284 CONCLUSION
A third area of agreement and implication for ethical debates in HRM is
that they can beilluminated by reasoning based on specific theories and systems
of ethics. Creighton demonstrates the long-term influence of legal systems
observing the latitude that remains within them for making moral choices
and adopting different courses of action. Watson’s (see Chapter 13) use of
neo-Weberian sociology makes a similar point about agency and determinism
noting the constraining but not exclusive role of business objectives when
making ethical choices in work and employment; interestingly, Weber was
himself trained in law and wrote extensively on its influence. Greenwood
and De Cieri (see Chapter 7) applies stakeholder theory in a challenging
way by adopting an implicitly utilitarian economic philosophy that eventu-
ates in increased moral onus placed on managers through the concept of
‘stakeholder engagement’ that sees employees as moral claimants rather than
simply strategic stakeholders. Kamoche takes a different approach to HRM
more consonant with aspects of Kantian ethics of respecting persons as well
as being similar in emphasis to discourse theory’s preference for addressing
issues of asymmetric power (see Chapter 15). He proposes that we reconsider
the ethics of organization’s appropriation of employees’ knowledge and work
efforts, thus presenting a strong moral challenge to business and manage-
ment for greater ethical reflection and action more sensitive to employee
considerations.
None of the contributors question that HRM has the capacity to treat
employees instrumentally as a resource, but they differ in their evaluation of
its core contention that people are a resource that must be strategically man-
aged. Some strongly question the adequacy of HRM systems and strategies
for managing the workforce (see Reed Chapter 10) whereas others see more
scope for defining relevant outcomes but remain somewhat ambivalent on the
sufficiency of HRM strategies for consistently attaining ethical employment
(see Boxall and Purcell Chapter 4). There again, some doubt the capacity
of companies to look seriously beyond their own bottom line (see Watson
Chapter 13), whereas others argue that this is in effect tantamount to the
rejection of the moral point of view (see Walsh Chapter 6).
A fourth area of general agreement between the contributors is thatany
intellectually and morally acceptable approach to HRM must take account of
a pluralism of partially conflicting interests. A major part of the debate about
ethical HRM concerns determining the right balance between the morally
relevant competing interests affected by HRM practice. Unitarist theories that
legitimate only stockholder interests are morally untenable and practically
unrealistic. So, there is reason for caution in outlining a radical vision for eth-
ical HRM in which the balance of economic efficiency and the more directly
humanitarian elements of basic human decency is tilted in the direction of the
rights and well-being of employees under the leadership of ethically enlight-
ened senior management and HRM specialists. Quite apart from the idealism