Virtue Ethics and Investment Advisors in the Canadian Financial Services Industry: An Application of Alasdair MacIntyre's Tripartite Model of Virtue Ethics and Moral Philosophy

Abstract

Recent events in global capital markets have underscored the impotence of securities regulation and paucity of ethical behaviour. With the resurgence of virtue ethics it only seems appropriate that a concerted effort should be undertaken to apply this model to the financial services industry. This thesis will apply Alasdair MacIntyre's tripartite notion of virtue ethics as explicated in his highly acclaimed work After Virtue to the role of the Investment Advisor in the Canadian financial services industry. MacIntyre's concepts of practice, narrative order of a single human life and the notion of tradition will be applied to the role of the Investment Advisor and the institutions that accommodate the profession. It will be concluded that MacIntyre's notions of practice and narrative order of a single human life is readily applicable but due to MacIntyre's profound criticism of capitalism, the notion of tradition is more difficult to incorporate comprehensively.