Ethics in an Information Age - Admission/Application Essay Example

 Ethics in an Information Age The alibi device works through GPS (Global Positioning System) and captures the location of the device holder. The GPS tracking system holds some ethical and legal issues. From the framework that is designed for ethical issues, four major concerns came out. These are known as the “four ethical issues of the information age”. These four most common and important issues are: PAPA issues, which are Privacy, Accuracy, Property and Accessibility. (Mcnamee) The privacy issue is totally concerned with one’s private information. The tracked data of person is used in critical situations. Here, accuracy means that who is responsible for the collected data. The authorized person should handle the critical information that belongs to some specific person. The owner of the information deals with the property concern of the ethical challenges. The level of access to the information is handled under the accessibility concern of ethics (Mason). The alibi device as exampled in question is used in the US metropolitan area. The stakeholders of the device are the holder of the device, the monitoring authority and the concerned persons around the alibi holder. The person that holds the device is fully and totally observed for sound, video and other activities. The other people to some range are also affected with this due to the observation procedure of the device and they are not the stakeholder for the device. The definition of stakeholder is around the persons that are involved with the organization or work with having their own interest. Therefore, in case of the alibi device, people around the device do not have any concern with it; they are here with no interest with it. User of the alibi is the main stakeholder of the device, he is the person who is seriously affected by the device. The effect may results positively or negatively for him according to the situations and scenarios in his life. Virtue Based Ethics: is a non-consequential theory that focuses the personal excellence by doing the rights things. This is called the Golden mean and applied in virtue based ethics. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle provided the baseline for virtue based ethics theory. Where Socrates focuses on the critical thinking, the investigation process of the virtues is come under the work of Plato and Aristotle is the student of Plato and deals with the goodness, living well and flourishing of one’s life style. This non-consequential theory of virtue based ethics is applicable for the device holder of alibi, who is monitored for all the activities and must follow some ethics for proving him the innocent and a good one. (Virtue Based Ethics) UTILITARIANISM ethical theory is purely consequentiality theory. It is based on the individual’s act that depends upon some relations. It deals with happiness and sadness feelings that have positive and negative impacts on a person’s life. The alibi device also captures the all good and bad moments of individual’s life and formulates the ULILITRIANISM ethical theory. The stakeholders of the device are the observers of collected data and the effected person who is under observation. As a Chief Executive Officer of a medium-sized high-technology company the person is imposed for having alibi device is not the right decision for some important reasons. The very first question is about the alibi device users data is monitored by authorized members who do not belong to a private sector. They must from the government officials that observe the collected information after court-orders. Only officials can process the evidence file, which are maintained by alibi through an observation procedure. In the example given, a Chief Executive Officer belongs to the private firm. Therefore, the board of directors who demand the alibi device for him is not the right decision, because they are not authorized people to process the information captured by alibi. The removal process of the alibi device is second most important reason of not using the alibi device for a current officer and new employees. If they have adopted the alibi device for the demand of current job, but when they went off from the company they must leave the alibi because they are not eligible for them. The process of removal of alibi is not as simple, only it is removed by killing or seriously injuring the person. In the private sectors, there is no need of imposing such decisions forcefully. If someone keeps using alibi for own decision and the purpose is protection from serious issues, it is a good idea to keep him innocence. There are many ethical issues raised for using the alibi. The social responsibilities are raised for the holder of alibi. The social role of an officer is important for employees working there. The social responsibility of such person is increased from personal to social and he would more concern about the activities he performs throughout his social life. ETHICS AND MORALITY: According to Ronald Dworkin the basics of ethics are made from the dignity. The dignity is more defined as the self-respect of the person and the social responsibility of person to live a good life. The moral restrictions are also part of living a good life. (Kamm) Virtue Based Ethics: In virtue based ethics the character of a decision maker is important. As in the example of a question, the CEO takes different types of decisions in the organization. The decisions taken by the officer represent the characteristic of his personal and social life experiences. The decisions somehow reflect the personality of a decision maker, which are different on different occasions. (Bunch) UTILITARIANISM ethical theory: Utilitarianism is thought that the permission was very important for consequences. This also impacts on making things morally right. The virtue ethics is more seriously approach for getting the best morality. In the paper, different kind of ethical actions are applied and results are collected, but the most perfect result is taken from the virtue based theory. The behaviour results in the consequences and it is shown through the actions done by a person (Virtue Ethics in Action). Implementing and Maintaining Social Responsibility: The views of professional HR manager serving in the real business are described here about implementation and maintenance of the social responsibilities. The implementation of such projects and the achievement of positive results is the most important factor for the organization. The effective communication among the company official and the stakeholders can result into positive results for the organization and increases the chances of success. The stakeholders are internal and external; both should make satisfied for making good results for the company. The strong communication between company officials and the internal stakeholders or internal employees of the company is basically the management of social responsibility. This maintenance has great effects on the performance of the company, if the social responsibilities are achieved as it gives a good impression as well as the good results. This shows that all issues could not be resolved through finance but the level of trust, respect and integrity among owner and employees are equally important for both parties. This is only achieved by implementing the social responsibilities. (Duggan) As a Director of Information Technologies for a major company some important decisions are taken for getting the better results from the implementation of social responsibilities in the organization. It has a positive impact on organization’s performance as well as the employee’s personal growth. The framework for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is introduced by (Maon and Swaen). The framework is the expansion of Lewin’s work, the approach is started from making awareness of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to mainstreaming the plan. The critical success factors are identified for development and maintenance of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). These factors are around the corporate, organizational, and managerial levels. (Maon and Swaen) The social responsibilities of the process of development, implementation and further maintenance are the core functionalities of the senior authorities of the organization. Many frameworks are available in the literature for managing the social responsibilities. These frameworks provide many features for the management of social responsibilities. The features include the strategic planning, management of process and resources, change management and the process of continual improvement. (Castka, Bamber and Sharp) Virtue Based Ethics The habit of doing well comes under the definition of Virtue based ethics. Only having the knowledge to behave well is not enough but behaving well is the virtue. Virtue is all about the positive character traits. (McHugh) Utilitarianism Morality makes a world better for living the people. The theme of morality is based on the production of good consequences, not only having the good intension. Utilitarianism shows the way to live a better life with having good consequences in a mind. John Stuart Mill believed that standard of utility is happiness, which is criticized, as happiness is not measurable. According to G. E. Moore by maximizing the ideal values we can make the world a better place to live. The ideal values are more freedom, more knowledge, more justice, and more beauty (Hinman). Panopticism is a social theory by Michel Foucault. The panoptic style is used of architecture, built for the surveillance of a specific location. It provides security and safety but at the same time it resembles with prison. Same is the case with alibi device, the user of alibi feels more protective from crimes and assaults due to full time observation but as a drawback he totally lose his privacy, which is also very dear to a human being. The social concern of the device is quite important and one should think over it before adopting the alibi. Work Cited: Bunch, Wilton Virtue Based Ethic, 2005. Available from http://faculty.samford.edu/~whbunch/Chapter13.pdf Accessed on 12/12/2013. Castka, Pavel., Bamber, Chris. and Sharp, John. Implementing Effective Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Governance a Framework, British Standards institution and High Performance Organization Ltd, 2005. Duggan, Tara. Implementing Corporate Social Responsibility Projects, 2012. Available from http://voices.yahoo.com/implementing-corporate-social-responsibility-projects-11833115.html Accessed on 11/12/2013. Hinman, Lawrence. The Ethics of Consequences: Utilitarianism, University of San Diego, September 19, 2013. Available from http://ethics.sandiego.edu/presentations/AppliedEthics/Theory/Utilitarianism.pdf Accessed on 12/12/2103. Kamm, F.M. What Ethical Responsibility Cannot Justify: A Discussion Of Ronald Dworkin’s Justice For Hedgehogs, Boston UniversityLaw Review, Vol.90:691, 2010. Maon, Francois. and Swaen, Valerie. Mainstreaming the Corporate Social Responsibility Agenda: A change Model Grounded In Theory and Practice, Université catholique de Louvain, Adam Lindgreen, University of Hull. McHugh, P.J. Virtue Theory, 2006, Available from http://www.tere.org/assets/downloads/secondary/pdf_downloads/ALevel/VirtueTheory.pdf Accessed on 11/12/2012. Mcnamee, A. Ethical Issues arising from the Real Time Tracking and Monitoring of People Using GPS-based Location Services, University of Wollongong, 2005. Available from http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=thesesinfo Accessed on 11/12/2013. Mason, Richard. Four Ethical Issues of the Information Age, Carr P. Collins Distinguished Professor of Management Information Sciences. Available from http://www.ida.liu.se/~TIMM32/docs/4etical.pdf Accessed on 10/12/2013. Virtue Ethics in Action, Available from http://www.bpa.ac.uk/answers/files/Virtue%20Ethics%20in%20Action.pdf Accessed on 11/12/2012. Read More