A Loyola University business ethics professor has received international recognition for scholarly work examining ethical frameworks in corporate settings.

Caleb Bernacchio, who holds the Legendre-Soulé Chair in Business Ethics at the New Orleans institution, secured the Best Published Paper prize from the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation.

His winning submission, Business and the Ethics of Recognition, appeared in the Journal of Business Ethics and addressed recognition as a fundamental principle within business ethics discourse.

Rupert Younger, who leads the Oxford-based Centre, indicated that the judging panel decided to recognise two additional submissions as runners-up given the strength of entries, alongside three further papers that reached the final stages.

The panel determined that all distinguished submissions offered innovative insights into how ethical lenses and social assessments shape organisational choices and outcomes.

The runners-up included Anastasiya Zavyalova from Rice University, whose research examined how non-governmental organisations face stigmatisation under Russian legislation, and Anna Kim from McGill University, whose work explored dimensions of social impact within Kenya.

Additional papers receiving commendation investigated subjects such as artificial intelligence, questions of legitimacy, and approaches to destigmatisation led by state authorities.

Bernacchio will be presented with a prize of £1,000 and will undertake a funded visit to Oxford to participate in the Centre’s annual Reputation Symposium scheduled for August.

The judging panel comprised Younger alongside Professor Alan Morrison and Professor Juliane Reinecke from Oxford Saïd, alongside Professor Michael Jensen from Michigan Ross.

The shortlisting process was overseen by Lorenzo Maulini, a doctoral candidate attached to the Centre, who evaluated entries from a pool exceeding 1,000 submissions.