In recent years, the momentum toward sustainability transformation has intensified, prompting a shift in corporate management toward the pursuit of shared value with diverse stakeholders. To identify shared issues （material issues） crucial for this pursuit, companies have increasingly conducted materiality analyses through stakeholder engagement. However, several issues have been identified in materiality analyses. Moreover, as the concept of dynamic materiality highlights, what is material for business and society changes dynamically in today’s highly uncertain environment. Against this backdrop, this paper aims to clarify key considerations for identifying material issues by reviewing prior research related to stakeholder theory, with a focus on stakeholders and stakeholder engagement. As a result of the examination, it was derived that mutual alignment of materiality between companies and stakeholders is important for sustainability management. This study concludes by proposing that the essential purpose of stakeholder engagement for identifying material issues is to achieve such mutual alignment.

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Outside Japan, an increasing number of enterprises obtain the B Corp certification, which certifies enterprises that put importance on stakeholders in business administration, while such business administration is demanded. However, Japanese enterprises have passively and reluctantly implemented measures for putting importance on stakeholders, so their proactive and voluntary measures have been demanded. In this situation, there exist a small number of Japanese small and medium-sized enterprises （SMEs） that have acquired the B Corp certification. In this light, the author tried to clarify how such SMEs utilize the B Corp certification through qualitative research and conceptualize it. In detail, the author interviewed 5 Japanese SMEs that have obtained the B Corp certification, and analyzed them based on an inductive approach with a case-code matrix. This study is expected to contribute to the accumulation of knowledge from a new perspective.

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Integrity is a central concept in business ethics. While prior research has examined its meaning and definition, little attention has been paid to how corporations themselves invoke the term in their management philosophies. This study addresses this gap through a text analysis of corporate philosophy statements, aiming to clarify how organizations conceptualize and articulate integrity. The analysis shows that integrity is attributed to multiple and diverse meanings, which can be classified into six types: （1） consistency and wholeness, （2） professional responsibility and mission, （3） judgments and actions grounded in specific values, （4） compliance with laws and regulations, （5） ethical conduct, and （6） cultivation of character or virtue. By identifying and categorizing these interpretations, the study provides a systematic account of how integrity is represented in organizational contexts and contributes to a deeper understanding of this concept in business ethics.

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Use of social media in elections significantly impacts its outcomes, and in this era of fake news, the credibility of those who disseminate information is more crucial than the quality of the information. Given that the core of such credibility is the “ethics of each individual” and their “professional ethics”. In Japan, the 2024 election coverage saw the media labeled “liars” by citizens, resulting in a significant loss of trust. To obtain recommendations to update the Japanese Basic Code of Broadcasting Ethics, we conducted a quantitative comparative content analysis of the Japanese Basic Code of Broadcasting Ethics and the 53 items of the World’s Code of Ethics for Journalists. We found that the world’s codes of ethics fall into four clusters, with Japanese Basic Code of Broadcasting Ethics forming an independent subcluster, and that the essential requirements for contemporary journalist ethics codes are “accuracy of information” and “professional independence.”

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This study experimentally investigated the effects of a wrongdoing's motive （egoistic vs. altruistic） and the presence of a reward system on a bystander's intention to blow the whistle internally. We conducted an online vignette experiment with 438 Japanese participants. The results revealed that in the absence of a reward system, internal whistleblowing intention was lower for altruistic misconduct （done “for the company”） compared to egoistic misconduct （done for personal gain）. Furthermore, for egoistic misconduct, the presence of a reward significantly increased the likelihood of whistleblowing. However, for altruistic misconduct, the reward system had no significant effect on whistleblowing intentions. These findings suggest that a one-size-fits-all reward system is not a cure-all. To effectively encourage whistleblowing, particularly for altruistic wrongdoing, organizations should consider measures that alleviate the psychological conflict between loyalty and fairness, such as ensuring anonymity and emphasizing that whistleblowing protects the organization.

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This study clarifies whether incorporating ESG factors into executive compensation strengthens a company’s efforts concerning ESG issues. It used logit analysis to examine whether the presence or absence of ESG executive compensation affected ESG issues （environmental, social, and sustainable procurement） based on the data from 1,319 listed companies in Japan for the fiscal year 2023. The results support the hypothesis that the companies that implement ESG executive compensation are more enthusiastic about addressing ESG issues. Additionally, dialogue with institutional investors, collaboration with NGOs and NPOs, and company size were shown to have a significant positive impact on a company’s efforts to address ESG issues.

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This study investigates how managerial involvement in accounting fraud affects the textual features of securities reports among Japanese listed companies. The analysis shows that such involvement is significantly associated with lower readability, indicating that fraudulent managerial behavior influences the clarity of mandatory disclosures. The study further proposes a mechanism in which managerial misconduct triggers counterproductive work behavior at lower hierarchical levels, thereby shaping the text production process within the organization. By highlighting how unethical behavior at the top can cascade downward and manifest in the linguistic properties of corporate documents, this research extends the scope of upper echelons theory. It also offers a novel perspective that integrates corporate governance research with text analysis, suggesting how textual data can serve as an indicator of organizational dysfunction and governance failures.

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This study explores what types of sustainability information active institutional investors in the Japanese equity market obtain from integrated reports and how they apply such information to their investment decision-making. Based on semi-structured interviews with seven highly experienced portfolio managers and analysts, the study shows that active investors use integrated reports to understand and distil company-specific narratives and the broad range of sustainability information that forms those narratives—namely governance, environmental and social factors, and business and financial performance and strategies. Particular emphasis is placed on the coherence among corporate purpose, business model, strategy, and governance, and on their connection with financial outcomes. The study further finds that active investors systematically utilise sustainability information throughout the investment process—initial scanning, management interviews, engagement, financial modelling, equity valuation, and investment decisions. The study proposes a conceptual framework that synthesises these findings.

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The purpose of this study is to consider how companies should work to strengthen human rights. Through a comparative analysis of Suntory, which received the highest score among Japanese companies in the WBA’s 2022 CHRB, and Unilever, a British company that ranked first in the world, this study considers the stage at which Suntory is addressing human rights, and how Japanese companies should strengthen human rights. The analysis reveals that Suntory falls into the compartmentalized carers stage as it has adopted a more human rights-based approach but still lacks a formal CSR strategy. Unilever is considered to be at the stage of being a CSR strategist. However, insufficient information disclosure has been pointed out. It needs to pursue “Do more good” while also ensuring that it achieves “Do no harm.” This study has been concluded that it is important to actively disclose information about its human rights initiatives.

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The processing and management of personal data raises issues at the intersection between protecting privacy and ensuring fair competition. After announcing its intent to deprecate third-party cookies from Chrome, Google was required to respond to privacy and fair competition concerns. Analyzing case studies from Google’s history, this study explores how institutional logics at institutional and organizational levels have changed, revealing why Google reversed its decision to deprecate third-party cookies under pressure from privacy and fair competition logics. The study showed three main results. Firstly, it was confirmed that conflicts could arise between social logics, such as privacy and fair competition, in institutional logic pluralism. Secondly, Google could not interpret fair competition logic as part of privacy logic, since the latter had derived from its organizational identity of users first. Thirdly, companies need to recognize the complementarity of privacy and fair competition logics to overcome the conflict.

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Various analyses of organizational misconduct have been conducted from the perspective of business ethics. Furthermore, many Japanese companies have implemented measures concerning governance, internal controls, and corporate ethics. However, organizational misconduct in Japanese companies continues unabated. This study proposes, as a response to these concerns, the utilization of Confucian ethics in addition to business ethics grounded in Western normative ethics and behavioral ethics. 　　 Among the various approaches within Confucian ethics, this study focuses on norms, behavioral patterns, and ways of being within human organizations, drawing attention to concepts like “ritual” （禮） and ‘music’ （楽） from the Analects and the Book of Rites. Furthermore, based on the Edo-period Confucian thinker Ogyū Sorai’s philosophy of “ritual, music, punishment, and governance,” it discusses the practice of Confucian ethics in preventing organizational misconduct and implementing business ethics. The approach of cultivating the “way of being” that Confucian ethics aims for is considered to promote individual autonomy and contribute to growth and development based on healthy criticism within organizations.

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This paper focuses on the fact that many prominent Japanese business leaders, despite denominational differences, derive the ethical outlook required for management from their respective doctrines. Yet it has not been sufficiently recognized that the management principles presented by Masuichi Midoro, founder of the ANA Group, at the Group’s founding were influenced by the Shinto（1） thought of Masatoyo Mikamo—a distinguished kokugaku scholar and Midoro’s “father according to local tradition.” In particular, who Mikamo was and why and how Midoro inherited the spirits of “bun over bu”—that is, privileging learning, cultivation, technological capability, diplomacy, and public reason over military force—and moral probity has remained unclear. This study examines how Mikamo’s Shinto system, derived from long-standing scholarly inquiry, shaped ANA’s founding governance through Midoro’s ethos. It further shows that Mikamo’s Shinto is categorically distinct from State Shinto in institution and purpose, constituting an anti-militarist, civil （bun） orientation. By strictly distinguishing State Shinto—as the state’s control and mobilization of religion—from Mikamo’s scholarship-based Shinto, the paper elucidates how the latter was concretized, in ANA’s founding governance, as ethical managerial principles （“bun over bu”, moral probity）.

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This paper provides a comprehensive review of research on business ethics education from the 1980s to the present. Drawing on journal articles, books, and review studies, it analyzes how business ethics education has evolved and identifies remaining challenges. Four key developments emerge. First, business ethics education has moved beyond the critique that “ethics cannot be taught” and now emphasizes students' inner transformation and moral agency, linking theory to real-world decision-making. Second, teaching methods have diversified, encompassing experiential, intercultural, critical, and narrative approaches, as well as practical tools and frameworks such as Sulitest, Giving Voice to Values （GVV）, and Dynamic Moral Capacity （DMC）. Third, efforts to integrate ethics across the curriculum foster interdisciplinary perspectives but face obstacles including limited faculty expertise and insufficient institutional support. Fourth, greater rigor in assessing learning outcomes is needed, as many studies rely on self-reported measures. Strengthening valid assessment indicators is essential for advancing the empirical foundations of business ethics education.

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This study examines three hypotheses regarding the impact of disability employment on a company’s financial and non-financial value. The results did not indicate that companies with a higher disability employment rate have a positive impact on Tobin’s q （used as financial data） or new graduate turnover rate after three years （used as non-financial data）. However, companies with a higher disability employment rate also have a higher proportion of female managers and male parental leave takers （used as non-financial data）. Thus, disability employment may have some impact on a company’s non-financial value, particularly on its corporate culture of workplace diversity. Disability employment may have the potential to go beyond achieving the mandatory proportion of workers with disability as legal compliance.

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In recent years, there have been many attempts to apply Kant’s ethics to business. Yoshiyuki Mikoshiba has criticized these attempts for using Kant merely as a ‘tool’ without respecting the systematic structure of his philosophy. According to him, Kant’s ethics has three layers—the critique of reason, the metaphysics of morals, and moral anthropology—and the direct application of the categorical imperative from the first to the third layer misses its proper purpose. This paper examines whether his criticism is valid by reviewing major Kantian approaches in business ethics and analyzing how they rely, or fail to rely, on the second layer of Kant’s system. It shows that most applications overlook duties grounded in human finitude and thereby undermine Kant’s project of a “metaphysics of morals.” The paper contributes by clarifying these limitations and by suggesting more adequate managerial duties that reflect the human conditions of dependency, vulnerability, and finitude.

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This study empirically examines the relationship between corporate international diversification and environmental performance. Based on an analysis of manufacturing firms listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, we find that firms with a higher ratio of foreign sales, as well as those operating in multiple foreign markets through overseas subsidiaries, tend to exhibit lower greenhouse gas （GHG） emissions. These results suggest that responding to diverse environmental standards and regulations across different countries, along with the accompanying accumulation of environmental knowledge and organizational capabilities, may contribute to the enhancement of corporate environmental practices. Moreover, we find that expansion into countries with more stringent environmental standards is positively associated with improved environmental performance. Exposure to stricter environmental regulations appears to serve as a driver for improving environmental outcomes.

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Using Japanese non-financial listed firms, this study examines how human capital investment relates to firm value and how disclosure shapes that relation. We test three issues:（1）whether investment improves ROA/ROE via productivity（mediation）;（2）whether integrated reporting（IR）amplifies investment’s effect on market valuation（Tobin’s Q, PBR）; and（3）how these effects evolve over time. Results show training hours significantly raise next-period gross profit per employee, which in turn is strongly associated with ROA and ROE, supporting a short-run mediation channel. This suggests implementation intensity, rather than spending, first lifts internal productivity. For market outcomes, we find a limited positive interaction between IR issuance and training costs at t+1 that fades by t+2, implying that a coarse “issued/not issued” IR metric may not sustain investors’ assessments. Overall, evidence points to dual evaluation logics: internal performance favors hours through productivity, while markets interpret costs under disclosure.

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This study empirically examines the effect of the newly mandated section “Approach and Initiatives toward Sustainability” in Japan’s Annual Securities Reports, effective for fiscal years ending March 2023, on firms’ cost of equity capital. Using the staggered implementation across fiscal year-ends, the analysis adopts a Difference-in-Differences （DiD） design that treats firms with March fiscal year-ends as the treatment group and those with December fiscal year-ends as the control group. The results indicate a statistically significant decline in the cost of equity, measured by the implied cost of capital from a residual-income model and by an estimate based on the Fama and French three-factor model. The decline is larger for firms that do not issue integrated reports and for those without a statement of support for the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures （TCFD）, indicating larger effects for firms with limited prior sustainability disclosure.

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This paper reconsiders corporate responsibility by examining victims’ responsibility in the JR Fukuchiyama Line accident. The victims’ group, the “4.25 Network,” saw it as their responsibility to uncover the truth of the accident and share its lessons with society. What does such victim responsibility mean, and what implications does it have for corporate responsibility? Section 1 outlines the victims’ social responsibility in the Fukuchiyama case. Section 2 reviews Yagi’s （2019） sociological explanation of how victims undertake social responsibility, and then examines Young’s （2011） theory of political responsibility to ethically explain this responsibility, arguing that it cannot fully capture the case. Section 3 applies Brandom’s （2019） concept of recollective responsibility to interpret the case as a rational reconstruction of actions and explication of norms. Section 4 explores its implications for rethinking corporate responsibility, showing the possibility of corporate attitudes that involve trusting victims, collaborating with victims, and recognizing victims as stakeholders.

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This study examined the keys to sustainability management those values “future generations” by focusing on Seiren Co., Ltd., a leader in Fukui Prefecture's textile industry. As a result of this research, the following four points were discovered as keys to sustainability management. First, rethink the structure of the business model from the perspective of the concept of sustainability. Second, reexamine the structure of the business model in light of the value concepts behind sustainable development. Third, question the concept of future value related to one's own business. Fourth, develop technology that leads to the future. Seiren's leap forward was a “challenge proposal” from an automobile company.

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This study examines the relationship between firm age and the choice of risk management （RM） system among 238 listed companies in the Japanese electrical equipment industry. Based on disclosures in securities reports under “Business Risks”, RM systems were coded as Types I to III according to Omori’s （2021） classification. The results from Fisher’s exact test and logistic regression analysis revealed that firms with longer firm age showed a stronger tendency to adopt Type II systems, characterized by coordination between the corporate planning department and the RM committee. Conversely, the tendency to adopt Type I systems was found to be weaker. These results indicate statistical associations but do not demonstrate causality.

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The history of drug-related harm represents a series of institutional and ethical failures, but at the same time, this history contains valuable lessons that we must learn. In this paper, we conducted an exploratory study on the challenges related to vaccine administration during the COVID-19 pandemic. In order for Japan’s healthcare system to maintain public trust in the future, it is essential to sincerely confront the lessons of the past and promote future-oriented reforms in institutional structures and ethical standards. The first step toward this goal is to make integrity the foundation of management across corporations, healthcare institutions, and government bodies.

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Since the administration of former Prime Minister Abe, the need for employment and labor reforms to relax dismissal regulations has been discussed as an important issue in order to promote economic growth through job mobility, but it has not yet been realized. Economic growth should be achieved by moving and optimally deploying talent to growth areas, but Japan's employment practices have hindered the liquidity of the labor market. On the other hand, the awareness of young people these days, who are not particular about Japan's employment practices, is changing, and their resistance to job changes is gradually diminishing. Meanwhile, with the acceleration of population decline, labor shortages are expected, and companies are beginning to switch to job-based hiring and year-round hiring. In the midst of these changes, it is desirable to introduce a financial compensation scheme. The dismissal provisions should be maintained based on the existing legal doctrine of abuse of the right to dismiss in the current Labor Contract Act.

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