Business Ethics as a Consideration on the Qualitative Potential of Economic Activities

The present paper develops the concept of ethics as a reflection on the qualitative potential of financial activity. It suggests that the quantitative‑instrumental utility of financial categories, such as profit and loss, can be fully actualized exclusively in an appropriate qualitative‑autotelic surrounding – thus, it suggests that economic efficiency, far from being in an immanent tension with ethical justifiability, is actually its natural consequence. What is particularly emphasized in this context is the potential of entrepreneurial creativity with respect to transcending apparent moral dichotomies, such as self‑interest versus other‑interest or profitability versus philanthropy. Special emphasis is also placed on the fact that the so‑called knowledge‑based economy, a characteristic feature of the era of the information revolution, creates particularly favorable conditions for the development of the aforesaid entrepreneurial creativity and its ethical potential.The “Annales. Ethics in Economic Life” is affiliated and co-financed by the Faculty of Economics and Sociology of the University of Lodz