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International Journal of
Social Science and Humanities
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VOL. 8, ISSUE 3 (2026)
Reconstructing Vietnamese entrepreneurial ethics: Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist, and vernacular moral resources for a differentiated six-value framework
Authors
Do Van Dung
Abstract
Entrepreneurs operate under uncertainty, create new organizational arrangements, and often act before legal and professional standards have stabilized. These conditions make entrepreneurial ethics more than a matter of compliance, yet prevailing research still gives limited attention to the culturally situated formation of the entrepreneur as a moral agent. This conceptual-philosophical study reconstructs Vietnamese entrepreneurial ethics through Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist, and Vietnamese vernacular moral idioms such as chữ tín, nghĩa tình, community responsibility, and service to the common goo. It combines theoretical analysis, comparative philosophical interpretation, contextual reconstruction, and framework development. The analysis first distinguishes entrepreneurial ethics from business ethics and ethical leadership by emphasizing innovation, founding authority, risk allocation, moral imagination, and norm creation. It then identifies four mechanisms of moral formation: self-cultivation, regulation of motives, relational accountability, and practical wisdom with prudent restraint. These mechanisms are assessed through five normative safeguards - human dignity, non-maleficence, fairness and rights, accountability, and the common good - and situated at individual, organizational, and institutional levels. The article proposes a differentiated six-value architecture comprising honesty and benevolence as character virtues; responsibility and fairness as relational and institutional obligations; wisdom as a meta-capacity for judgment; and service as a purpose orientation. The framework is not claimed to be culturally pure or empirically validated. Its theoretical contribution lies in showing how historically hybrid Vietnamese moral resources can be critically reconstructed into an entrepreneurship-specific account of moral agency. The framework offers a basis for qualitative inquiry, indicator development, entrepreneurship education, and institutional research.
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Pages:33-43
How to cite this article:
Do Van Dung "Reconstructing Vietnamese entrepreneurial ethics: Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist, and vernacular moral resources for a differentiated six-value framework". International Journal of Social Science and Humanities, Vol 8, Issue 3, 2026, Pages 33-43

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