Publisher's Synopsis
Ethics is rarely a topic in project management research, despite its increasing popularity in the general management literature in recent years. Many of the recent scandals are traced back to questionable ethical behaviors of individuals or organizations. The work of these individuals and organizations is done to a large extent in projects. Thus, a better understanding of ethics and its implications in the context of projects helps building awareness about ethics within the project management community and helps preparing project managers to tackle ethical issues when they arise. Ethics - the justification of actions and practices in specific situations - is a reasoning process, a philosophical reflection on the moral life and the principles embedded in that life and their application to a given situation. The moral life and its principles develop from the traditions or beliefs that have evolved over several years or even centuries in societies concerning right and wrong conduct (Buchholz & Rosenthal, 1996). Thus, the moral principles is what we bring with us to projects, and their application to project situations constitute the ethical reasoning process.
