The role of ethical intelligence and organizational infrastructure in organizational decision-making

Ethics and corporate social responsibility have emerged as two of the most important organization management principles of the last 30 years. Despite the empirical relationship between high standards of ethical decision-making and organizational performance, the literature abounds with extraordinary examples of corporate irresponsibility which raises the question of ‘why’ this continues to be the case. Recently, interest in the question of ‘how’ an organization might implement strategies that support corporate social responsibility and effective and consistent ethical decision-making has emerged. This paper introduces the concept of ‘ethical intelligence’, and considers the role aspects of organizational infrastructure might play in building on ethical intelligence to support effective ethical and socially responsible decision-making processes.