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Working Ethics

Working Ethics

How to Be Fair in a Culturally Complex World

Richard Rowson

Paperback: £16.99 / $26.95

2006, royal, 208pp
ISBN: 978-1-85302-750-5, BIC 2: HPQ LATC

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Exctract from Chapter 1: Sources of Guidance and the Basis of Ethics

Different sources

We generally see ethics as giving us a standpoint from which to decide what is right and wrong and what we ought or ought not to do. Ethics is not, however, the only source of guidance from which we judge behaviour to be acceptable and unacceptable. Every day we make such judgements from the perspectives of law, social convention, professional codes of conduct, religious beliefs, aesthetic taste, politics and practicality. Moreover we often consider a situation from the standpoints of more than one of these, as the following scenario demonstrates.

A police patrol stops a car for exceeding the speed limit. The driver is a father desperate to get his heavily bleeding child to hospital. Although the police officers are aware that what the father did was legally wrong, they think it is morally right to try to save a life and so they help him reach the hospital by driving ahead of him with lights and sirens going.

Here follow some definitions and scenarios that make clear the different standpoints we use when making judgements about what is right and wrong.

Law

We judge behaviour as right or wrong from the legal standpoint when we consider whether it complies with, or goes against, the laws of a particular country.

Bull fighting is legal in Spain but illegal in the United Kingdom. Some people, however, think it is wrong to cause animals to suffer and so regard bull fighting as ethically unacceptable no matter where it takes place.

Social convention

We judge behaviour from the point of view of social convention or etiquette when we consider whether it is the accepted way of behaving in a particular community.

It is good etiquette in some communities for women to keep their heads covered in the presence of men; in other communities men are expected to open doors for women. Some people regard these customs as ethically objectionable because they think they encourage the idea that women are inferior to, or less capable than, men. Others, however, see these customs as ways by which members of one gender show respect for members of the other, so they regard them as ethically acceptable.

Professional codes of conduct

Codes of conduct set out procedures to be followed by members of an organisation or profession. Within a profession, behaviour is considered 'right' if it conforms to the relevant code.

For example, the United Kingdom Code of Conduct for National Health Service Managers (October 2002) says that managers should 'seek to ensure that:

NHS resources are protected from fraud and corruption and that any incident of this kind is reported to the NHS Counter Fraud Services' (p.9)

It would be considered right for a manager to report such an incident, and wrong if she deliberately failed to do so.

Religious beliefs

In most religious traditions human behaviour is judged right or wrong according to how well it fits into an overall divine scheme.

In many religions the deity is seen as the giver and taker of life. To many believers it is therefore wrong for one person to kill another. However, throughout history many people, some religious believers and some not, have thought it ethically acceptable to take life in certain circumstances - for example, to punish murderers or to kill an enemy soldier in battle.

Visual and aesthetic sense

We often judge objects and actions acceptable and unacceptable by how well they accord with our own visual taste and artistic sensitivities.

A social worker has managed to get a client rehoused in better accommodation. When the client enthusiastically shows her how he has redecorated his room, the clashing colours and patterns offend her aesthetic sense. However, she thinks it ethically important to promote his self-esteem and so praises him for what he has achieved.

Practicality

From a practical standpoint we judge an act 'right' if it is the best way to achieve a particular objective.

We may decide that the right way to hang a picture on a concrete wall is to use a drill, plastic plug and screw, rather than a hammer and nail. The hammer and nail method may chip the wall, the nail lose its grip and the picture fall down. We may see the drill method as right from a practical standpoint and not see any other evaluative standpoint as relevant - law, ethics and social convention, for example, do not have anything to say about it.

Politics

We judge actions and policies from a political standpoint when we consider whether they will promote or hinder our political objectives.

Someone may think gambling is ethically unacceptable but consider it would be politically wrong of a government to ban it, as it would then lose the support of a large section of the population and so put at risk its chances of being re-elected.

Ethics

What constitutes the ethical standpoint is the subject of the rest of this chapter and the next. In the above scenarios ethics has been seen as quite separate from the other evaluative standpoints. Some people, however, question whether there really is a clear distinction between ethics and law and ethics and religion. The following sections consider different views on these relationships.

Views on the relationship between ethics and law1

There are various views on the relationship between ethics and law. One is that law and ethics are one and the same or, at least, inextricably entwined. Law is seen as a device for enforcing the ethical views of a society: so as long as we act within the law we act in ways that are ethically acceptable in our society. One objection to this view is that in societies in which there are several cultures there is insufficient agreement on ethical issues for the law to enforce anything that can be seen as an ethical consensus. Another objection is that the law permits behaviour that many people consider ethically unacceptable - gambling, high-­pressure selling and arms dealing, for instance - so, for these people at least, ethics and law are distinct.

Many people think that not only does the law not enact ethics, but it would be wrong for it to do so. In their view, the law should allow individuals as much freedom as possible, and if it did not allow people the freedom to act in ways that some may regard as unethical it would be too restrictive - if, for example, the law were to declare telling lies illegal.

Moreover, many people consider the law too blunt an instrument to make the subtle judgements appropriate in ethics; imagine the difficulties of using the law to establish when it is and is not acceptable to tell a 'white lie'. Considerations such as these lead most people to regard law and ethics as different evaluative standpoints even though they may often see their demands as coinciding.

If we regard ethics as a separate source of guidance from law, what is the basis of ethics? We know where to find the basis of British law, for example - Parliament approves legislation to which the people are subject, or judges make judgements which become legal precedents - but what is the basis of ethics? What is its source?

A traditional answer to such questions is 'religion'.