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What if business ethics had less to do with rules and compliance, and more to do with beauty, gestures, and the poetics of organizational life? Business Aesth/ethics: Dialogic Perspectives upends conventional moral frameworks by inviting aesthetics into the heart of ethical inquiry. Through a sustained dialogue between philosophy, social sciences and management, the authors champion a situated aesth/ethics grounded in context, affect, and improvisation. The first part dismantles myths of managerial objectivity showing how they conceal deeper ethical tensions. The second part turns to art, history, and lived examples to reveal how beaux gestes can interrupt, reorient, or subvert organizational routines. Writing together across disciplinary lines, Bouilloud and Deslandes not only advocate dialogical thinking - they perform it. In a world where organizations shape nearly every corner of life, this book opens a space for dissonance, irony, and care.
List of contents
Part 1- THE ETHICS OF BUSINESS: NUMBERS, VIRTUES AND TRUTH.- Introduction.- Chapter 1. Life is not a quantity. Comments on Governance by Numbers.- Chapter 2. Wisdom against Power: Ricoeur and the Ethics of Situated Judgment.- Chapter 3. Beyond Recognition? Ethical Inquiries.- Chapter 4. Care and Control: The Managerial Takeover of Compassion.- Chapter 5. The Leader as Chief Truth Officer.- Part 2- AESTHETICS CONSIDERATIONS FOR BUSINESS ETHICS.- Chapter 6. Fighting Ugliness in the Business School: Blanqui and the Pedagogics of Taste.- Chapter 7. Finance as Farce : Paul Laffitte and the Satirical Aesthetic of Resistance.- Chapter 8. The Dandy s Shadow: Aesthetic Arrogance and the Seduction of Contempt.- Chapter 9. About the Aesth/ethics Reality of Organisations: The Visitors by Ragnar Kjartansson.- Chapter 10. Business Aesth/ethics: Beau Geste as Philosophy.- CONCLUSION. AESTH/ETHICS AT WORK.
About the author
Jean-Philippe Bouilloud is Professor of Organisation and Philosophy of Sciences at ESCP Europe in Paris, France, and at the University of Paris Cité. He has been visiting scholar at various universities, including UQAM, UNAM, or University of San Andres. He has published many books, most recently POUVOIR FAIRE UN BEAU TRAVAIL - UNE REVENDICATION PROFESSIONNELLE, and numerous articles in international journals (PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, JOURNAL OF BUSINESS ETHICS, ORGANISATION STUDIES, M@N@GEMENT, REVUE FRANÇAISE DE GESTION, NOUVELLE REVUE INTERNATIONALE DE PSYCHOSOCIOLOGIE). He received the Best Book on Work Award in Paris for his book, ENTRE L’ENCLUME ET LE MARTEAU (Paris, Seuil).
Ghislain Deslandes is a professor in Humanities and Management at ESCP Business School. His most recent research has been published in journals like BUSINESS ETHICS QUARTERLY, JOURNAL OF BUSINESS ETHICS, MANAGEMENT LEARNING, ORGANIZATION, AND ORGANIZATION STUDIES. He has also published several books in the field of management studies, most recently POSTCRITICAL MANAGEMENT STUDIES: PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS (Springer) and HUMANITIES AND ORGANIZATIONS IN DIALOGUE: HERMENEUTICS INQUIRIES (Lexington). A former program director at the Collège International de Philosophie (CIPh), he is also the author of various philosophical essays, such as ANTIPHILOSOPHY OF CHRISTIANITY (Springer) and THE IDEA OF BEGINNING IN JULES LEQUIER'S PHILOSOPHY (Lexington books).
