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Business Ethics in Russia

Article  in  Journal of Business Ethics · October 1997

DOI: 10.1023/A:1005815115202

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Business Ethics in Russia
Author(s): Ruben G. Apressyan
Source: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 16, No. 14, Region: and Country-Related Reports
on Business Ethics (Oct., 1997), pp. 1561-1570
Published by: Springer
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Business Ethics in Russia Ruben G. Apressyan
ABSTRACT. Most of the features of modern
Russian business are transient, determined by the
transitional character of the Russian economy and
drastic changes in the social structure, ideology, and
consciousness of Russian society in general. There are
three main normative experiences in the traditions
of Russian business: a) the experience of pre
Revolutionary business, specifically developed and
practiced by the merchants of the old-believers
extraction; b) the experience of socialist economy,
which was more or less oriented to the public good
and presupposed selfless aspirations by the economic
agents; c) the experience of legally and administra
tively constrained private business and illegal shadow
business, which expected businessmen to be vigorous,
industrious and enterprising. The process of privati
zation was developed under the aegis of state, specif
ically the state bureaucracy. The influence of changes
in the social-economic system has been ambivalent
for social morals. However, the reforms could stim
ulate their improvement. The recent development in
the cultural environment of business testify to the
emerging space of civilized business, which manifests
that it is practically useful for businessmen to be
ethical.
Ruben G. Apressyan, Head, Department of Ethics,
Institute of Philosophy, Russian Academy of Sciences,
teaches Ethics in Moscow Lomonosov University and
Leo Tolstoy Tula Pedagogical University. He has pub
lished several books: The Experience of Nonviolence
in the 20th Century, ed. (1996), The Idea of
Morality and Basic Normative-Ethical Programs
(1995), Morality and Rationality, ed. (1995),
Ascenso a la moral (1991), Comprehension of the
Good (1986), and Ethical Sentimentalism:
Shaftesbury and Hutcheson (1986).
Journal of Business Ethics 16: 1561-1570, 1997.
? 1997 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
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Modern private business in Russia has become
legal only since the late 1980s. This became
possible owing to liberal reforms in the social
political and economic spheres of the late Soviet
and post-Soviet society. For the society as a
whole, these reforms were inconsistent and rather
destructive than constructive. However, they gave
real impulse to the birth of a social force which
became a new agent of economic activity.
From the historical point of view, private
property in Russia today is too new to make
definitive conclusions about it. However, one
may speak about tendencies in the development
of Russian business, keeping in mind that most
of its features are transient, determined by the
transitional character of the Russian economy
and drastic changes in the social structure,
ideology, and mentality of Russian society in
general.
1. Traditions and behavioral attitudes of
Russian business
1.1. Pre-revolutionary business
In the pre-Soviet past, there were certain tradi
tions of ethically and socially responsible business
in Russia. They increased after the abolition of
serfdom in 1861 and then were destroyed by the
socialist reorganizations after the October
Revolution of 1917.
Ethical attitudes in business were especially
strong among so called "old-believers," i.e.,
members or extractors of religion faith succeeded
from Orthodox Church after Peter the Great's
Church reform. They constituted the elite of
pre-Revolutionary Russian business. Many
 1562 Ruben G. Apressyan
writers have considered the old-believers' prin
ciples of rational and zealous management a
Russian analog of Protestant ethics. Old-belief
merchants regarded their business as a mission
commanded by God. The principles of life and
behavior known as "Franklin Virtues", i.e.,
frugality, allegiance to the pledged word,
economy, modesty, and so on, were highly
respected. (Anderson et al., 1994) In this aspect
Old-Belief essentially differed from Russian
Orthodox teaching, which did not elaborate
specific business ethics. However, in the Old
Belief, as in Orthodoxy and unlike Protestantism,
labor and business as such still were considered
manifestations of mundane asceticism rather than
means for sacred service and salvation. (Zarubina,
1995) Service to higher social and state ideal was
much more significant for Russian businessmen
of the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
followed by individual service devoted to God.
To justify their activity, they appealed to the
highest obligation. However, it was obligation
not toward God but toward Fatherland.
From Peter the Great until the second half of
the 19th century, merchandise and industrial
business were developed under the aegis of the
autocratic state. Later, it was permanently under
state supervision. Traditional Russian elites ?
aristocracy and bureaucracy - strongly opposed
the development of a third class. The develop
ment of capitalism also faced the psychological
opposition of patriarchal peasants and, broadly,
patriarchal psychology widespread in Russian
society. Socialist criticism of capitalism borrowed
its spiritual energy mainly from patriarchal,
intellectual, bureaucratic, and aristocratic hostility
against business as a cultural phenomenon in
general.
1.2. Soviet business
The communist ideology developed this sharply
negative attitude of mass consciousness towards
business and business ethos for many years. This
had its seamy side in attitude towards the ethics
of labor. The official ideology ^vas glorifying the
worker. But only heroic, i.e., selfless, labor was
considered as the highest value. While this can
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be justified under conditions of war or starvation,
selfless labor cannot be a norm under the con
ditions of peaceful, usual life.
Under the conditions of a state regulated
economy, it was not usual to talk about business
ethics. There was no room for it. Because of state
Communist ideology, there was no need for any
additional value justification of economic activity.
This ideology corresponded to a particular ethos
and appropriate business morals with a cunning
double spring. On the one hand, everything was
submitted to the fulfillment of the economic plan
and the improvement of quantitative level of
production. On the other hand, upward distor
tions took place whenever possible, to demon
strate the fulfillment, and over fulfillment of the
plan and to secure bonuses. The expansion of
production was considered the primary and
absolute criterion of organizational success. The
managers of state enterprises were not interested
in the questions of marketing, distribution,
management or finances, or the environment
because those were the state's responsibilities.
Such was the picture on the level of management
and labor organization. On the level of individual
participants of labor, everyone also aspired to the
growth of productivity. At the same time,
everyone was concerned in using state property
so far it was possible in his/her private interests.
Since the mid-1950s, different attempts were
undertaken to improve management and labor
relations and to activate workers' personal interest
in labor results. In the 1960s the significance of
the moral-psychological environment of labor
besides or instead of personal material incentive
for the growth of productivity became evident.
In the 1970s the ethics of business relations, i.e.
personal aspects of labor relations (relations
between head and subordinates, between col
leagues) became a popular issue. The elabora
tion of this topic was determined by the rulers'
understanding of the necessity of activating the
factors of increasing of labor productivity by
different means than material and ideological
incentives.
 Business Ethics in Russia 1563
1.3. Experiences of private and shadow business
Three kinds of marginal and intrinsically alter
native economic practices existed side by side
(but not equally) with the state economy in the
U.S.S.R.: first, individual activity in production
of foodstuffs and goods (mainly agricultural) and
services; second, the activity of small collectives
(artels) and cooperatives, and third, the "shadow
economy", concentrated in the spheres of light
industry, trade and services. Individual activity
used to be relatively autonomous, being com
pletely based on the efforts and individual
property of its agents. The "artel," collective
economy, though based on collective (in this
sense non-state) property, was strictly controlled
by state institutions. The shadow economy was
based on more entrepreneurial and efficient
business. However since it was dependent upon
illegal usage of state material and financial
resources, or thefts, it was essentially parasitic by
its character. Only according to an extremely
romantic approach it can be considered a kind
of "popular economy". It would be incorrect to
assume that the decay of the state economy made
room for the extension of shadow economy.
Since the latter was parasitic and complemen
tary to the state socialist economy, it went to
pieces as well. Compared with the non-regulated
and criminal market, one can consider the con
ditions of business in the shadow of the state
socialist economy leading a hothouse existence.
Therefore, we can distinguish three main
normative experiences in the traditions of
Russian business. First, there is the experience of
pre-Revolutionary business, specifically devel
oped and practiced by the merchants of the
old-believers extraction. The values of social
responsibility, and the moral and spiritual signif
icance of business were the most important for
them. Second, the experience of socialist
business, which was more or less oriented to the
public good and presupposed selfless aspirations
by the economic agents. Third, the experience
of legally and administratively constrained private
business and illegal shadow business, which
expected businessmen to be vigorous, indus
trious, and enterprising.
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2. New economic situation and social
morals
The current Russian business ethos is determined
by the transition of the Russian economy and the
peculiar features of this transition. The main
features are the following.
First, the transition to a market economy has
been undertaken in a time of deep and varied
economic crises. It is not exaggerating to say that
the Russian economy is not passing merely a
period of transition, but surviving an extreme
situation. One can follow different crises within
the current economic crisis in Russia. These are:
(1) the recession in production, caused by struc
tural transformation, usual during the transition
to market; (2) the crisis caused by the coinci
dent decays of two huge geopolitical superstruc
tures: the Council for Mutual Aid (the economic
organization based on the Warsaw Pact) and the
U.S.S.R.; (3) the deep structural crisis of the
Soviet economy, the first symptoms of which
were revealed in the early 1970s; (4) and the
prolonged cyclic crisis stipulated by the delay of
technological renovation in the 1970s and 1980s.
Second, the crisis has been aggravated by the
extremist Gaydar's reforms (Sidorovitch, 1996). His
critics argue that the reforms were mainly
oriented to stabilize the finances rather than
production. The production itself was suppressed
by the reforms. As romantic liberals, Gaydar and
his team were too optimistic about the "invis
ible hand" and spontaneous power of the market.
The "shock therapy" of 1992 presupposed trans
formation of the previous economic system and
the formation of forces able to take under their
control the economic resources of the country,
to help it out of the economic crisis, and to tune
the economy to a free market in a short period
of time. The previous economic system based on
socialist principles, developed in regard to over
spread geographic space, oriented exclusively to
heavy and military industry and dependent upon
transport infrastructure, was destroyed, but not
modified by the reforms. Production was reduced
in heavy industry as well as in light industry and
agriculture. By the end of 1996, Russia has
preserved only 40-45 percent of the level of
industrial production of 1990.
 1564 Ruben G. Apressyan
During the first two years, the humanitarian
aspect of reforms was almost ignored. On the
occasion of the fifth anniversary of Gaydar's
"government of reforms" in October 1996, most
of the members ofthat government shared in the
press their understanding of the first attempts to
turn Russia to the market economy. Many of
them expressed their regret concerning the lack
of attention they paid to the human factor of
sever economic changes, and later on the gov
ernment only declared its concern of ordinary
people living conditions. The terrible fall in
incomes and level of life was not balanced in
people's eyes by positive results of reforms.
Disparity in income in Russia has become the
highest in the world.
It is evident now that a new social stratum
of businesspeople whose wealth is based on
financial and trade operations has emerged.
Unrestricted liberalization of prices, extraordi
nary and closed to public privatization and the
use of budget and monetary measures as the
primary of fighting inflation and stagnation,
caused the speculative (in Max Weber's terms)
character of new Russian business. New capitals
have been constituted at the expense of uncon
trolled export of mineral resources. The proce
dure of distribution of export licenses at the
beginning was purposefully confused by the
legislators and high level bureaucracy. The
unclear system of preferences which reminded
the former Soviet privileges was surely unfair.
The distribution of export licenses is unclear and
probably unfair. Private and corporate interests
of exporters prevail over national priorities.
However, because of objective civic, legal, and
economic conditions, private business has no real
interest in the growth of production and long
term investments. Even if private business were
ready to take responsibility for the new economy,
the state, in the person of government and fiscal
institutions, by the mere order of state regula
tions in finances, would not allow it to fulfill this
commitment. Since cumbrous state apparatus has
survived in Russia, which consists of 24 federal
ministries and 69 equal to them by status com
mittees and departments and 1 million officers.
Third, to understand the Russian transition to
the market it is essential to realize that the process
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of privatization was developed under the aegis of
state, specifically the state bureaucracy. All forms
of economic activity are also self-seeking and
illegally controlled by a corrupted bureaucracy
from the top and by Mafia, quasi-Mafia, or legal
social and state structures "from the side."
Because of an undeveloped legal system, the state
is unable to guarantee businessperson's personal
and material security. Moreover, the most com
plicated and sharp conflicts in business are usually
resolved by criminal "mediator." From their own
side criminals are interested in preserving con
tradictions and conflicts in business, and they
provoke or manufacture conflicts to turn them
to their advantage and to redistribute income for
their own benefit. It is almost impossible for
small business to survive under the pressure of
contradictory laws and regulations, bureaucracy,
and criminals. By the summer 1996, the share
of shadow economy in Russian gross internal
output was about 40 percent; (see Kakotkin,
1996).
Owing to perestroyka and then post-Soviet
economic reforms, Russian has become signifi
cantly more open to the world. However, forms
and prospects of globalization in this country are
also determined by its general economic and
social conditions. There are several faces of
globalization in Russia today. The first one is the
"natural" internationalization of life, attitudes,
and knowledge, owing to the removal of the
"Iron Curtain." This is manifested in: free
curriculum of information, ideas and images,
particularity displayed in the development of
email and electronic networks, embarking most
of the university and academic centers of the
broadcast of dozens of soap operas on TV; b)
growing possibilities for professional and business
contacts and cooperation; c) growing variety of
imported foods and goods are available at the
market; d) possibility to travel abroad, etc. The
second one is economic modernization, for the
most part as capitalization. The third one is that
capitalization has been developed under the
conditions of deep general economic crisis and,
hence, is concomitant by shape inflation, reduc
tion of social programs, and impoverishment of
millions of people. Besides, the privatization has
been undertaken mainly in bureaucratic forms.
 Business Ethics in Russia 1565
The fourth one, correlated to the first, is
Westernizing and Americanizing by which inter
nalizaron is exhausted. For intellectuals this is
association with the domination of pop-culture
and oppression of classical cultural standards. The
"invasion" of Western values, symbols, and labels
and the seeming retreat of the national ones is
aggravated by the collapse of the Soviet ideology
and by the evident weakness of slowly reani
mating traditional values, inherent to the various
ethic cultures and confessions of Russian.
However, the latter is likely a temporal effect
stipulated, on one hand, by the circumstance that
seized upon the fruit, forbidden for decades, and
on the other hand by the first impression from
the appearance of something unknown and alien.
Meanwhile, the question is opened whether
modernization can take place in a other than
Westernizing forms, for it presupposes the devel
opment of finance and technologies, civilized
means of government, and civic control on it,
i.e. that what was invented by the West and
spread out over the world from the West.
The shift in conditions and the "rules" of
living have compelled many Russians into self
management of their own lives and created
conditions for initiatives in social and economic
activities. However, the reforms of the first three
years were developed in such a way that only a
few people could save enough to increase their
practical interests. Inequality in starting positions
has affected people's status greatly.
Privatization as a whole appeared to become
mainly bureaucratic. The "first wave" of business
occurred in 1988-1991, when the system of state
economics still remained, though shackled. The
success of "first wave" businessmen was stipulated
mainly by such "natural" virtues as energetic
industry, creativity, sharpness, and a thirst for risk
(clearly associated with useful connections). The
businessmen of the "second wave" appeared in
1992-1993. They mainly originated from Party
and state officials, or nomenklatura. They based
their business on old connections and acquired
direct access to privatizing state property.
So managers (of enterprises and commodities),
officials of ministries and departments as well as
Communist Party officials appeared to be more
"lucky" in the redistribution of state (in fact
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national) property by the force of circumstances,
i.e. as possessors of appropriate connections and
operators of material and structural resources.
The appropriate connections under the lack of
vigorous legal regulations and control can secure
any kind of economic activity. Thus the Soviet
nomenklatura has maintained its power and only
changed its modality. Intellectuals and technical
specialists are in the second place among Russian
businessmen. Special information and the skills
of intellectual, creative and innovative work is
their initial capital. Peasants are the least dynamic
in this respect (see Chernysh, 1994).
Inequality of possibilities for different agents
of business was maintained for a long time. In
1992-1994 two different systems of credit and
taxation were functioning in Russia. The state,
still the biggest owner, sponsored the state
enterprises by establishing the regime of highest
favor and almost ignored private enterprises.
Unjustified privileges in credits and taxes
provoked a double standard in the economy.
Moreover, they provoked the corruption of
economic relations. To obtain privileged credit,
one had very often to bribe high level officials.
In turn the privileged credits gained by state
institutions were very often used for financial
investment at commercial rates rather than for
investments and enterprise development. Many
of the state enterprises have maintained their
dependence on this system.
By the number and volume of taxes, Russia
occupies the first place in the world (there are 27
federal taxes and about 70 kinds of local taxes);
for instance, the profit-tax reaches the figures of
85?90 percent what is more than twice higher
than the average in the world. The current
system of taxation is both unjust and burden
some. It hampers investments and the recon
struction of production. It pushes businesspeople
to hide profits and escape taxes. Hence it
condemns business to illegitimate existence.
It would be wrong to propose that drastic
changes in the social-economic system were
fruitful for social morals. However, the reforms
in the economy and ? what is more significant
- in the law could stimulate their improvement.
For accomplishing this, the process of transition
should have been secured with effective legal
 1566 Ruben G. Apressyan
mechanisms to provide appropriate conditions for
development of productive business.
3. The prospects of socially responsible
business
Though there are no evident positive changes
in real conditions of life, the number, of people
optimistic about their personal prospects in the
near close future has increased. This growth is
determined not by the psychological and func
tional adaptation of people to the changeable
conditions of life, but the decrease of people's
dependent expectations on the state as the patron
and guarantor of social wealth. People are more
oriented towards their own personal, professional,
financial, social, etc. possibilities. A relatively
homogeneous consumer environment has
appeared in Russia for the first time after decades
of the Soviet regime. To a large extent this
became possible as a result of stirring up private
business, particularly in trade and individual
merchandise, as well as in capital construction
and services. The real independence of citizens
from the state is actually manifested in social
activity of this sort.
For decades the Soviet state order was stipu
lating a client psychology. With such a back
ground, the importance of the growing aspiration
of more and more people to solve the problems
of their life by themselves (at least within the
limits of their personal experience) cannot be
overestimated.
Liberal reforms in Russia have given (at list
formally) liberties for citizens and enough
autonomy of regions. However, the making and
development of local communities with their
own self-governing institutions and finances is
still on the agenda. One of the most important
results of the reforms has been that people as
self-determined agents, mainly individuals and
families, and rarely small associations, have
become empowered to solve some of their
private problems independently of the state. But
the institution of local community in the above
sense is still undeveloped. Therefore the citizen's
possibility to contribute to the solution of public
problems, like prevention of crime and pollution,
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improving schools, and so forth, are not high
enough. Meanwhile it is easier for urban than
rural citizens to sustain and overcome the
problems of any kind they run across. In this
respect environmental problems appear to be
more consolidated than any others. As a result
of the collapse of the communist regime and
partly liberal reforms, the strong hierarchical
structure of the Soviet society has been destroyed.
The centralization of the state power has
weakened. The economy has become essentially
decentralized, what one can witness (as men
tioned above) in the development of more or less
homogeneous consumption in the country.
However, the situation in this sphere could
become better if the state promoted small
business and people economy. From the liberal
point of view, low communal (sub cultural, local)
spirit in Russia today has been determined by the
lack of guaranteed local, or "bottom," munic
ipal rights and liberties. Local administration is
almost not sovereign. Therefore, it is nothing but
administration, concerned with implementing
the superior authority's directions and interest;
hence, treating people as merely subject and in
this sense, non-citizens. It is far to be the power
of local residents. Likely, the low civic spirit in
Russian society is determined namely by the lack
of legal quarantines of any private activity, non
discrepant to the law, in spite of its substance:
business-like, entrepreneurial, intermediary,
political, cultural and so forth. One faces here
the vicious circle: people are not concerned to
sustain their own rights because their interests are
under developed. However, they fail to maintain
their civil interests so far as the society's legal
sphere is amorphous. Only on the basis for the
law can these interests be legitimately secured
against either unjustified claims and violation
from the side of other citizens or the infringe
ment of the state (specifically, in the person of its
legal institutions), or the Mafia. It is important
to mention that communal life has not been yet
resurrected after so may years of totalitarian
order. From the communitarian point of view, so
far local "communities" (even taking into
account their pervert nature under Soviets) used
to be completely tuned to the directions of the
superior authorities, who through the decay of
 Business Ethics in Russia 1567
Soviet political structure have lost their legiti
macy regarding the social-political context and
their group identity regarding participants' moti
vation. It is difficult to avoid condescension when
speaking about the traditional culture of Russian
communities. The old cultural traditions were for
the most part washed away under Soviets. Those
ones, developed under Soviets, are no more
appropriate under new time; at least they should
be re-understood and reinterpreted. For example,
the farmers movement appeared in the late of
1990s as an alternative to collective farms of the
Soviet type. Many farms were of non-peasant
origin and were motivated by individualistic and
industrious norms. As such, they were severely
opposed not only by local bureaucrats who have
kept control on the main means of distribution,
both materials and finances, but by common
rural people, the members of former collective
farms (recently replaced by agricultural cooper
atives).
Radical changes for the better have also
occurred in business circles. Taking into consid
eration the increase of freedom as a value among
Russians, one may presuppose that business
people were the first in Russian society who
realized the liberal content of this idea, unlike
the typical Russian understanding of freedom as
anarchical willfulness or insubordination and
independence from anyone. According to recent
surveys, big business, unlike small and medium
business, still remains "semi-liberal," i.e. it prac
tices non-liberal attitudes towards its partners,
expecting liberal tactics from their side.
Nevertheless, Russian business more and more
constitutes an active, civic responsible and self
conscious force for renovating society. This is
proved by certain tendencies within the business
community.
"The Round Table of Russian Business"
(RTRB), a kind of Western type business club,
was founded in the fall of 1993 by the initiative
of the well-known Russian businessman Ivan
Kivelidi. It is a non-political and non-economic
organization called to stand up for common
interests of business and the growing middle class.
In 1994 and 1995, RTRB initiated annual con
gresses of Russian businessmen. The First
Congress issued a Statement condemning adven
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turesome tactics and fraud in business
(Zayavleniye, 1995). In the spring of 1995,
RTFJ3 appealed to the Russian Government and
pointed to the lack of collaborative and stable
relations between business circles and the
executive branch (see Delovye Liudy, 1995, No.
56, May, p. 11): RTRB has repeatedly taken steps
to increase productive collaboration between the
authorities and private business. Kivelidi was one
among those who consistently and persistently
argued for the possibility of honest and respon
sible business in Russia. The biting irony of fate
was that he became another victim of assassina
tion in the summer of 1995.
The positive changes in taxation and the state
policy towards small business in many respects
have been determined by the dialogue initiated
by businessmen and developed by the state at the
eve of presidential elections.
Meanwhile, on the eve the Second Congress
of Russian businessmen, RTRB adopted a
"Charter of Business in Russia" (see
"Predprinimately" Rossii, 1995). The Charter
presents an elementary ethical code of business.
Its participants declare their rejection of violence
and fraud in competition, collaboration with
criminals, and engagement in or support of
"laundering" dirty money. They express their
intention to promote the maintenance of law in
the sphere of business. The Charter was criticized
in the press and business circles. Critics were
concerned about its purely ethical character.
However, the elaboration of such a document
(though far from perfect according to a strict
normative approach) and its signing by many
businessmen signify the visible changes in value
attitudes of business. The Charter has set up a
certain standard of really cultural relations in
business.
Another factor was the dramatic experience of
"Black Tuesday" of October 11, 1994 and "Black
Thursday" of August 14, 1995 which shocked
commercial banks and brought some of them to
bankruptcy. This experience pushed the execu
tive and legislative power to realize the necessity
for laws and regulations regarding financial
operations in order to guarantee a certain level
of security. That experience also showed that
partners may trust each other if there is mutual
 1568 Ruben G. Apressyan
openness of commercial information, rationality
of evaluative methods, and adherence to com
mitments. Professional business mass media
intends to promote higher levels of openness in
companies' information and popularizes the
positive experiences of those medium companies
which could increase their profits on the basis
of investments to make their commercial infor
mation more transparent. In November 1995, the
Association of Honest Businessmen "Bureau of
Future Business" (BFB) was established by the
initiative of the International Confederation of
Consumers to promote the development of part
nership between business and consumers. BFB
intends to establish vigorous mechanisms of
ethical business. The corruption of ethical norms
in business should be reflected in mass media and
professional publications, but it is not.
All these facts testify to the emerging space
of civilized business in Russia. This is a natural
process for it results from the efforts by the actual
participants in economic relations and their civil
responsibility, good will, and rationality, mani
festing that ethics is also practical. These ten
dencies are a hopeful sign that business is
developing the elements of civil society as its own
most appropriate social environment.
4. Business ethics activities in academia
4.1. Teaching
Business ethics as a research field is still in the
making in Russia. It started mainly as a teaching
discipline within the curricula of industrial
sociology and/or applied ethics. As such, it was
hampered by the difficulties in teaching social
sciences and humanities because of severe
changes in the ideological and outlook paradigm
in the late 1980s rather than by the problems in
business itself. For the teachers and professors of
the schools of economy, business ethics became
a godsend to replace old fashioned and abstract
Marxist social sciences.
Most of the courses in the mainstream of
business ethics were of three kinds: first, the
courses about the etiquette of business commu
nication and the psychology of treating people
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(in the spirit of Dale Carnegie's philosophy of
making friends and influencing people); second,
the courses based on writings by Max Weber and
Russian Orthodox philosophers like Vladimir
Soloviov, Nikolay Berdyaiev, and Father Nikolay
Bulgakov; third, the courses based on sociology
and psychology of labor, management, and
conflict resolution. I know social and moral
philosophers who have almost switched over to
teaching such courses as "organizational
behavior," "stuff management," "body language,"
etc., considering these as very close to business
ethics. As a rule the courses are mandatory.
Along with the recent changes in teaching
ethics, the topics related to business ethics have
been incorporated into ethics curricula. There
have been no publications about teaching
business ethics yet.
4.2. Institutional forms of business ethics
Speaking about centers, one should mention the
Center for Applied Ethics in Tyumen (East
Siberia) established and directed by Professor
Vladimir Bakshtanovsky. He and his associates
started the studies in applied ethics ten years ago.
Their main interest is in political and business
ethics. With Professor Vladimir Sogomonov
(Vladimir City) they have published several books
on these topics. In 1994, Bakshtanovsky started
the journal The Ethics of Success.
There are a few research centers in Moscow
and St. Petersburg, which are state institutions or
independent. A small center "Business and
Culture" was established by several fellows of the
Institute of Philosophy in 1994. The Center
directed by Dr. Nikolay Kormin organized two
international conferences on "The Cultures of
Business: Russia-West-East" (1993, 1995). A
volume of articles, devoted to the cultural aspects
of business mainly by Russians, is now being
prepared for publication in 1997. Business ethics
is a matter of special interest for a group of
scholars associated with the Chair of Ethics and
Aesthetics, Hertsen University of Education (St.
Petersburg): the group is directed by Professor
Larisa Gromova. The Center of Business
Research was established in Plekhanov Academy
 Business Ethics in Russia 1569
of Economy in 1994, and similar center is soon
to be established by the Trade Chamber. The
project has been developed by Professor Peter
Shihirev.
4.3. Research
A professional discourse in this field with con
tinuous and developing discussions, meetings, and
publications has not yet grown up. As if they
started from the zero, most of the research and
round-table discussions put forward too general
issues irrelevant to practical problems of business.
Business ethics as a research discipline has not
become a subject matter of academic reflection.
The basic problem is the lack of case studies,
corresponding data, and materials. I know
teachers who provoke their mature students in
business schools to share their real experience and
to discuss it during class. However, it is difficult
to develop case studies because the main source
here is oral history, but not the proceedings and
descriptions of real legal cases.
Another problem concerns the theoretical
paradigm. The western (American and German)
writings in business ethics are the main source
in developing business ethics in Russia. Most of
the Russian scholars' background in economics
was Marxist political economy; they need not
only to explore writings in business ethics but
also to reeducate themselves in modern eco
nomics as well as in theory of norms, decision
making, and so forth.
5. Common tasks of business and
academia in the field of business
ethics
Business people today are not interested in
publicizing the inner conflicts, their resolution
(or often destruction), corporate dynamics, the
motives and process of decision-making, etc. As
mentioned above, social and psychological issues
of labor and management were relatively topical
in the late Soviet times. With the development
of a cooperative economy and private business
with fantastic rates of profit, managers and busi
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nessmen became no more interested in ethical
discourse about human, value, and normative
aspects of business and the economy. Only those
businesspeople whose educational background
in the humanities have been supportive and
interested in business ethics studies.
Meanwhile, it is quite plausible that the new
tendency in the Russian economy toward the
reduction of the rate of profit which emerged in
summer 1995 will make businesspeople take note
of noneconomic factors in economic activities.
The declaration of the "Business Charter" in
November 1995, mentioned in the main text,
was one of the manifestations of a growing new
mentality in Russian business. Business has to
realize its social responsibility to take the first
steps towards the dialogue with scholars, under
standing that business ethics justifies normative
restrictions for business but that it does not give
additional (cultural) means of increasing profits.
Another question deals with scholar's motiva
tion to the studies in and teaching business ethics.
For some of them, business ethics is a new
challenge and they like to try themselves in a new
academic field. For others, business ethics is a
door to business itself, and opportunity to
become connected with business, to provoke
research orders form the side to business people,
to convince them they have a need in different
academic services to make their profits higher.
Very few are ready to teach business ethics to
criticize the morals of capitalism, enterprise,
profit-seeking, and consumerism. There is a
perceptible lack of the very ethical motivation
towards studies and teaching business ethics
among Russian scholars. In the West business
ethics started as an academic effort and move
ment of intellectuals committed to "upgrade"
and actualize the social responsibility and virtues
of business. However, to develop equal partner
ship with business people, scholars should realize
that they themselves are socially responsible and
independent, capital citizens.
 1570 Ruben G. Apressyan
6. Relationship to business ethics in
other countries and regions
Russian scholars would be able to provide the
international academic community with adequate
surveys of the development of national business
and its cultural roots and normative aspects.
Interesting experience regarding the psycholog
ical attitudes of Russians oriented to business
could be collected from the discussions of the
cases provided by Western manuals in business
ethics.
In general, the situation for teaching business
ethics can be improved by joint summer schools,
re-education courses for young scholars and
training workshops (mainly based on case
analysis) for businesspeople. Sharing my personal
experience, I can say that even a few issues of
EBEN I received four years ago highly motivated
my first steps in understanding business ethics
agenda and point, and oriented me towards
current literature and eminent authors.
Though the current Western literature is the
main theoretical resource for Russian studies in
business ethics, the experiences of former
European post-socialist countries and the Third
world developing countries are, surely, important
for understanding the process of market economy
growth in Russia. Unfortunately, this part of
world national experiences has been usually
ignored.
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14 Volhonka,
119842 Moscow,
Russia.
E-mail: rapressy@iphras.irex.ru