Business Ethics in a Transition Economy: Will the Next Russian Generation be any Better? Eugene D. Jaffe Alexandr Tsimerman ABSTRACT. This study investigated students’ percep- tions of ethical organizational climates, attitudes towards ethical issues, and the perceived relationship between ethical behavior and success in business organizations. Comparisons were made between the attitudes of these future managers with previously published studies of Russian managers’ attitudes. A survey of 100 business students in three Moscow universities showed that their attitudes toward ethical behavior were more negative than those of Russian managers. No significant differences were found in the perceptions or attitudes of students who had attended an ethics course and those that did not. The implications for both managers and researchers were re- ported. KEY WORDS: ethical climates, ethics and success, ethics in a transition economy, Russia. Introduction While there is ample evidence that the Russian economy has made significant progress since its transition from the Communist political system in 1990, businesspeople not only compete with each other, but also with graft and gangsterism (Aris, 2001; Burton, 2001). Some indicators of the extent to which unethical behavior is believed to occur in Russia are given by the Corruption Perception and Bribe Payers Indices compiled by Transparency International. The Corruption Perception Index is an attempt to measure the perception of corruption in a given country by respondents employed in multinational corporations and institutions. In the 1996 index, Russia was ranked 47 out of 54 coun- tries surveyed, with a score of 2.58 (10 is the highest score possible, indicating no corruption). In contrast, New Zealand was ranked as the least corrupt country with a score of 9.43. In 1998, Russia had a score of 2.4 and in 2004, a score of 2.8 (ranked 90 out of 145 ranks). In short, corruption is perceived to be a significant problem in Russia, without any improvement in nearly a decade. The Bribe Payers Index was initiated in 1999. It ranks countries to the degree in which bribes are paid to senior public officials by companies in leading exporting coun- tries. Of the 21 countries surveyed in 2002, Russia was in last place with a ‘‘bribe propensity’’ score of 3.2 (10 is the highest score meaning a zero Eugene D. Jaffe is a Visiting Professor of Marketing in the Copenhagen Business School, Denmark. He has B.S. (Econ.) and PhD degrees from the Wharton School, Uni- versity of Pennsylvania and an MBA in International Business from New York University. His teaching and research interests are in International Marketing/Business and Business Ethics. He has published previously in the Journal of Business Ethics and in the Journal of Value Based Management, Teaching Business Ethics, Business Ethics a European Review, Journal of Marketing Research, Columbia Journal of World Business, Management International Review, European Journal of Marketing, International Marketing Review, Long Range Planning, Industrial Marketing Management, among others. Alexandr Tsimerman is an Instructor at the Graduate School of Business Administration, Israel. He holds an M.A. degree in Mathematics and Computer Science from Moscow State University, and is a PhD candidate at the Graduate School of Business Administration, Bar-Ilan University, Israel. His teaching and research interests are in International Advertising and Consumer Behavior. Journal of Business Ethics (2005) 62: 87–97 Ó Springer 2005 DOI 10.1007/s10551-005-0848-2