This is an issue closely connected to the previous one of whether business ethics teaching should have a more than purely managerial focus. It concerns whether the problems addressed should be simply those to do with the operation of businesses within a given economic system (micro problems) or whether problems associated with the rights and wrongs of any given economic system (macro problems) should also be addressed. (As the prevailing economic system is a capitalist one, in practice a discussion of macro issues usually means examining the rights and wrongs of capitalism.)

The link to the previous issue lies in the fact that those not wanting to give attention to macro issues will normally do so on the grounds that only the micro are of concern to managers. Conversely, those wishing to include both sorts of problems will usually do so on the grounds that not only is it perhaps salutary for managers to consider the macro dimension but given that business ethics is addressing not just managers but also the wider society, then in order to properly serve those wider constituencies it cannot confine itself to just micro problems.

In particular, it is only by attending to macro problems that business ethics can fully contribute to debates on large-scale questions such as company law reform, business regulation, global economic governance, and so on.