond this baseline, citizenship implies a willingness to deal with public authorities in good faith and may even imply some additional contribution by way of charity, civic support, or help in addressing broad societal problems.

The Responsiveness Principle: It implies a readiness to engage with other parties that may be affected by a company's activities or may have a justifiable claim (even if not an entitlement) to attention.