The first book ever to integrate business ethics with financial economics, Finance Ethics shows how ethical behavior fits within the rational, profit-maximizing, finance paradigm. Dobson argues that even in economic terms the finance paradigm has a serious flaw: it views the firm and financial markets in general as contractual nexuses yet it fails to supply any adequate mechanisms for enforcing those contractual relations. Finance Ethics is therefore not just a moral critique of the finance paradigm, arguing that self-interested profit making must be constrained by ethics. Rather, it is a critique from within that paradigm, in which truth becomes a rational mechanism to enforce contracts, and virtuous behavior is shown to make the most business sense.

"...must be commended for choosing to approach the subject of finance ethics from 'inside the paradigm' for electing to do so in connection with the realities of financial and global markets... Dobson's work sets a challenge for other writers and teachers dealing with ethics in economics, business and finance to define the subject they are dealing with and to articulate ethics from inside theory and practice...." - Finance and Bien Commun / Common Good, Spring 1999

"The first book ever to integrate business ethics with financial economics . . ." - Sbe Newsletter

"...must be commended for choosing to approach the subject of finance ethics from 'inside the paradigm' for electing to do so in connection with the realities of financial and global markets... Dobson's work sets a challenge for other writers and teachers dealing with ethics in economics, business and finance to define the subject they are dealing with and to articulate ethics from inside theory and practice." - Finance and Bien Commun / Common Good, Spring 1999