Norman E. Bowie is an American philosopher and business ethicist, known for his work in corporate responsibility and the application of Kantian ethics to business. He is professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota, where he held the Elmer L. Andersen Chair in Corporate Responsibility.
He is an important voice in ongoing debates over business ethics, in which his own voice has been in favor of the Kantian view of ethics (in business as elsewhere) as a Kingdom of Ends.
Bowie earned his AB in philosophy from Bates College in 1964 and his PhD in philosophy from the University of Rochester in 1968.
In 1972 Bowie accepted the position of executive director of the American Philosophical Association (APA) and the APA then at the University of Maryland moved to Hamilton College.
Bowie moved to the University of Delaware when the American Philosophical Association moved its permanent headquarters there in 1975. Later at Delaware ÃÂ he created the Center for the Study of Values which was best known for its conferences that applied philosophical insight to contemporary valueÃÂ conflicts. Several of these conference proceedings resulted in books.
Bowie held a joint appointment in the Department of Strategic Management and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota. He has also served as Dixons Professor of Business Ethics and Social Responsibility at the London Business School and was a fellow at Harvard University's Program on Ethics and the Professions.
He is a past president of the Society for Business Ethics and the American Society for Value Inquiry, and a former executive director of the American Philosophical Association.
Bowie has served on the editorial boards of Business Ethics Quarterly and Business and Professional Ethics Journal and is a senior contributing editor for the Journal of Business Ethics Education.
Bowie has taught business ethics in the Minnesota Carlson Executive MBA program, regular MBA courses, and the joint MBA program with the Warsaw School of Economics. In 2003, he launched an international business ethics course that includes a study trip to Europe.
In 2009, Bowie received the first Lifetime Achievement Award in Scholarship presented by the Society for Business Ethics.
Bowie is recognized for his pioneering work on Kantian ethics in business. His work on Kantian Business Ethics was the subject of a festschrift Kantian Business Ethics: Critical Perspectives that included criticism of his work and his response. He also co-edited Ethical Theory and Business with Tom Beauchamp, which has reached its ninth edition.
His areas of expertise include corporate responsibility, ethics, leadership, morality of markets, and sustainability. Bowie has emphasized integrating philosophical ethics into practical business decision-making.