Bernard Prusak
Smiley Chair in Business Ethics
Professor
Background
Dr. Prusak is a philosopher with twenty-five years of teaching experience at several universities. He came to John Carroll in fall 2023 as the Raymond and Eleanor Smiley Chair in Business Ethics. He has published widely in moral philosophy, business ethics, bioethics, and Catholic social thought, and his public scholarship appears often in Commonweal and America magazines. He is also an affiliated scholar of the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies at U.S.C.
Areas of Expertise
- Moral philosophy (practical and theoretical)
- Business ethics
- Bioethics
- Catholic social thought
Research Interests
Dr. Prusak’s scholarship focuses in moral and social philosophy. Much of his work can be described as public philosophy: he brings the conceptual tools and analytical style of philosophy to bear on questions of public interest and concern, not least questions arising in the world of business. Click here for his C.V.
He is the author of two books: Parental Obligations and Bioethics: The Duties of a Creator (Routledge, 2013) and Catholic Moral Philosophy in Practice and Theory: An Introduction (Paulist, 2016). Together with Dr. Jennifer Reed-Bouley, he edited the volume Catholic Higher Education and Catholic Social Thought (Paulist, 2023). He has published dozens of articles in academic journals; he was the founding editor of Zeal: A Journal for the Liberal Arts; and he has been guest editor of three issues of the Journal of Catholic Higher Education.
Education
- Ph.D., Boston University
- B.A., Williams College
Courses Taught
Business ethics (undergraduate and graduate); healthcare ethics (graduate)Publications
- Recent articles: "Unshackling the Coffee Supply Chain: An 'Ethics Project' for Catholic Colleges and Universities," Journal of Moral Theology 15, no. 1 (2026): 79–104, co-authored with Kim Lamberty; "Triage and the Patient-Physician Relationship," in Emerging Issues in Catholic Bioethics, ed. Jason T. Eberl (Springer, 2026), 173–191; "Jointly Committed: Examining the Sexual Abuse Scandal as a Case of Institutional Vice," in The Legacy and Limits of Vatican II in an Age of Crisis, ed. Catherine Clifford, Kristin Colberg, Massimo Faggioli, and Edward P. Hahnenberg (Liturgical Press, 2025), 129-144; "Distortions of Normativity in the Church's Sexual Abuse Scandal," Journal of Moral Theology 13, no. 2 (2024): 136-154
- Books: Catholic Higher Education and Catholic Social Thought, edited with Jennifer Reed-Bouley (Paulist Press, 2023); Catholic Moral Philosophy in Practice and Theory: An Introduction (Paulist Press, 2016); Parental Obligations and Bioethics: The Duties of a Creator (Routledge, 2013)
- Recent public scholarship: "The Ghost Sacrament," review essay on For I Have Sinned: The Rise and Fall of Catholic Confession in America, by James M. O'Toole, Commonweal, February 2026, 52–53; "Bad Tidings," review essay on Unforgivable: An Abusive Priest and the Church That Sent Him Abroad, by Kevin O'Neill, Commonweal, November 2025, 56-58; "More, or Else," review essay on Abundance, by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, Commonweal, April 2025, 52-54; "All Too Human," review essay on The Occasional Human Sacrifice: Medical Experimentation and the Price of Saying No, by Carl Elliott, Commonweal, March 2025, 58-59; "Investing the Catholic Way: Is There a Better Way to Align Money and Values?" America, September 2024, 33-38
