This book is part of the Fast-Track MBA series, published in association with Coopers & Lybrand. It is very much an introductory text aimed at the practitioner. Each chapter outlines major issues and offers practical guidance on how to address these issues. The book is split into three parts, Diagnosis, Action and Ideas. Under Diagnosis we find chapters on Public Concern, Shared Values, Multiple Stakeholders, Organisations in Flux and Shrinking World. Action is concerned with Ethical Codes, Dilemmas, Ethics and Value Programmes, Integrated Ethical Management and Managing Ethical Performance. The section on Ideas covers Ethics and Government, Business Ethics and the Media, Ethics and Professional Institutes, Business Ethics and NGOs, Business Ethics and Faith, Academic Business Ethics and Business Ethics into the 21^st Century. An eclectic choice of topics to address.

Little space is devoted to philosophical discussions of the different ethical approaches. Murray takes a wide view of ethics and offers a single theme for the book:

"To manage all our relationships, both internal and external, with total integrity and with a view to the long-term." (p 21)

As an Introductory Text, the book serves its purpose well. Each chapter contains vignettes, points of discussion, guides to further reading and relevant web sites. The book touches upon many issues and is wide-ranging in its scope. It is strong on prescription but less convincing on analysis. The reader is not offered any ethical tools, grounded in philosophical principles, with which to get to grips with the many issues that are raised. From this point of view the book is less than the sum of its parts and, despite the author’s single theme outlined above, it is difficult to see a sustained argument running through the book as a whole.

The values and the personality of the author are stamped on the pages of the book which does make a refreshing change, and a good read.

(Kogan Page, London) pp239 ISBN 0 7494 1592 4

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