How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of Ethical Living (Paperback)

~ Rushworth M. Kidder (Author) "All of us face tough choices..." (more)
Key Phrases: truth versus loyalty, ethical fitness, justice versus mercy, United States, Golden Rule, Los Angeles (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

A brilliant analysis that squarely faces all the issues and can be grasped by the thoughtful nonspecialist. -- Kirkus Reviews

A thought-provoking guide to enlightened and progressive personal behavior. -- Jimmy Carter

“A brilliant analysis that squarely faces all the issues and can be grasped by the thoughtful nonspecialist.” (Kirkus Reviews )

“A thought-provoking guide to enlightened and progressive personal behavior.” (Jimmy Carter )

Product Description

Should you take a much-needed vacation or save money for your children’s education? Should you protect the endangered owl or maintain jobs forloggers?

How do you handle questions such as these? We frequently face ethical dilemmas in our daily lives, and few have trouble with the “right vs. wrong” choices. However, the “right vs. right” dilemmas, in which neither choice is clearly or widely accepted as wrong, many times present obstacles that call for value-based decisions, and that’s where we often need help.

Kidder -- the founder of the Institute for Global Ethics -- teaches us how to think for ourselves in order to resolve any ethical dilemma, from the personal to the philosophical. Unique in its approach and full of illustrative anecdotes, How Good People Make Tough Choices is an indispensable resource for arriving at sound conclusions when facing tough choices.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (December 16, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0688175902
• ISBN-13: 978-0688175900
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #21,740 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #30 in	Books > Business & Investing > Business Life > Ethics
  #61 in	Books > Nonfiction > Philosophy > Ethics & Morality
  #85 in	Books > Business & Investing > Management & Leadership > Decision-Making & Problem Solving

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars choice and conflict, May 7, 2000

By	Coriolanus Scotchmiglo "Exo-Psyche-Sound Conj... (Inside of Multiple Universes, Existence, NA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of Ethical Living (Paperback)

This is a nice, short book that anybody could read and get something useful out of. To help potential readers, I will clarify a little about the book. In many ways, it is not a book about decision making per se, but rather ethics and decision making. As such the title doesn't quite fit: perhaps it should be called how good people -should- make tough choices. Given that the emphasis of the book was somewhat different than expected, Kidder made a decent book out of the general topic of ethics. Not arcane in any way, chock full of examples and designed to be user-friendly. A great book for "lay persons" who are nonetheless quite familiar with decisions that have ethical implications and need to make them on a regular basis.

19 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautifully written, easy to understand ideas, July 6, 1999

By	[e-mail] (Chicagoland area) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of Ethical Living (Paperback)

This book has provided me with a structure through which I can begin to think more openly about ethics. It has surprised me with a number of new ideas, most of which are relevant to all of us. I highly recommend this work to those who care about living a thoughtful life. Ethics this way is not stodgy and limiting, but expansive and exciting.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good material for ethics class, August 19, 2005

By	Peter Cooper - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of Ethical Living (Paperback)

This books allows students of all ages to start the difficult job of ethical decision making. Starting with its "Right vs. Right" concept, it teaches various ways to think about ethical decision making. This would be a wonderful book for a middle school or high school ethics class as well as an adult discussion group. Could easily be adapted to a church setting.