Consumer Ethics in The EU
Consumer Ethics in The EU
Consumer Ethics in The EU
common set of standards within many industries way that they interact with consumers, as well
is something that can only be achieved with the as other businesses, which are also influenced by
assistance of EU bureaucrats, and requires exten- national culture (Harris, 1982).
sive change by firms in most EU countries. This paper focuses on examining one aspect
The premise that there are market benefits to of consumer – firm interaction, that of consumer
the EU has as an implicit assumption that con- unethical behaviour in relation to business
sumers within the member countries behave in transactions using Muncy and Vitell’s (1992)
the same or similar way, which is in line with Consumer Ethics Scale (CES). Rather than
Levitt’s (1983) idea of globalisation, i.e. there is examine consumers within individual countries,
a convergence in consumers’ wants, needs and this study will group consumers into those in
behaviours. However, this also assumes that Northern EU countries (Germany, Denmark,
cultural traits dictating consumer behaviour not Scotland, The Netherlands) and Southern EU
only become similar, but that divergent business countries (Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece).
cultures (Harris, 1982) become similar as well. Students at universities are used as a proxy for
For only when both these types of cultural consumers in general. While this might be
change occur can the full benefits of global somewhat artificial, in many of the cross-cultural
standardization (or in the case of the EU region- studies student samples are used as a proxy for
alisation) be realised. “future” managers and while students may
Globalisation and regionalisation deal with the become business leaders in the future, they are
integration of many country strategies within a consumers today, and as such they are a repre-
broader worldwide or regional market ( Jeannet sentative sampling frame. In addition, using
and Hennessey, 1998). Therefore, having region- students as respondents assures homogeneity in
ally similar consumers assumes that firm behav- terms of age and educational level, as well as
iour, as well as customer behaviour, beyond academic interests. This enables comparisons to
simple activities such as product preferences be made free of moderating factors other than
converge. It also assumes that any differences in culture (Waller and Polonsky, 1999). The research
the way that consumers and firms interact are question examines whether there are differences
reduced. However, if cultural factors, even subtle between Southern and Northern EU consumers
ones such as the evaluation of friendship, time, using Muncy and Vitell’s (1992) 4 CES con-
space, and possessions (Hall, 1960), are radically structs.
different it will be difficult for organisations to The following background section discusses
standardise marketing activities and thus region- the rationale for examining consumer ethics and
alisation may not result in homogeneous markets for focusing on the Northern – Southern EU
or highly integrated marketing strategies and distinction. The methodology section then
tactics. follows, examining the consumer ethics scales,
Thus, it might be suggested that if consumers sampling techniques and the analytical methods
become more similar as Levitt (1983) suggested, used. Analysis and discussion of the results, lim-
then cultures and consumption will also have to itations and future research, and conclusions
become more similar, which will reduce the follow.
influence of cultural interpretation of situations
(i.e. high context) and thus in the long-run high
context cultures should disappear. Given that Background
Hofstede (1994) found there were a range of
different cultures in Europe, it is unlikely that Consumer focus
consumer’s behaviour across the European Union
will become similar overnight, if at all and Much of the business/marketing ethics literature
complete regionalization may not be achievable has focused on the buyer – seller dyad (Brenner
in the short term or even medium term. and Molander, 1977; Vitell and Festervand, 1987)
Therefore, firms need to be concerned with the or the employer – firm relationship (Al-Khatib
Consumer Ethics in the European Union 119
et al., 1997). Such an emphasis might be Lebanon (Rawwas et al., 1994; Rawwas et al.,
explained by the fact that the “marketing 1998) South Africa (Higgs-Kleyn, 1998), as well
concept” traditionally considers how organisa- as the U.S. (Al-Khatib et al., 1997; Muncy and
tions can better deal with customers. As such, it Eastman, 1998; Muncy and Vitell, 1992;
is traditionally assumed that firms have the Rallapalli et al., 1994).
majority of power in the relationship and Muncy and Vitell’s (1992) original Consumer
therefore, consumers need to be protected. This Ethics Scale (CES) was developed in the U.S.
presumption has resulted in countries around the over several years using a range of items that was
world developing a range of regulations to refined, reduced and validated to consist of 18
protect consumers from such corporate abuses. items examining a range of “questionable”
The result of adopting this perspective has consumer behaviours in relation to their dealing
been that within the ethics literature there has with firms (Al-Khatib, 1997). Although many of
been less examination of the ethical behaviours the non-U.S. studies have omitted or added items
on the part of consumers in relation to firms, for cultural reasons (i.e. the items were deemed
rather than the traditional firm-consumer per- to not be applicable in these cultures or others
spective. For example, Al-Khatib et al. (1997) that were deemed to be more applicable were
suggests that in the early 1990’s there were added within other cultures). Muncy and Vitell’s
limited “. . . studies exist that have examined (1972) original items identified that there were
the consumer’s perspective (to ethics in the four distinct constructs or categories of ethically
marketplace), and most of these studies focused on questionable consumer behaviour and these have
very specific and limited situations such as been consistently found to be reliable across
shoplifting” (p. 750 emphasis added). countries.1 The constructs are labeled as:
Some studies of consumers’ attitudes towards
• Proactively Benefiting at the Expense of the
unethical consumer practices have been under-
Seller. These situations are initiated by con-
taken. In particular, Vitell has examined this issue
sumers, who perceive the act to be illegal;
with a number of co-researchers (Al-Khatib et
• Passively Benefiting at Expense of the Seller.
al., 1996, 1997; Muncy and Vitell, 1992;
These situations result from seller’s mistakes,
Rallapalli et al., 1994; Rawwas et al., 1998;
which are not corrected by consumers.
Rawwas et al., 1994; Strutton et al., 1994; Vitell
• Deceptive Practices. These situations are
et al., 1991; Vitell and Muncy, 1992). This is not
initiated by consumers, who do not
to suggest that others have not considered this
perceive the act to be illegal.
issue as well, for a range of other authors have
• No Harm/No Foul. These are situations that
also examined consumers’ perceptions of
consumers perceive result in little if any
unethical consumer behaviour (Chan et al., 1998;
harm to the seller.
Higgs-Kleyn, 1998; Fullerton et al., 1996;
Muncy and Eastman, 1998; Rawwas et al., 1995; Many of the works using the Consumer Ethics
Rawwas, 1996; Wilkes, 1978). The majority of Scale have also examined how a range of other
the empirical works in this area have applied variables moderate and/or explain differences in
versions of Muncy and Vitell’s (1992) Consumer consumers views. For example, Al-Khatib et al.
Ethics Scale (CES). (1997) used the CES to profile U.S. and Egyptian
While the CES was initially developed in the consumers and examine the role of respondent’s
U.S. it has been widely applied in a range of ethical beliefs, preferred ethical ideology, and
single country and cross-cultural studies and thus their degree of Machiavellianism, which can be
is appropriate for further examination within this defined as a kind of cool detachment that makes
paper. Some of the countries examined include; individuals less emotionally involved with others.
Austria (Rawwas, 1996), Egypt (Al-Khatib et al., Other earlier studies of consumer ethical attitudes
1995, 1997; Rawwas et al., 1994), Hong Kong focused on more narrowly defined moderating
(Chan et al., 1998; Rawwas et al., 1995), Ireland and/or explanatory factors including demo-
(Rawwas et al., 1995; Rawwas et al., 1998), graphic variables such as age, gender, education,
120 Michael Jay Polonsky et al.
race, income and social class (Higgs-Kleyn, 1998; block, the EU in this case, which may or may
Rayburn and Rayburn, 1996; Strutton et al., not reflect “one” set of cultural values, this study
1997) and personal characteristics (Wilkes, 1978; examines broader regional groupings into
Mayo and Marks, 1990; Strutton et al., 1994; Northern and Southern Europe, the rationale for
Vitell and Murcy, 1992; Rallapalli et al., 1994). which is discussed below.
For the most part CES studies have focused on
factors within one society and have tried to
determine how these “other” variables interact North/South rationale
with consumers’ attitudes towards ethical prac-
tices on their part. The few cross-cultural studies Some writers have suggested that Europe needs
that exist have usually chosen to look at diver- to undergo a process of cultural change, such that
gent markets, to determine if differences or there is a common identity as well as a common
similarities in the various relationships exist. market (Moller, 1993; Seed, 1993). Such a per-
For example, Al-Khatib et al. (1997) examined spective seems to be a utopian ideal, ignoring the
whether Egyptian and U.S. consumers’ perceived realities of “combining” independent states who
consumer ethical situations differently (i.e. have different political traditions, histories (even
responded to the CES differently). The rationale though they are often related), cultures, and in
for selecting these two economically and cultur- some cases even values (Bohata, 1997).
ally divergent countries, was that they wanted to When thinking about differences in today’s
broadly examine whether the relationships Europe, many think in terms of the problems
examined held in diverse cross-cultural settings. associated with joining countries that have devel-
Other cross-cultural works have tried to oped under capitalistic markets, i.e. Western
examine countries that have more “similarities”, Europe, and those that have evolved under a
for example Rawwas et al. (1995) choose to look controlled system, i.e. Eastern Europe
at Northern Ireland and Hong Kong as these two (Anonymous, 1993; Ballew and Schnorbus, 1993;
markets have British/U.K. links and thus might Dale, 1995). While the previously controlled
therefore have some common underlying values. Eastern economies have been open to competi-
An examination of Egypt and Lebanon (Rawwas tion for several years, there are still extensive
et al., 1994) and Ireland and Lebanon (Rawwas, difficulties making the shift to full capitalism.
1998) was also undertaken to focus on countries This is not to suggest that there are no differ-
that had similar environments, that of war and/or ences or difficulties associated with business
unrest. activities within Western capitalist markets, as
While there is an appropriate justification for these may exist as well. For example, research has
examining these pairs of countries, it could be found that there are differences in corporate
suggested that researchers should also focus their practices, such as corporate codes of ethics,
examination on pairs or multiple countries within the developed capitalist markets of
within one trading block or market, such as the Western Europe (Langlois and Schlegelmilch,
EU, NAFTA or CIS. It might be assumed that 1990). While this is only one business practice,
countries within such trading blocks should there is other evidence that there may be other
possibly be more similar than countries in differences within Western EU countries that
markets that are not formally “integrated”. If any makes full European integration “difficult”,
differences occur, the examination of ethical ignoring the problems associated with the East
values would be even more pertinent to organ- – West differences (Grimond, 1995).
isations operating within these regions, as they While the East – West distinction involves
would be operating within a heterogeneous important regional differences, there is a much
“unified” market. As such the study described older Northern – Southern division within
in this paper attempts to focus this work on one Europe, which relates to overall economic devel-
market. However, rather than examine differ- opment and growth that should also be consid-
ences between “countries” within one trading ered (Wood, 1995). That is historically, Northern
Consumer Ethics in the European Union 121
countries/regions have tended to be more 1997) found that there are differences in the
industrialized and Southern countries and regions moral judgements and values of consumers’ in
have been more agrarian (Loxley, 1998). In fact, developed and developing “Westernised” coun-
the differences between Northern and Southern tries.
regions have been discussed within individual While Southern EU countries are not tradi-
European countries (Cagliozzi, 1991), as well as tionally considered to be “developing nations,”
between Northern and Southern regions of an examination of various socio-economic
Europe (Wood, 1995). characteristics frequently used to examine devel-
In terms of ethical differences between the two oping countries (Thirlwall, 1989), identifies that
regions (Northern and Southern Europe) Van Southern EU countries do tend to be “different”
Luijk (1997) has suggested that “. . . business as compared to their Northern EU counterparts,
ethics in Northern and Western Europe have although the distinctions are sometimes blurred
acquired a certain momentum during the last 15 (see Table I).
years . . . (p. 1579)”, which, may seem to suggest Table I provides a list of selected socio-
that within Southern and Eastern Europe economic data from the United Nations and
business ethics has been slower to “catch on”.2 World Bank. As can be seen Southern countries
Wood (1995) also suggests that there are gener- generally have; slightly lower population growth
ally, important ethical differences between highly rates, lower per capita income; fewer years of
industrialized countries of the North and less schooling, higher infant mortality rates and lower
industrialized and developing countries of the proportions of their population live in urban
South. Although Wood’s examined business to areas. All of these factors, other than lower
business transactions in the purchasing and sales population growth suggests that Southern EU
interface, it might be inferred that consumer countries are “less” developed than their
ethics would also be different in Northern and Northern neighbors. However, these differences
Southern economies, especially if Southern are not universal across countries within the
countries are considered to be less developed. For regions. For example, in terms of population
example, Rossouw (1994) suggests that the growth Greece’s population growth is more
general inclusion of ethics into business practices “similar” to Northern EU countries and Scotland
in developing countries may be difficult and is more “similar” with Southern EU countries.
Priem et al. (1998) and Al-Khatib et al. (1995, In the case of per capita income Italy’s figure is
TABLE I
Country socioeconomic characteristics
SOUTH
Greece 0.4 11,673 13.8 8 60
Italy 0.2 21,219 NA 7 67
Portugal 0.1 10,923 14.3 7 37
Spain 0.2 14,641 15.5 5 77
NORTH
Denmark 0.4 33,387 14.6 5 85
Germany 0.4 28,728 15.1 6 87
The Netherlands 0.6 25,426 15.5 6 89
Scotland (U.K.) 0.3 19,847 16.3 6 89
more “similar” to Northern countries and for U.K.). Some countries were explicitly excluded.
unemployment Portugal’s rate appears to be more For example it was decided not to include France
“similar” to the Northern countries. In regards because of its cultural diversified characteristics
to education Spain’s mean years of schooling is and geographical position, i.e. it borders seven
more “similar” to the Northern EU countries other European countries make difficult to
as is its infant Mortality rate. classify it as a northern or a southern country
Assuming that there are differences between (Mermet, 1991). The selection of specific uni-
regions and that Woods (1995), Van Luijk (1997) versities was undertaken in pragmatic convenient
and Priem et al. (1998) are correct, this would manner, i.e. the authors relied on the generosity
broadly support the idea that there are also likely of their academic contacts within each of the
to be differences in Northern and Southern EU countries who assisted with the data collection.
consumers’ ethical perspectives. Which if true If universities or particular degrees are not
would mean that firms dealing throughout the representative, then there could be some response
EU would be interacting with consumers who bias introduced, although this is not believed to
have differing ethical outlooks. Although, it is be the case.
recognised that while Table I seems to suggest Using students samples was not deemed in
the Southern countries are “less developed” than itself to introduce bias, as it has been suggested
their Northern counterparts, it is unclear if they that within cross-cultural research that students
fit into the traditional definition of “developing” are relatively homogeneous and thus student
nations. samples enable researchers to control for a rage
of moderating factors, such as age, education
levels, etc. (Waller and Polonsky, 1999). In
Methodology addition much of the literature examining
business ethics and more specifically CES based
The focus of the study is to examine the hypoth- consumer ethics, has used student samples (Chan
esis that consumers in Southern and Northern et al., 1998; Higgs-Kleyn, 1998; Muncy and
regions of the EU have similar views towards Eastman, 1998; Rallapalli et al., 1994). In
what could be considered permissible or unac- addition, students are consumers and thus at the
ceptable consumer behaviour. This can be further extreme the sample would be representative of a
broken down into four sub-hypotheses relating segment of the wider population. However,
to differences between the regions for each of the given that they have been used extensively as a
four dimensions of the CES; Proactively proxy for consumers, the sampling frame is not
Benefiting at the Expense of the Seller; Passively considered to be a major limitation.
Benefiting at Expense of the Seller, Deceptive The CES survey instrument was translated
Practices, and No Harm/No Foul. from English to the host county language and
The data used in this study was collected from back translated from the host language to English
students studying business in 8 EU countries, when necessary, using the original CES instru-
four from Southern EU countries – Italy, 3 ment to ensure linguistic consistency. Although,
Portugal Greece and Spain – and four from it should be noted that cultural differences could
Northern EU countries – Scotland, Denmark, have impacted on the relevance within each
The Netherlands and Germany. The sample culture (i.e. functional equivalency may not
includes all EU countries from Southern Europe, exist). Table III provides the English wording of
which also includes the one Southern founding Muncy and Vitell’s (1992) original items, which
member, Italy. The Northern countries were were used in the English version of the instru-
chosen to represent a broad cross section of ment. The CES questionnaire was a self-admin-
Northern EU members and were selected from istrated questionnaire to undergraduate students
the founding members, Germany and the from each of the countries, there were 962
Netherlands, and two of those who joined in respondents in total (See Table II for a break-
1961, Denmark and Scotland (as a proxy for the down by region/country). The sample is region-
Consumer Ethics in the European Union 123
TABLE III
Consumer ethics scale items
Scale: 1 – Strongly believe it is wrong; 5 – Strongly believe it is not wrong
version of Muncy and Vitell’s CES (consumer A factor analysis was undertaken using the
ethics scale) was used. The items evaluate con- SPSS Varimax with Kaiser normalisation proce-
sumers responses to various ethical issues using a dures to reduce these survey items into a smaller
five point likert scale with 1 indicating that set of underlying variables that measure the same
respondents “Strongly believe it is wrong” and construct (SPSS, 1990). This process is designed
5 indicating that they “Strongly believe it is not to allow researchers to combine variables, such
wrong”. Thus a mean response of less than 2.5 that they “. . . capture the ‘essence’ of the data”
indicates that respondents feel the practice is and summarise the meaning of these underlying
unacceptable, whereas a mean response of greater factors or composite variables (Churchill, 1991,
than 2.5 indicates that respondents feel the p. 896). The variables within the factors were
activity is acceptable. This type of scale was also then examined for reliability to further ensure
used in Muncy and Vitell’s (1992) original study, that the items measured the same construct.
as well as in the other CES studies. Composite variables were then calculated (i.e.
TABLE IV
Factor structure of CES (The rotated loadings using a 0.45 cut-off)
responses added and averaged) based on their (Churchill, 1991). As can be seen in Table V, the
factor grouping (i.e. solution). An analysis of reliability of the constructs for the total sample
variance (ANOVA) was then used to compare and the two sub-groupings appears to be lower
whether these composite variables differed than in some of the previous CES studies, which
between the two regions, i.e. Northern and have reported Alpha’s for the four constructs of
Southern EU. greater than 0.8 (for example Rallapalli et al.,
1994). However, the Alpha’s of individual con-
structs have also been found to be lower than 0.8
Analysis and discussion in some studies, especially those undertaken
outside the U.S. For example, when examining
The factor analysis identified four factors, which Egypt, Al-Khatib et al. (1995, 1997) and Rawwas
were generally consistent with the previous et al. (1994) reported that the No Harm/No Foul
research using the CES. While at first this seemed construct had an Alpha of less than 0.50. Other
to support the global generalisability of the CES studies have also reported Alpha’s lower than
scale, a detailed examination of the four con- those in this study including the Passively
structs identified that two variables loaded (i.e. Benefiting construct which was less than 0.6 in
were associated with a specific factor) in an Lebanon (Rawwas et al., 1994) and Hong Kong
inconsistent fashion, i.e. they were associated and Northern Ireland (Rawwas et al., 1995).
with different types of ethical behaviour than had The reliability of the four constructs also
been reported in previous CES research. There appears to differ across the Northern and
was no rationale for these inconsistent associa- Southern EU samples, with the constructs being
tions and their inclusion would have “diluted” “more” reliable (i.e. higher Alphas) for the
the focus of the constructs. As such these two Southern countries than the Northern EU
items were removed, which ensures broader con- sample. Finding differences in Alphas when
sistency with previous CES works and enables examining multiple countries/samples is also
some direct comparisons with these works to be consistent with other results (Al-Khatib et al.,
undertaken. 1997; Rawwas et al., 1994; Rawwas et al., 1995).
The remaining items were factor analysed One possible explanation for difference in relia-
again and resulted in four factors, which bility might be that there are minor differences
explained 51% of the variance in the data and amongst consumers within each region, although
which were also “consistent” with previous CES there do not appear to be substantial differences
results, i.e. Actively Benefiting From Illegal between regions for three of the four constructs.
Activity, Passively Benefiting, Actively Benefiting These reliability results were somewhat
From Questionable Action, No Harm/No Foul. unanticipated, given that the CES instrument has
The reliability of constructs was examined, been rigorously tested, including studies that have
using Cornbach’s Alpha to determine if the items examined CES in European countries, i.e.
could indeed be added into one construct Austria (Rawwas, 1996) and Ireland (Rawwas et
TABLE V
Reliability test of CES for southern and northern EU groupings
al., 1995; Rawwas et al., 1998). Thus, future In examining the ANOVA results in Table VI
research might examine the global generalisability it can be seen that there are statistical differences
of CES measurements. Based on this study and between the regions for two of the CES con-
other non-U.S. studies it is unclear whether the structs dealing with “Actively Benefiting” from
CES is generalisable. either an illegal or questionable activity, although
Composite item scores were calculated for as mentioned above respondents in both regions
each construct by adding the relevant items (see perceive these issues to be “wrong”. There are
Table III) and calculating the mean score for the no statistical differences for the two constructs
four constructs for each individual. The overall examining non-active behaviours (i.e. Passively
mean response for each construct within each Benefiting, No Harm/No Foul), and thus, overall
region was then calculated. The regional mean there is a statistical difference in terms of per-
values were compared using an analysis of ceptions toward active consumer behaviour but
variance (i.e. ANOVA). The results of the not “passive” consumer behaviour.
ANOVA are presented in Table VI and can be While there are statistical differences for the
used to evaluate the sub-hypotheses related to the two Active constructs the direction of these
four components of the CES. differences is not consistent. That is, Southern
Before examining the ANOVA results it is respondents perceived that Actively Benefiting From
worth noting that the ordinal ranking of per- Illegal Activity is statistically less appropriate than
ceptions relating to a construct being perceived their Northern counterparts, whereas Northern
as wrong is consistent across the two groupings. respondents perceived that Actively Benefiting From
That is Actively Benefiting From Illegal Activity is Questionable Activity is statistically less appropriate
perceived to be most inappropriate (i.e. wrong) than their Southern counterparts. However, in
by both groups, followed by Actively Benefiting both cases these statistical differences reflect
From Questionable Activity, Passively Benefiting, and relatively minor differences in absolute terms (i.e.
lastly No Harm/No Foul. This suggests that active 0.07 and 0.08 respectively).
“questionable” behaviour on the part of con- As such, while there are some statistical dif-
sumers is perceived to be less appropriate than ferences between the two regions, respondents in
passive (i.e. non-active) questionable behaviour. both broadly perceived issues in similar ways.
While this makes intuitive sense, other studies This finding is somewhat inconsistent with the
have found different ordinal rankings of the previous literature as Wood suggested that
constructs (Al-Khatib et al., 1997). It is also Northern, highly industrialised regions, would
worth noting that the two constructs relating to be more likely to perceive a range of “question-
Actively benefiting were both perceived to be able” ethical activities more negatively, which
“inappropriate” as they had a mean value of less does not occur in this study.
than 2.5, which is consistent with other non-U.S. The fact that Northern respondents were less
CES studies (for example Al-Khatib et al., 1995, concerned with “illegal” activities and more
1997). concerned with “questionable” activities than
TABLE VI
Examination of the difference in CES components between southern and northern EU
Southern EU Northern EU
Construct Mean (Std) Mean (Std) F-Value Significance
their Southern counterparts, might reflect the fact that the reliability of the four factors of the
fact that the context (i.e. specific situation) of the CES were lower than might have been expected.
activity may play a more important role in the While the CES has been used outside the U.S.A.
evaluation of the situation. If one assumes that on several occasions, it might be that these items
“less developed” countries have a higher context, are not as globally generalisable as one would
then the ethical evaluation of the specific situa- have hoped and more research into the cross-
tion would depend on the specific circumstances, cultural validity of the scale needs to be under-
such as whether the individuals being “harmed” taken. A second limitation relates to the sample
know the individual (Dawson, 1997). Some used. While it is deemed that students are a
questionable activities may be inappropriate suitable sample for consumer studies, they may
because of the parties involved and could require in fact represent a narrow demographic segment
a more contextual (i.e. situational) evaluation of of the population. In fact, it is often suggested
consumer ethical situations. For example there that students tend to be more similar across-
are substantially more retailers in Southern EU countries and as such there might be more
countries, which are also most likely to be variation between different sub-samples and/or
smaller (See Table VII). Thus, Southern EU from the wider population.
consumers may associate harming firms with Future research could attempt to have more
harming individuals. Whereas Northern EU con- representative sub-samples across each region,
sumers may perceive harming firms as harming both in terms of ages and in terms of overall
faceless corporations. If this is the case, devel- population (i.e. a stratified sample). A related
oping relationships with individuals could assist issue is that the respondents within each of the
in minimising the occurrence of intentional regional sub-samples were collected at one
harm. location in each country and while students do
frequently travel, any regional differences within
countries may have been underestimated. Not all
Limitations and future research Northern EU countries were included and thus
future researchers might try to include sub-
As with any study there are a number of limita- samples from all existing member countries and
tions that need to be highlighted. Firstly, is the possibly from proposed members as well, which
would also broaden the Southern sample. Finally,
future research might consider the impact of
TABLE VII other factors such as the relationship between the
Retail outlets per 1000 inhabitants consumer and the firm, to identify whether this
impacts on consumers’ ethical behaviour.
REGION/ Retailers (outlets) per
Country thousand inhabitants
Conclusions
SOUTH
Greecec 12.3
Italyd 25.3 The main differences between Northern and
Portugalc 12.5 Southern EU consumers relates to the way in
Spaina 11.2 which they perceive actively benefiting from
illegal and questionable activities. Any differences
NORTH
in consumers’ undertaking proactive “unethical”
Denmarkd 7.8
Germanyd 5.0 behaviour would have substantial implications for
The Netherlandsd 6.5 organisations, as they would need to establish
Scotland (U.K.)b 5.4 differential monitoring systems and procedures to
preclude these proactive activities occurring in
Figures based on Corporate Intelligence on Retailing the two regions. However, given the small dif-
figures 1988,a 1992,b 1994,c 1995.d ferences in terms of consumers’ views, this might
128 Michael Jay Polonsky et al.
suggest that differing monitoring mechanisms are Almeida for assisting us with translating, distrib-
not needed in Northern and Southern EU uting and collecting the survey, as well as John
countries. Therefore, even though Southern Stanton who provided feedback to earlier
countries appear to be “less” developed, they do versions of the paper.
not exhibit the ethical characteristics of devel-
oping countries as suggested in the literature
(Priem et al., 1998; van Luijk, 1997; Wood, Notes
1995).
1
While there are some differences in consumers This occurs even after cultural adjustments have
attitudes it is unclear if these are sufficient been made to items.
2
enough to warrant broad based segmentation in This does not mean that less developed Southern
action, either on the part of business or legisla- countries have not developed business ethics or that
tors trying to regulate ethical behaviours. It Business ethics is a 20th century “discovery”, for some
“not so developed” Southern EU countries had well-
therefore appears that the EU is broadly a union
developed concepts of business ethics for extensive
of consumers markets, at least in terms of the periods.
context of this study, as well as a union of 3
The Italian university was based in south central
economic markets. This might suggest that Italy.
within Europe there is some “standardization” of
consumer views, which would support Levitt’s
(1983) view that consumer are becoming more References
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