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Racial Justice Without Character: Business Ethics, Diversity Training, and Distributed Cognition

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  • Abraham Singer

    (Quinlan School of Business, Loyola University Chicago)

Abstract

This paper challenges the “characterological” theory of racial injustice. This theory, widely held in corporate efforts to address race, simultaneously endorses a “structural” account of racism while advocating deeply individualistic remedies: challenging systemic racism, on this view, requires directing our energies inward toward our most ingrained habits and self-conceptions. I begin by reconstructing the characterological theory and its appeal. I then argue that it rests on questionable, if not untenable, cognitive assumptions. Instead of seeing racism as carried forth by agents’ deeply internal characters, I argue that a structural account of racial domination is better served by understanding cognitive processes as externalized and conducted through our environments. Drawing on theories of the “extended mind” and distributed cognition, I offer an account of both structural racism’s persistence and individual racist actions, which is anchored in the environmental (and not characterological) manifestations of racial hierarchy. I conclude with the normative potential of business ethicists adopting the distributed cognition framework.

Suggested Citation

  • Abraham Singer, 2025. "Racial Justice Without Character: Business Ethics, Diversity Training, and Distributed Cognition," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 199(4), pages 715-729, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jbuset:v:199:y:2025:i:4:d:10.1007_s10551-024-05827-4
    DOI: 10.1007/s10551-024-05827-4
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