The appearance standard: Criteria and remedies for when a mere appearance of unethical behavior is morally unacceptable

• Author: Muel Kaptein
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/beer.12195
• Published date: 01 January 2019
• Date: 01 January 2019

Business Ethic s: A Eur Rev. 2019;28:9 9–111.   

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1 | INTRODUCTION

“You must […] avoid engaging in any a ctivit y that involves even t he appear‐

ance of improprie ty.” IBM includes this stat ement in its Code of Con duct

and is not the only co mpany that forbids bo th actual and app arent uneth‐

ical behavior by i ts employees. Dell states i n its Code of Conduct, “We

avoid even the appea rance of impropr iety;” Genera l Motors declare s,

“We expect all e mployees to avoid the ap pearance of or invol vement

in conflicts of interest;” and Nestlé stipulates, “Employees must refrain

from any activi ty or behavior that could give ris e to the appearance or

suspicion of such con duct or the attem pt thereof.” The codes of ethic s of

other large compa nies, like Walmart, AT&T, Apple, General El ectric, and

Exxon Mobil , also forbid employees from giv ing rise to the appearance

of specific unet hical behaviors or of un ethical behavior in ge neral. There

is also some anecd otal evidence of the applicat ion of this so‐called ap‐

pearance standard (Thompson, 1992). For example, directors from the

Bank of Hawaii (Engle man, 2005), Google (Paczkowsk i, 2009), Hulman

& Co (Associate d Press, 2012), Churchill D owns Incorporated (Me nmuir,

2014), and Uber (Golson , 2016) had to resign either to pr event them from

creating the ap pearance of unethic al behavior or after t hey have created

the appeara nce of unethical behavio r.

The appeara nce standard—also ca lled the double sta ndard of be‐

having and appe aring ethicall y (Gilman, 2003 )—is neither new nor

only typic al in the business secto r. As early as the first cent ury, Saint

Paul advised t he Thessalonia ns to “abstain from al l appearance of

evil” (The Ki ng James Bible, 1 Th essalonians 5: 22). Several profes‐

sional codes, fo r example, thos e of court judges, l awyers, audito rs,

doctors, an d politicians, in clude the appearance stan dard. The first

canon of the Mod el Code of Judicial C onduct of the Am erican Bar

Association (2 011) is, “A judge […] shall avoid impropriety an d the ap‐

pearance of imp ropriety.” The appear ance standard does not seem

unimport ant either. The appear ance of unethica l behavior is seen

to be almost as imp ortant (Luban, 2001) or jus t as important as ac‐

tual unethic al behavior (Abr amson, 2000; Dopuch , King, Schwar tz,

& Zhang, 2003) . For Gilman (2003), the appear ance standard might

be the most impo rtant sta ndard by which to judge t he actions of

public offic ials. McKoski (2010) obse rves that people in all kinds of

professional po sitions, from doctor s to teachers, from spo rts figures

to journalist s, are often publicly ju dged by the appearance s tandard.

At first glance , the appearan ce standard is ap pealing. It is highl y

ambitious in tha t it goes further than proh ibiting actual unethic al be‐

havior (Pingree, 2 007), and it is a great catcha ll for improper behavior

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DOI: 10 .1111/bee r.12195

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

The appearance standard: Criteria and remedies for when a

mere appearance of unethical behavior is morally unacceptable

Muel Kaptein

This is an open ac cess article und er the terms of the Crea tive Commons Attr ibution Non Comme rcial License, whi ch permits use, dis tribution and re production

in any medium, p rovided the origin al work is properly ci ted and is not used for com mercial purpose s.

© 2018 The Author. Busi ness Ethics: A Europ ean Review publishe d by John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Business‐Society Management, RSM

Erasmus Unive rsity, Rotterdam, T he

Netherlands

Correspondence

Muel Kaptein , RSM Erasmus Unive rsity,

Room T11‐52, P.O. Box 1730, 3000 DR

Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

Email: mkaptein@rsm.nl

Abstract

While there are compa nies whose codes of ethic s state that mere app earance of

unethical behavio r by employees is morall y unacceptable, this s o‐called appear ance

standard has hard ly received any attention i n the business ethic s literature. Using

corporate integrit y theory, this arti cle explores the crite ria that may explain how

mere appearance s of unethical behavio r can arise (i.e., the pre sence of conflicts of

interests, the e ntanglement of these interests, a r eputation for lack of integ rity, and

deviant outcomes) and tho se that may make such appearances mora lly unacceptable

(i.e., foreseeabili ty, avoidability, and seriousnes s). The article propos es remedies for

preventing and resolving instances when mere appearance of unethical behavior is

morally unacceptable.