Patricia E. Dowden and Philip M. Nichols Column

We propose to defend this principle: “A basic duty of every organization is to earn stakeholder trust.” Patricia E. Dowden is President and CEO of Center for Business Ethics and Corporate Governance, and Managing Director of the Russian Compliance Alliance, an online compliance self-evaluation system www.compliancealliance.ru. She is a member of the International Advisory Board of St. Petersburg State University of Economics (formerly FINEC). She has extensive U.S. commercial bank management experience. Ms. Dowden holds a BS from University of North Carolina (Phi Beta Kappa) and an MBA (Finance) from Georgia State University. More information is available at http://www.ethicsrussia.org/index.php/who-we-are/organization/119-who-we-are/our-organization/106-patricia-dowden. Philip M. Nichols is Joseph Kolodny Professor of Social Responsibility in Business and Professor of Legal Studies & Business Ethics at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. His research focuses on emerging economies and corruption. He is President, Academy of Legal Studies in Business; Co-Chair, Anti-Corruption Law Interest Group, American Society of International Law. Professor Nichols has been active in Russia in promoting business ethics, where he has lectured, conducted roundtables, and presented papers at major universities and conferences in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Yaroslavl. Dr. Nichols holds a JD, Duke University; LLM, Duke University; AB, Harvard University More information is available at https://lgst.wharton.upenn.edu/profile/nicholsp/.