This essay wants readers to understand the very special perspective on ethics in business in Germany, where historical context had a strong influence on the unfolding of ‘business ethics’ as an academic discipline. On the one hand, there has been philosophical reflection for centuries on ‘Wirtschaftsethik’ (i.e. systemic reflections, somehow ‘Economics and Philosophy’), but on the other hand, the academic profession supposedly concerned, i.e. ‘Betriebswirtschaftslehre’, paid only weak attention to, or even disregarded, concepts of ‘Unternehmensethik’ (which roughly means ‘Business Ethics’). It may be curious, but essential, to understand that just the historical development of the young professional discipline since the 1920s as an ethical-normative approach to ‘Betriebswirtschaftslehre’ has led to a strong reluctance among Germany’s mainstream scholars after World War II towards all kind of ethical concepts. Instead, the German ‘special way’ of Betriebswirtschaftslehre was developed as a supposedly value-free extension of microeconomic theory, with a definite rejection of ethical judgments. Ethical demands on business were understood as a political duty of the regulatory system, an ingredient of the social market economy. It was only after practical experience of business responsibility since the 1980s for their very own decisions, particularly for failures, scandals, and the emerging issues in global value chain interdependencies, that business ethics became an issue also in mainstream business administration from the 2010s—alas, no longer as philosophical business ethics, but empirically as CSR and sustainability research. So where are we going?