Business Ethics After the Global Financial Crisis

10The Bankers and the ‘Nameless Virtue’

Tom Sorell

Introduction

Morally conscientious people sometimes blame themselves for things that are not within their control. The driver who unavoidably kills someone nevertheless kills someone, and because it is normally awful to have killed someone, it makes sense for the driver to blame him- or herself. It makes sense, although the death was not the driver’s fault. Blame also makes some sense where a driver who does not kill anyone but who does not maintain his or her car properly, identifies with someone else who runs a child over through failure to maintain the car. Although there has been no bad outcome of the second agent’s negligence, the second agent feels guilty for having carelessly increased ...