This book is based on a premise that the concept of ethics, or what constitutes ‘ethicality’ differs across the globe. What is regarded as ethical in one society may not be so regarded in another. This is not a straightforward assumption as it is also possible to assume that there is a universal ethic. For example, it is reasonable to suppose that all societies and cultures have a value which condemns murder and causing unnecessary suffering to other people. It may also be reasonable to suppose that a belief in universal human rights is indeed universal (from the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, and subsequent United Nations declarations), and that this is a useful guide in differentiating what is acceptable and what is not acceptable in a society other than our own. Why this may not be a reasonable assumption is discussed later in Chapter 5.

An assumption of a universality of ethics, as well as an assumption of cultural variation in what constitutes ethicality, does not necessarily provide a contradiction. But it does cause problems for managers operating across different countries.

The current chapter is concerned with why concepts of ethicality differ across the globe: from country to country. A simple cross-cultural approach that explains variation in terms of ‘culture’ is not sufficient. Explaining variation by reference to Hofstede's (1980a/2003) value dimensions, for example, although useful, does not fully answer the question of why there is variation.