Corporate responsibilities and values in codes of ethics: an exploratory study of the Global Fortune companies

Abstract

This study aims to develop a common language for code of ethics (CofE) statements and explore whether Global Fortune companies have expanded their CofE statements by including all stakeholder responsibilities and universal values. The results of the exploratory factor analysis demonstrated that even though compliance and other first-generation CSR were the dominant concepts second- and third-generation stakeholders were included in the first factor which was named as core values and responsibilities. In the four-factor model with 30 sub-factors the second factor was community issues the third factor was internal conduct and the fourth factor was employee rights. The findings indicated the complete presence of trustworthiness citizenship and respect values whereas responsibility fairness and caring values can be improved in CofE statements. Further due to the dynamic nature of CofE companies should give more importance to new concepts like risks fair dealing fair competition industry issues training and education.