The legal and ethical environment for business

The legal and ethical environment for business entails laws and regulations that govern the operations of the business and its relations with its environment. The legal environment is mainly made up of business law, which is a body of law that governs the business and its operations. The business law aspects, which are considered as a branch of civil law, deals with both the public and private law. The business law regulates the operations of the business including contracts and hiring practices. Contracts are agreements that businesses can get into with other parties and which are binding to those parties ( McKendrick , 2014). There are laws that guide the contracts that a business can get into, with all the set procedures for the formation and remedies for breach of the contract. Regulation contracts within the business world are important as it provides an opportunity for any aggrieved party to seek remedy for the breach by the other party. The legal environment of the business is also made up of government regulations and policies concerning labor and hiring practices. 

The ethical environment of business, on the other hand, entails the human values and actions that minimize harm not only to the environment but also to society as a whole. The ethical environment is composed of social and environmental aspects of the business. Businesses should apply utilitarianism while making ethical decisions by going with actions that produce the maximum benefits to a large number of people. Social responsibility through community support is also an area that determines the ethical business environment. Also, environmental protection should remain core goal of any business. Environmental ethics holds that a business should ensure that there is effective use of resources as well as minimization of environmental pollution and other adverse impacts on the surrounding. 

Reference 

McKendrick, E. (2014).  Contract law: text, cases, and materials . Oxford University Press (UK).