Imagination, Fantasy, Wishful Thinking and Truth: Life is translation and we are all lost in it. (Clifford Geertz)

Joanne B. Ciulla

Business Ethics Quarterly, 1998, vol. 8, issue S1, 99-107

Abstract: In “Moral Imagination and the Search for Ethical Decision-Making,” Patricia H. Werhane observes that people and institutions sometimes do unethical things because they have a narrow perspective on their situation and little in the way of moral imagination. She defines moral imagination as “an ability to imaginatively discern various possibilities for acting in a given situation and to envision the potential help and harm that are likely to result from a given action.” Werhane’s paper focuses on how the conceptual schemes of people and organizations hinder the exercise of moral imagination. She develops two key concepts for understanding moral imagination, memory or moral amnesia and empathy. Both of these give us a better picture of how imagination bridges the gap between moral principles and actions.

Date: 1998
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