¹ See, for example, the articles collected in Michael Hoffman, W., Lange, Ann E., and Fedo, David A., eds., Ethics and the Multinational Enterprise (New York: University Press of America, 1986).Google Scholar

² Thomas, Donaldson, The Ethics of International Business (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989).Google Scholar

³ Donaldson discusses the question whether states have moral obligations to each other in op. cit., pp. 10-29. The critical question, however, is whether multinationals, i.e., profit-driven types of international organizations, have moral obligations. Although Donaldson is able to point out withou' a great deal of trouble that the realist arguments against morality among nations are mistaken (see pp. 20-23, where Donaldson points out that if the realist were correct, then there would be no cooperation among nations; but since there is cooperation, the realist must be wrong), his points leave untouched the arguments I discuss below which acknowledge that while much cooperation among nations is possible, nevertheless certain crucial forms of cooperation will not obtain among multinationals with respect to the global common good.

⁴ Bentham, J., Principles of Morals and Legislation, 1. 4–5.Google Scholar

⁵ William, A.Wallace, O.P., The Elements of Philosophy, A Compendium for Philosophers and Theologians (New York: Alba House, 1977), p. 166–67.Google Scholar

⁶ Ibid., p. 167.

⁷ “Common Good,” The New Catholic Encyclopedia.

⁸ John, Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 233 and 246.Google Scholar

⁹ Thomas, Hobbes, Leviathan, Parts I and II, [1651] (New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1958), p. 108.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Ibid. As noted earlier, I am simply assuming what I take to be the popular interpretation of Hobbes’ view on the state of nature. As Professor Philip Kain has pointed out to me, there is some controversy among Hobbes scholars about whether or not Hobbes actually held that moral obligation exists in the state of nature. Among those who hold that moral obligation does not exist in Hobbes’ state of nature is Oakeshott, M. in “The Moral Life in the Writings of Thomas Hobbes” in his Hobbes on Civil Association (Berkeley-Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1975), pp. 95–113;Google Scholar among those who hold that moral obligation does exist in Hobbes’ state of nature is Taylor, A. E. in “The Ethical Doctrine of Hobbes” in Hobbes Studies, ed. Brown, K. C. (Cambridge: Harvard, 1965), pp. 41ff.Google Scholar Kain suggests that Hobbes simply contradicts himself— holding in some passages that moral obligation does exist in the state of nature and holding in others that it does not—because of his need to use the concept of the state of nature to achieve purposes that required incompatible conceptions of the state of nature; see his “Hobbes, Revolution and the Philosophy of History,” in “Hobbes's ‘Science of Natural Justice,”” ed. Walton, C. and Johnson, P. J. (Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987), pp. 203–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar In the present essay I am simply assuming without argument the traditional view that Hobbes made the claim that moral obligation does not exist in the state of nature; my aim is to pursue certain implications of this claim even if I am wrong in assuming that is Hobbes’.

¹¹ See ibid., where Hobbes writes that “yet in all times kings and persons of sovereign authority, because of their independency” are in this state of war.

¹² Ibid., pp. 107-8.

¹³ See Sen, Amartya K., Collective Choice and Social Welfare (San Francisco: Holden-Day, Inc., 1970), pp. 2–5.Google Scholar

¹⁴ See, for example, Gregory, Kavka, “Hobbes’ War of All Against All,” Ethics, 93 (January, 1983), pp. 291–310;Google Scholar a somewhat different approach is that of David, Gauthier, Morals By Agreement (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986)Google Scholar and Russell, Hardin, Morality Within the Limits of Reason (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988).Google Scholar

¹⁵ See Robert, Axelrod, The Evolution of Cooperation (New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1984), pp. 27–69.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Robert, Frank, Passions Within Reason (New York: W W. Norton & Company, 1988).Google Scholar