The Assumption Chair in Law, Business and Ethics
(in development)
Instilling in students the need for legal and business practices that are grounded in an understanding between right and wrong appears high on the list of concerns faced at the beginning of the 21st century by both Canadian business and law schools. The Assumption Chair in Law, Business and Ethics, is a joint appointment linking Assumption University’s Centre for Religion and Culture and the University of Windsor’s Odette School of Business and The Ron Ianni Faculty of Law. The appointment that will begin in 2008 attempts to address the need for legal and business practices that are based on an established sense of moral values.
In order to increase the value – added of this Chair, there will be an international or transborder component involving one or more Law Schools in Detroit, Michigan eg. Wayne State University, Mercy College, etc. There will be open access to library materials in the legal field, including access by American students to The Paul Martin Sr. Library in The Faculty of Law at The University of Windsor.
Over the course of an appointment that will run five years, this will be accomplished through three distinct initiatives.
The first is to establish both the need for and an understanding of the ethical behaviour in the minds of students through university teaching. The Assumption Chair will take the initiative in the development of a core course in Law, Business and Ethics, dealing with issues such as codes of ethics, truth in advertising, whistle-blowing and company loyalty, and role of personal morality in the business sector, where profit is the motivating factor and competition may be intense. This core course, combined with other curriculum changes, will result in the issue of law, business and ethics appearing in the content of a wide number of courses taught in fields as diverse as accounting, law, human resource management, advertising, and business strategy. It is envisioned that the Chair will be the focal point of ethics-related issues in the Odette School of Business; and The Ianni Faculty of Law; as such the Chair will be tasked with the preparation of relevant teaching materials and ensuring that the need for ethical behaviour is a central thrust in all the programs offered by the Schools.
The second initiative involves a program of outreach education to be offered to business executives, lawyers and middle managers currently in the workforce. The Assumption Chair, along with the Centre for Religion and Culture, will design and organize a series of professional symposia, conferences, and workshops dealing with critical issues in law, business and ethics. In planning these programs, the organizers will invite as presenters, leading Canadian business executives, lawyers, accountants and academics.
The third initiative involves designing, funding, and carrying out a program of research centered on key questions in the area of law, business and ethics; for example, In a secular society, where do personal values come from? Do corporate cultures reflect corporate codes of ethics? or, In an environment of intense competition, how do corporations ensure that their employees will behave ethically? As will be the case with symposia and workshops, we see the Assumption Chair and the Centre for Religion and Culture working collaboratively in organizing, funding, and implementing this program of research. We hope that you will participate in helping us to achieve our goals.
Very truly yours,
Dr. Aris Kaplanis, LL.D.
Honorary Chancellor, Assumption University
ALUMNI
