v12n1: Herman on Empathetic Ethical Reasoning
Posted: June 5, 2025 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a comment
“Toward More Empathetic Ethical Reasoning,” by Bill D. Herman
A COMMENTARY ON Tobey K. Scharding and Danielle E. Warren (2023), “When Workplace Norms Conflict: Using Intersubjective Reflection To Guide Ethical Decision-Making,” Bus Ethics Q 33(2): 352–380
Scharding and Warren (2023) provide a compelling implementation of Scanlon’s (1998) contractualism. Their intersubjective reflection (IR) process is an especially clear map for applying contractualism to actual workplace conflicts, demanding empathy with specific stakeholders and their unique perspectives. However, they do not address the related problem of epistemic injustice/oppression. Any ethical theory based on intersubjective reflection should be attentive to systemic forces that unfairly render some subjective experiences less credible than others. With greater attention to systems of knowledge, IR can better meet its potential as a go-to theory in business ethics.
To download the full PDF, click here: “Herman on Empathetic Ethical Reasoning”
Bill Herman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing at Metropolitan State University of Denver


