ABSTRACT
The term "management" can be used to denote activity, "the act or manner of managing; handling, direction, control". Many moral environmental problems are about activities that concern management, whether corporate or governmental. They are often about the rights and obligations of firms and governmental agencies as well as their employees. This chapter examines some recent historical aspects of business development. It explores some of the problems concern the moral status and correlative liabilities of business firms and explains three main forms of business: sole proprietorships; partnerships; and corporations. The hand of government is available for preventing or decreasing the incidence of moral and environmental schizophrenia by means of regulations. But as the type of arguments indicates, an analogous schizophrenia can be found in governmental organizations. Indeed, Adam Smith argued for free competition and the invisible hand of the market because he thought competition, not governments, was by far the most effective control of the tendency business firms.
