Analysis of Apple Inc.'s Ethical Issues

The assessment for this module is similar in style and format to that used in previous years and is based on 2 individual assignments. The first constitutes 40% of the final marks for the module, with the second contributing the remaining 60%. This document should be read in conjunction with other supporting materials that are discussed in the first lecture and tutorials throughout the module. Tutorials in the second week of the semester will focus on assignment 1 and clarify any issues that you may have with the assignment. As the module progresses, we will spend some time focusing on the specific requirements for the second assignment and re-emphasise the information in this document.

Assignment 1 Individual Assignment (development of a video) 40% 

This assessment allows you to explore in detail the ethical responsibilities of an industry, an organisation, business issue or topic of your choice and to develop your analysis and response in video format. You can adopt a local, national or international perspective; for example, you might choose to focus on the recent concerns with human rights abuses and modern-day slavery in specific supply chains, or bribery and corruption issues in financial institutions or ethical challenges with the use of AI (artificial intelligence). You could, for example, focus on the lack of trust in the banking industry, or the problems with pricing of drugs in the pharmaceutical industry worldwide, or the concerns raised about poor management behaviour in the UN. You might want to evaluate a specific issue/topic, such as the effectiveness of whistleblowing policies, or the problems in Oxfam with the sex-for-aid scandal, or the scandal at Theranos, or the recent problems faced by Boeing and 737 Max crashes, or the ongoing issues with Johnson and Johnson talcum powder which has led to a recent decision to discontinue globally from 2023, or global food security, or the governance and ethical lapses at Wirecard or Satyam or Luckin Coffee, or the use of child labour in the supply chain etc. Alternatively, you could focus on a more positive side to business ethics and social responsibility, and there have been some excellent examples of business for good during the pandemic and beyond. You can be as broad or specific as you wish; you might choose to evaluate the ethical implications of advertising in general, or, more specifically, the ethical implications of advertising to children, or the ethics of advertising alcohol, or ethics and social media influencers etc. Or you could focus on a very contemporary issue, for example, understanding the role ethics in the development and use of autonomous vehicles, or data privacy and security, or issues relating to lapses in corporate governance or some of the accounting scandals etc. You could focus on one specific organisation; for example, Boeing, or NHS and the consequences of children not getting the MMR jab; or JB Sports and zero-hours contracts, or the working environment in Amazon; Coca Cola and Land Grabbing; Leadership and Ethics in the CoOp or FIFA; or FoxConn, Apple and i-phones in China, or Facebook and Cambridge Analytica and issues around data security, or the sacking of McDonalds CEO Easterbrook because of an alleged affair in November 2019, or whistleblowing, including, for example, the recent (September 2020) case of a whistleblower exposing problems in England with the test and trace system for coronavirus positive cases, or modern day slavery in the  Business Ethics Assessment Overview supply chain (such as that exposed in Leicester, July 2020), or the very recent concern re financial irregularities in Garda Siochana, or data security breaches in PSNI, or the PWC ‘tax scandal’ in Australia and US (May 2023) These examples are just a snapshot of the breadth and depth of the topics, industries, and issues that you could explore. Please note that your topic MUST have a business (public, private and/or third (voluntary) sector) focus. You should refrain from choosing more broad-based ethical issues such as the legalisation of abortion in (N) Ireland or the ethics of euthanasia etc. These are obviously very important ethical issues but they do not necessarily have a ‘business-based’ dimension. You are, of course, welcome to focus on a health-related topic but it would then have to be rooted in, for example, the NHS, or have some sort of government or NGO angle etc You CANNOT choose to develop a topic that you have already been (or is about to be) assessed on in a different module. For example, if you are completing MGT3013 Supply Chain Management and choose to study the supply chain in the palm oil industry; or transparency in the garment industry in the developing world, you cannot rejig this and use it again in this module. The same applies to any report/project that you might have developed for a module in Level 2, for example, in Leading for Change or in Level one MGT1012 Business, Government and Society module. You must choose a new topic/area/issue. It is a serious academic offence (and is penalised accordingly and could result in a mark of zero for one or both modules) to present work which has already been (or is about to be) considered and awarded marks in another module and, it is very easy to find this out! Your focus must be within the last 10 years. To help you get started, outlined below are some examples of recent undergraduate Business Ethics topics that students have developed. You are NOT expected to choose a topic from the list overleaf – the titles are for illustrative purposes.