Philosophy

Dr Rowan Cruft

Professor Tim Mulgan

Since the 1st of September 2010 I have been working at the interdisciplinary applied ethics centre at Leeds University as a teaching fellow and knowledge transfer officer; you can find my page on the centre’s website here: http://www.idea.leeds.ac.uk/about/staff/james-dempsey/. I am continuing my PhD part-time while working at Leeds.

I returned to academia in 2007 when I started the St Andrews and Stirling MLitt in Philosophy, and upon graduating in 2008 I started my PhD in the same joint programme. Prior to returning to academia I worked for eight years, the majority of which was as a consultant at Accenture where I ran projects for a variety of clients, focused mainly on information strategy. I also spent a year, before joining Accenture, setting up a UK business for a successful Norwegian mobile telecoms start up.

I completed my undergraduate degree in Philosophy and Economics at Oxford University in 1999.

My research is primarily in applied business ethics, viewed from the perspective of moral and political philosophy. At present my theoretical work focuses on why existing theories of organisational ethics are not fully satisfactory; my PhD thesis is based on identifying the basic questions any such a theory must address and developing a framework that answers them in a coordinated fashion. Ideas of ‘responsibility’ feature prominently in this work, as do debates on social ontology and the purpose of business activity.

My more practical research is currently focused on ethical questions arising out of the recent financial crisis. I have recently run a series of workshops with figures from the financial services sector looking at ethical criticisms arising from the crisis and how the sector has responded. I am now looking to develop this work into a longer term project on purpose and culture within financial services.

Besides these specific questions I am also interested in general issues in both moral and political philosophy, including the contemporary debate on global justice.

I am currently teaching a variety of undergraduate and masters courses in applied and professional ethics at Leeds University.

Dempsey, J. (2011), Pluralistic business ethics: the significance and justification of moral free space in integrative social contracts theory. Business Ethics: A European Review, 20: 253–266. As ‘The Moral Significance of Business Practice’, presented at the Society for Business Ethics’ annual conference, Montreal, August 2010.

‘Theories of Business Ethics: Linking the Methodology Debate and the Status Debate’ (with Ben Wempe): under review. Presented at the Society for Business Ethics’ annual conference, San Antonio, 2011.

‘Towards a Methodology for Business Ethics’: presented at the European Business Ethics Network (UK) conference, Bristol, April 2009.

'Personal Goodness, General Goodness, and Practical Ethics', presented at the symposium on "Weighing Lives" by John Broome, October 2008, St Andrews.