[Pursuing the ethics of integrity in a business context]

Having placed the phenomenon of corruption in the wider context of the current cultural and anthropological crisis and after recalling the ancient roots of the phenomenon, the author proposes an itinerary in six stages that is a sort of a minimal ethics in view of affirming and rooting ethical behaviors and prevent corruption in a business context. The six stages are: professionalism, respect, loyalty, honesty, responsibility, integrity. If corruption is a phenomenon of personal (cor-ruptum) and collective (cum-rumpere) breaking and disruption, which gives birth to duplicity, hidden and not transparent behaviors, integrity, on the contrary, is the attitude of fullness and consistency that manifests and produces the healthy character of the individual and the group. The author discerns in the corruption of the word a basic destructuring element of relational networks and also of relations internal to a business organization. He emphasizes the urgency of the recovery of an ethics of the word that alone enables the creation or reconstitution of trust, which is the necessary foundation for the good performance and livability of interpersonal, social, and corporate relations.