ETH 316 Week 1 Ethical Theories Applied Example

Close the Store or Keep It Open? Four Ethical Theories and a Grocery Chain's Hardest Decision

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

ETH/316: Ethics and Social Responsibility

Week 1 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

Crossroads Fresh Markets, its stores, people and figures are composites written for a model paper.

Crossroads Fresh Markets, a composite company, runs 42 grocery stores in central Indiana and employs about 4,800 people. Its store on the near east side of Indianapolis opened in 1988 and was once among its busiest. Sales have fallen as nearby factories closed and population declined, and last year the store lost about $640,000. The chain's lenders, worried about tight margins across the company, have asked management to close underperforming stores. The east side store is the largest loss. If it closes, the nearest full-service grocery for about 9,000 residents will be more than two miles away, and about a third of nearby households do not own a car. The sections below test that decision against four ethical theories in turn.

Who Is Affected

The 58 employees, most of whom live nearby; about half have worked there more than ten years.

Residents, especially older people and families without cars who walk or take the bus to the store.

The chain's other 4,700 employees, whose jobs depend on the company's financial health.

Lenders and the family that owns the chain.

The city, which has offered help to keep grocery stores in underserved areas.

Jones (1991) argued that the moral intensity of an issue, including how large its consequences are, how many people they reach and how close those people are to the decision maker, shapes how seriously managers treat it as an ethical matter. By that measure this decision is intense: the harms are large, concentrated and fall on people the company has served for decades.

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism, developed by Bentham and Mill, judges actions by their consequences: the right choice is the one whose results add up to the most well-being across all the people it touches (Mill, 2001). Applied here, the theory asks the chain to weigh the harms of closing, lost jobs, reduced access to fresh food and the health effects that follow, against the benefits, a stronger company that protects thousands of other jobs. Research on food access suggests that losing a nearby supermarket can push residents toward convenience stores with fewer healthy options, though the size of the health effect is debated. The utilitarian answer depends on the alternatives. If the only choice is closing or losing $640,000 a year indefinitely, closing may produce more good overall. If a smaller store, a partnership with the city or a change in product mix could cut the loss, those options likely produce more good than either extreme.

Deontology

Kant's deontology holds that actions are right or wrong based on duties, not results, and that people must be respected as beings with their own purposes, never used merely as tools for someone else's goals (Kant, 1998). The theory does not forbid closing a store. It asks how the decision is made. Closing suddenly, without notice to workers or residents, would treat them merely as means to the chain's financial goals. Being honest with employees, giving notice beyond what the law requires and helping them find other jobs would respect them as persons even if the store closes. Kant's test of universal law also applies: could every grocer close every store in a low-income area once it stopped being profitable? If so, entire neighborhoods would have no grocery stores, which suggests a duty to at least seek alternatives first.

Kant does not tell the chain to keep the store open; he tells it not to close the store as if the people in it did not matter.

Virtue Ethics

Virtue ethics, rooted in Aristotle, shifts the question from which rule applies to what kind of company Crossroads wants to be and what someone of sound character in its position would choose. Virtues such as justice, honesty, courage and practical wisdom guide action. Crossroads has long described itself as a neighborhood grocer that serves all of Indianapolis. A company with integrity would test whether its actions match that identity. Practical wisdom would look for a solution that balances the company's survival with its commitments, rather than choosing the easiest financial answer.

Care Ethics

Care ethics, developed by Gilligan and Noddings, focuses on relationships and responsibility to those who depend on us. It emphasizes attention to particular people's needs rather than abstract principles. The east side store has relationships built over 35 years: employees who know customers by name, seniors who rely on deliveries the store arranges informally and a church food pantry the store supplies with near-dated goods. Care ethics would ask what those relationships require: at minimum, involving the people who depend on the store in finding a solution and ensuring that their needs are met if it closes.

Where the Theories Agree and Differ

The theories differ on what matters most: outcomes, duties, character or relationships. Utilitarianism could support closing if no better alternative exists, while care ethics weighs the store's relationships heavily. But they converge on two points. First, the chain should look seriously for alternatives before closing, such as a smaller format, city support or a cooperative partner. Second, if the store does close, how it closes matters: honest communication, generous notice, job placement and help for residents to reach other stores.

Recommendation

Crossroads should not close the store immediately. It should spend six months testing alternatives: reducing the store to a smaller footprint, applying for the city's grocery access fund and talking with a community development corporation about a partnership. It should tell employees and residents now that the store is at risk, which respects them as persons. If alternatives fail, it should close with 120 days' notice, transfers for all employees who want them and a free shuttle to its nearest store for a year. This recommendation draws most on utilitarian reasoning about alternatives and Kantian respect for persons, while honoring the relationships care ethics highlights.

Conclusion

Four ethical theories reach different conclusions about a grocery chain's money-losing store, but they agree that alternatives must be tested and that people affected deserve honesty and help. Applying theories to the same facts shows how ethical reasoning can move a decision beyond a simple choice between profit and principle.

References

Jones, T. M. (1991). Ethical decision making by individuals in organizations: An issue-contingent model. Academy of Management Review, 16(2), 366-395. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.1991.4278958

Kant, I. (1998). Groundwork of the metaphysics of morals (M. Gregor, Trans.). Cambridge University Press. (Original work published 1785)

Mill, J. S. (2001). Utilitarianism (2nd ed.). Hackett. (Original work published 1863)