Moral Blindness in Business: A Social Theory of Evil in Organizations and Institutions

315 Pages·2020·3.825 MB·English

by  Jacob Dahl Rendtorff

Jacob Dahl Rendtorff
Moral Blindness in
Business
A Social Theory of
Evil in Organizations
and Institutions
Moral Blindness in Business
“Alsomanagersarehumanbeings:thiscompellingbookoffersanethicalconcep-
tion of management, which is highly relevant to our times, where the balance
of power between corporations and the state is in flux. Against the sociological
view that managers simply do whatever they have to do dictated by the pragmatic
requirements of the market, Jacob Dahl Rendtorff develops a powerful, orig-
inalandethicallychallengingconceptionofmanagersassubjectsofjudgmentand
imagination. He discusses the works of Hannah Arendt and in particular her
work on Eichmann as the basis for this ethics of judgment. The book is lucid as
well as thought provoking.”
—Reidar Due, University of Oxford
Jacob Dahl Rendtorff
Moral Blindness
in Business
A Social Theory of Evil in Organizations and
Institutions
Jacob Dahl Rendtorff
Department of Social Sciences and Business
Roskilde University
Roskilde, Denmark
ISBN 978-3-030-48856-7 ISBN 978-3-030-48857-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48857-4
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2020
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights
of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and
retrieval,electronicadaptation,computersoftware,orbysimilarordissimilarmethodology
now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc.
in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such
namesareexemptfromtherelevantprotectivelawsandregulationsandthereforefreefor
general use.
Thepublisher,theauthorsandtheeditorsaresafetoassumethattheadviceandinforma-
tion in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither
the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with
respecttothematerialcontainedhereinorforanyerrorsoromissionsthatmayhavebeen
made.Thepublisherremainsneutralwithregardtojurisdictionalclaimsinpublishedmaps
and institutional affiliations.
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
Switzerland AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
This book was finished in the difficult circumstances of the global
corona-crisis in spring 2020. The virus epidemic came from China
developedintoaPandemic,wherethevirusattackedfirstAsia,thenEurope
and USA and the whole world. Indeed, many people considered the virus as
a new kind of evil without human intentions and motives. Here, this kind
of evil has some resemblances with Hannah Arendt’s concept of a new kind
of evil without origins or clear intentions, like a sand storm, a fungus or
purenothingness. Duringtheterrible crisis,Istayedathomeinquarantine
with my family, my loved Victoria and my sons Erik and Arthur who gave
me space and time to work on the book. In addition, we were in close
contact with my other sons Joachim and Elias and my mother Kirsten who
was isolated all alone in her house. Thus, with Arendt’s reminder of the
possibility of hope and new beginnings in dark times I dedicate this book to
Kirsten, Victoria, Joachim, Elias, Erik and Arthur.
Preface
Thisbookisaresultofmorethan25yearsresearchoftheimplicationsof
Hannah Arendt’s political philosophy and social theory for concept and
practices of administration, management, and leadership. This research
began with my work as a post doc. researcher on bioethics and biolaw
at the University of Copenhagen, where I studied moral blindness in
the context of history of medical ethics and the atrocities of the Nazis
with their deadly medical experiments during the Holocaust. This is an
extreme indication of the need for the basic ethical principles of respect
forhumanautonomy,dignity,integrity,andvulnerabilityinbioethicsand
biolaw.Thus,theseprincipleswerepresentedinthebookthatIpublished
together with Peter Kemp Basic Ethical Principles in European Bioethics
and Biolaw (Copenhagen: Centre for Ethics and Law, 2000). In this
context, I rediscovered my earlier work on the political philosophy of
Hannah Arendt in 1994 that I applied to a theory of moral blindness
in medicine and more broadly in organizations and social institutions
in modernity. Another research for this interest in the banality of evil
was need to understand the violence of the genocide in Rwanda and
the violent killings in war in Yugoslavia in the 1990s. In the 1990s, I
was research coordinator in the Nordic Summer University and during
this time, we had several research seminars focusing on Hannah Arendt’s
political theory applied to international relations, political systems, and
modernity. A milestone of this research was published in Danish in the
bookOndskabensBanalitet:OmHannahArendts“EichmanniJerusalem”
vii
viii PREFACE
[TheBanalityofEvil.AboutHannahArendt’s“EichmanninJerusalem”],
that I have edited together with Carsten Bagge Laustsen, Copenhagen:
Museum Tusculanum Press, 2002.
As I was employed at Roskilde University in 1999 as researcher and
later professor in philosophy of management and ethics, I became more
and more interested in the implications of Hannah Arendt’s political and
socialphilosophyforconceptsandpracticesoforganization,management,
and leadership. During my research and teaching on business ethics and
corporatesocialresponsibilityatRoskildeUniversity,Irealizedtheimpor-
tance of clarifying the concept of banality of evil and moral blindness for
ethics and philosophy of management. The background for this under-
standing was my book Responsibility, Ethics and Legitimacy of Corpora-
tions (Copenhagen: CBS Press, 2009) which made me aware of the need
to go deeper into the philosophical and social and psychological foun-
dations for understanding incompetency, harm, and evil in organizations.
Indeed, the problem of the banality of evil can also without being fully
discussed be said to lie behind my later other works of business ethics
and philosophy of management, including Cosmopolitan Business Ethics:
Towards a Global Ethos of Management. (London: Routledge, 2017) and
Philosophy of Management and Sustainability: Rethinking Business Ethics
and Social Responsibility in Sustainable Development (Bingley: Emerald,
2019).InthispresentationofphilosophyofmanagementIdefinedmoral
blindness as the dark side of the contemporary debate of sustainability
andtransformationtoanecologicaleconomy.Duringthisresearch,Ihave
increasingly realized that more research is needed to define the theoret-
ical basis for the concepts of forms of violence, corruption, terror, and
domination in organizations as they are determined by the concept of
moral blindness. This contributed to the clarification of Arendt’s philos-
ophyofthebanalityofeviloftheobedientmanagement,bureaucrats,and
employeesoforganizationsincontrasttopeoplewithmoralsensibilityand
judgment.
Thus, after several visits and presentations in the US from 2001 to
2009, I became visiting fellow at the Hannah Arendt Center for Ethical
and Political Thinking, Bard College, New York State, USA in autumn
2011. The aim of this research stay was to use the insights of Hannah
Arendt’s political philosophy to understand the dark sides of organiza-
tional action and to facilitate better decision-making among executives
andmanagers.Here,IworkedintheArendt’archivesatBardCollegeand
I had access to relevant material and was in dialogue with colleagues, in
PREFACE ix
particularCenterDirectorRogerBerkowitzandotherswhoarespecialists
on Arendt’s philosophy. Moreover, I visited relevant centers and institu-
tions for business ethics and administration, in particular Harry Truman
School of Government, University of Missouri and Darden Business
School, University of Virginia. I also presented my research on Arendt
at the Academy of Management and Society of Business Ethics meetings
in Saint Antonio, Texas and at of the 25th IVR World Congress, Law,
science, and technology: Frankfurt am Main in 2011.
These presentation were later published as J. D. Rendtorff 2012
“HannahArendtandtheLawandEthicsofAdministration:Bureaucratic
Evil,PoliticalThinkingandReflectiveJudgment”inthePaperSeries,no.
112 from the 25th IVR World Congress: Law, Science, and Technology;
and as J. D. Rendtorff, 2015 “Evil in Organizations and Corporations:
TheConceptofMoralBlindness”inthepolishjournalZeszytyNaukowe
“OrganizacjaInZarza˛dzanie”PolitechnikiS´la˛skiej,vol32,no.4,pp.95–
110. In addition, I presented the research at the annual meeting of the
working on Economic Ethics and Philosophy of the German Philosoph-
ical Society in München in 2011. This research was published as J. D.
Rendtorff, 2014 “Risk Management, Banality of Evil and Moral Blind-
ness in Organizations and Corporations” In C. Luetge & J. Jauernig
(eds.), Business Ethics and Risk Management. Springer Science+Business
Media B. V., Dordrecht, pp. 45–71. Ethical Economy, no. 43. More-
over, from 2005 I participated in the annual research symposium of the
internationalresearchgroupEcoethica,foundedbyTomonoboImamichi
(1922–2012), Tokyo with Peter Kemp as president. In 2006, my work
on Hannah Arendt was presented to this group and later published as
J. D. Rendtorff, 2009 “Ethics, Responsibility and Reflective Judgment—
How to Deal with the Problem of Evil in Modern Philosophy!” Acta
Institutionis Philosophiae et Aestheticae, vol 24, pp. 233–247. In addi-
tion, I participated several times in the annual colloquium on Philosophy
and Social Sciences at Villa Lana of the Academy of Sciences in Prague.
Therein2009Iinitiallypresentedtheresearchconceptofmoralblindness
and then later in a roundtable on social pathology in 2019, organized by
MathiasKettnerandwithHartmutRosaasthethirdparticipant,Irelated
this concept to pathologies in business and administration.
Thus, I have worked on the philosophy of Hannah Arendt in many
different contexts. During the years, this had led to many presentations
and talks about the banality of evil in organization administration. Two
presentations from visits to Bard College are available on youtube:
x PREFACE
Jacob Rendtorff, 2009: Hannah Arendt on the banality of evil. Reflec-
tions on Moral Blindness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tY-d_I
hrPLs&list=PLYW5qHLZjOWHWGUdn-AAFPIgTMO2HpJAh&ind
ex=4 [Accessed April 15, 2020]. Lunchtime Talk with Jacob Dahl
Rendtorff, 2011, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTj2c5NVTPA.
[Accessed April 15, 2020]. Another key moment was the talk “Ethics,
ResponsibilityandReflectiveJudgment:HannahArendtandtheProblem
ofEvil”atthe24WorldConferenceofPhilosophy,Beijing,China,2018.
Presentations were also held at Roskilde University, Aalborg University,
Aarhus University, University of Southern Denmark, and the Danish
Peoples University, the Danish Academy of Management, Danish Associ-
ation of Political Sciences, and the Danish Philosophical Forum. Several
of these talks were the basis for articles in Danish on Hannah Arendt’s
philosophy of law and political theory, including J. D. Rendtorff 1994,
“HannahArendtogLeoStrauss:ToperspektiveringerafImmanuelKants
politiske filosofi” [Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss: Two perspectives
on Kant’s political thought]. In Harste (ed.), Dømmekraft og Komplek-
sitet, Immanuel Kant om politik, æstetik og natur. NSU Press, Aalborg,
pp. 149–167; Laustsen, C. B. & Rendtorff, J. D., Arendt, Eichmann
og det ondes banalitet [Arendt, Eichmann and the banality of evil] In
C. B. Laustsen & J. D. Rendtorff (Eds.) Ondskabens banalitet. Om
Hannah Arendts “Eichmann i Jerusalem”, Museum Tusculanums forlag,
København 2002; Laustsen, C. B. & Rendtorff, J. D., 2002, “En human
verden? En Introduktion til Hannah Arendts filosofi” [A human world.
Introduction to Hannah Arendt’s political thought], In C. B. Laustsen
& J. D. Rendtorff (Eds.), Ondskabens banalitet. Om Hannah Arendts
“Eichmann i Jerusalem”, Museum Tusculanums forlag, København
2002;J.D.Rendtorff,2003,“Dømmekraftenshistoriskeansvar:Hannah
Arendt og vores opfattelse af Holocaust” [The historical responsibility
of judgment. Hannah Arendt and our conception of the Holocaust]
Slagmark, no. 37, pp. 107–125; J. D. Rendtorff 2003, “Nogle opfat-
telser af det onde i nyere kontinentalfilosofi” [Some conceptions of evil
in contemporary continental philosophy] Psyke & Logos, vol 24, no. 1,
pp. 107–125; J. D. Rendtorff, 2007, “Dømmekraftens tænker: Hannah
Arendtspolitisketeoriogretsfilosofi”[Thethinkerofjudgment.Hannah
Arendt’spoliticaltheoryandphilosophyoflaw]Retfærd.NordiskJuridisk
Tidsskrift, vol 30, no. 3/118, pp. 3–16, and J. D. Rendtorff 2019,
“Indledning: Totalitarismen og Arendts politiske filosofi” [Introduction.
Totalitarianism and Arendt’s political Philosophy” In Hannah Arendt:
PREFACE xi
Antisemitismen: Totalitarismens Oprindelse 1 (Dansk revideret udgave
udg., s. 7–35). Aarhus: Klim.
During the years with this continuous work on Arendt’s philosophy
andsocialtheory,Irealizedthatweherehaveastrongconceptualbasisfor
understanding moral blindness, wrongdoing, harm and evil in organiza-
tions.Thiscanbeseenasacombinationofmyworkonbusinessethicsand
political philosophy in order to deal with the dark side of governance of
public and private organizations. On this foundation, this book addresses
the topic of the dark and evil sides of organizational action in order to
provide a better foundation for business ethics, leadership, and corpo-
ratesocialresponsibility.Inaddition,IuseArendt’sphilosophytoanalyze
recent examples and cases of harm and wrongdoing from the corporate
and political world of organizational and corporate life. Hannah Arendt’s
concept of moral blindness deals with the problem of how normal “ordi-
nary people” in organizations and corporations might do harmful and
wrong things that would never have been justified from the point of
viewofreflectiveethicaljudgment.Thusinthefollowing,welookclosely
on implications of Hannah Arendt’s political philosophy for concepts of
administration,management,andleadership.Thus,Ihopethatthisbook
about the possibilities and limits of applying Hannah Arendt’s political
philosophy to understand the ethics of organizations will give the readers
newandfruitfulknowledgeandideas.Indeed,thisbookshouldideallybe
of strong benefit both for better practice in organizations, corporations,
and institutions and for further research and teaching in philosophy of
management, business ethics, and corporate social responsibility.
Roskilde, Denmark Jacob Dahl Rendtorff