Purchase Solution

PharmaCARE Case Study: Ethics and Corporate Responsibility

Not what you're looking for?

Ask Custom Question

PharmaCARE (We CARE about YOUR health®) is one of the world's most successful pharmaceutical companies, enjoying a reputation as a caring, ethical and well-run company that produces high-quality products that save millions of lives and enhance the quality of life for millions of others. The company offers free and discounted drugs to low-income consumers, has a foundation that sponsors healthcare educational programs and scholarships, and its CEO serves on the PhRMA board. PharmaCARE recently launched a new initiative, We CARE about YOUR world®, pledging its commitment to the environment through recycling, packaging changes and other green initiatives, despite the fact that the company's lobbying efforts and PAC have successfully defeated environmental laws and regulations, including extension of the Superfund tax, which was created by Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA).

Based in New Jersey, PharmaCARE maintains a large manufacturing facility in the African nation of Colberia, where the company has found several "healers" eager to freely share information about indigenous cures and an abundance of Colberians willing to work for $1.00 a day, harvesting plants by walking five (5) miles into and out of the jungle carrying baskets that, when full, weigh up to fifty (50) pounds. Due to the low standard of living in Colberia, much of the population lives in primitive huts with no electricity or running water. PharmaCARE's executives, however, live in a luxury compound, complete with a swimming pool, tennis courts, and a golf course. PharmaCARE's extensive activities in Colberia have destroyed habitat and endangered native species.

1.Describe the key characteristics of a stakeholder and determine all the stakeholders within the PharmaCARE scenario.
2.Analyze the human rights issues presented by PharmaCARE's treatment of the Colberia's indigenous population versus that of its executives. Recommend at least three (3) changes PharmaCARE can make to be more ethical going forward.
3.Assess PharmaCARE's environmental initiative against the backdrop of its anti-environmental lobbying efforts and Colberian activities. Support the position.
4.Decide whether or not PharmaCARE's actions with respect to the indigenous people of Colberia would be ethical in accordance with each of the following ethical theories:
1.Utilitarianism
2.Deontology
3.Virtue ethics
4.Ethics of care
5.Your own moral / ethical compass
5.Compare PharmaCARE's actions with those of at least one (1) real-world company, whose corporate activities led to ethical, environmental, or workplace safety issues and financial loss. Analyze the similarities and differences between PharmaCARE and the company that you chose.

Purchase this Solution

Solution Summary

This solution explains ethics and corporate responsibility. The sources used are also included in the solution.

Solution Preview

In accordance with BrainMass standards this is not a hand in ready paper but only background help.
Step 1
The key characteristic of a stakeholder is that they have an interest in the business. Stakeholder may be persons, groups, or firms that may be impacted by the activity of the organization. If a person has an interest in the organization he is a stakeholder. For example, an employee is a stakeholder of an organization. Stakeholders are described as entities that can be affected by the results of that in which they are stakeholders. For example, the shareholders of a company are affected by the results of a business and so are stakeholders. The organization also depends on its stakeholders. For example, a supplier is a stakeholder and the organization depends on him. Consider another example, the employees of the firm are stakeholders and the firm depends on its employees to operate. From another perspective, the stakeholders have an influence on the organization. For example, lenders are stakeholders and they have the ability to influence the organization. The broader view of stakeholders is that these are individuals, groups, or organizations who are involved with the operation or projects of an organization. They may be affected directly or indirectly. In case of PharmaCARE the healers that the company has found and the Colberians who are working for the company are included in the list of stakeholders.
We determine the stakeholders in the scenario of PharmaCARE. These include the shareholders, the management, the employees, the suppliers, the healers of the company in Colberia, the Colberians that work for PharmaCARE, executives of PharmaCARE, the state government in New Jersey, the US Federal government, the communities being harmed by the lobbying of PharmaCARE, the local communities in Colberia, and the government of Colberia. We take some examples, the state government in New Jersey is interested PharmaCARE because the company is required to comply with all its laws and pay taxes. The federal government is similarly a stakeholder because it is interested in getting tax revenues from PharmaCARE and also ensures that the company follows all federal laws and regulations. The healers in Colberia are stakeholders because the company obtains local remedies from them and possibly markets them. Let us take another example; PharmaCARE has actively lobbied against several environmental laws. This has adversely affected the environment of the United States and from this perspective every citizen of the United States is a stakeholder. From a narrow perspective the US Senate and the Congress where it has ...

Purchase this Solution


Free BrainMass Quizzes
Transformational Leadership

This quiz covers the topic of transformational leadership. Specifically, this quiz covers the theories proposed by James MacGregor Burns and Bernard Bass. Students familiar with transformational leadership should easily be able to answer the questions detailed below.

Understanding the Accounting Equation

These 10 questions help a new student of accounting to understand the basic premise of accounting and how it is applied to the business world.

Social Media: Pinterest

This quiz introduces basic concepts of Pinterest social media

Organizational Behavior (OB)

The organizational behavior (OB) quiz will help you better understand organizational behavior through the lens of managers including workforce diversity.

Understanding Management

This quiz will help you understand the dimensions of employee diversity as well as how to manage a culturally diverse workforce.