A relativistic approach to moral judgment in individuals: Review and reinterpretation

• Author: Peter E. Mudrack,E. Sharon Mason
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/beer.12263
• Published date: 01 April 2020
• Date: 01 April 2020

Business Ethics: A Eur Rev. 2020;29:403–416. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/beer  

|

  403© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

1 | INTRODUCTION

Ethics Position T heory (Fors yth, 1980) prop osed that two basi c di-

mensions, relativism and idealism, explain individual approaches to

moral judgme nt parsimoniously. High idealism su ggests convictions

that only “right ” actions are appropriate an d that all harms inflicted

on others are wro ng. Relativism incorp orates the degree to wh ich in-

dividuals reje ct notions that universal m oral rules should be appl ied

unwaveringly in al l situations and thus perceive mul tiple ways from

which to consider m orality. Researc hers utilizing Fo rsyth's Ethic s

Position Ques tionnaire (EPQ ) have often predic ted, and usuall y

found, that high i dealists tend als o to be ethical (e.g., Bar nett, Bass, &

Brown, 1994) regardles s of how this is operationali zed. Investigators

have often predic ted, but not always fou nd, that highly relat ivistic in-

dividuals are unethical. The ethical implications of idealism generally

seem well-understood and unambiguous, whereas the ethical impli-

cations of relativism are neither.

After almost f our decades of investig ation, researchers co ntinue

to formulate and ad vance hypotheses sl anted toward a tacit assu mp-

tion of questionable ethics among highly relativistic individuals. As

discussed shor tly, these hypotheses have recei ved tepid support at

best. A possib le reason, as yet unexp lored, is that perha ps relativistic

individuals are actually not unethical . The purpose of t he present

investigation i s to look back on what fo ur decades of re search has

found in order to as sess whether wi despread assu mptions of dubi-

ous ethics among relativistic individuals are actually warranted. No

such review of the re lativism litera ture has ever been p ublished to

our knowledge. T he result of this effort is i ntended to be a more ac-

curate and deta iled map of the nomologica l net surrounding the rel-

ativism constr uct than is currently availab le. This map will highlight

Received: 17 Febru ary 2019 

|

  Revised: 16 Decemb er 2019 

|

  Accepted: 17 Decemb er 2019

DOI: 10.1111/beer.12263

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

A relativistic approach to moral judgment in individuals: Review

and reinterpretation

Peter E. Mudrack1 | E. Sharon Mason2

1Departme nt of Management, K ansas State

Universit y, Manhattan, KS, US A

2Departm ent of Organization al Behaviour,

Human Resources, Entrepreneurship and

Ethics, Broc k University, St. Cat harines, ON,

Canada

Correspondence

Peter E. Mudra ck, Departme nt of

Management , Kansas State Unive rsity, 3091

College of Busin ess Building, Man hattan, KS

66506, USA .

Email: pmudrack@ksu.edu

Abstract

In Ethics Position Theo ry, relativism is the degr ee to which people beli eve that uni-

versal moral rul es should not always be applied unwaver ingly. Researchers often pre-

dict that highly relativistic individuals are characterized by questionable ethics given

their ostensible self-interested “anything goes” approach. Corroborating evidence for

such predictions , however, remains elusive. This paper suggeste d that high relativists

are perhaps not unet hical, and reviewed fo ur decades of releva nt literature in order

to clarify the mea ning and implicatio ns of the relativism cons truct. The po rtrait of

relativism that emerged is often contrary to prevalent expectations. Relativistic indi-

viduals seem tolerant of ambiguity, open to experience, non-authoritarian, accepting

of others with diff erent backgroun ds and lifestyle s, and troubled by inj ustice. No

persuasive evidence of q uestionable ethics is availa ble. These findings have profou nd

implications for managerial practice and suggest that highly relativistic employees

may be among the most va luable. Future resea rch grounded in an und erstanding of

what relativism is rather than what it should be has the potential to all ow a deeper

understand ing of this import ant construct to em erge. We also explore possi ble

reasons why an inaccurate narrative about relativistic orientations may have emerged

and persisted amo ng both researchers and people gen erally.