Ethics in Justice, Law, and Social Control - Research Paper Example

The law therefore upholds true liberty. The law is meant to prevent a person from causing grave harm to themselves and others where there are no other means of doing so. These are called paternalism laws. This could be either economic physical or even psychological harm. Besides protecting people from harm, there is the moral perspective of the law. This means that something can be prohibited simply because it is wrong. Pollock gives the example of pornography which is prohibited by the law in America (Pollock, 2007).

Research has shown that the viewing of pornographic materials does not cause any perceivable harm on the individual, nor does it cause an increase in sexually related crime. Pornography is thus prohibited simply because it is morally wrong. Laws may also be developed because they benefit others. For instance, forest conservation laws prohibit the cutting down of trees not because it would cause harm to the actor or to other but because conservation benefits everyone including generations which are yet to be born.

There are conflicts that may arise with the paternalistic laws where some systems give more weight to individual rights allowing people to do some actions, even though they may cause harm to themselves. . The next time he sees the mayor driving carelessly and possibly being a threat to the safety of other road users. In this case, if the police officer stops the mayor and gives her another ticket, he would get in trouble with his boss. If he, however, ignores the mayor and in an unfortunate incidence the mayor causes an accident on the road, the police officer would be accountable for that accident since he would have failed in his duty of upholding the law.

In this situation, the most ethical thing that the police should do would be to stop the mayor and kindly warn her for over-speeding and again give her a ticket. This is because letting her drive that dangerously not only puts her life in danger but also puts the lives of other road users at risk. Since the mayor knows that she has the support of the captain, she is more likely to continue breaking more traffic rules. Being in a position of power does not mean that one should break the laws that have been put in place to protect the rights of everyone.

Such an action would definitely put the police officer in an awkward position with the captain. Conversely, the captain is not his ultimate boss, and there are other senior people whom he reports to and who may not condone such behavior. In case the captain punishes the officer for upholding by the law, the officer should ensure that he keeps all evidences of this case in order to prove his innocence to the seniors. Although corruption has been seen to be a common occurrence especially in our large cities, stopping it requires that all actions be guided by the law (Pollock, 2007).

Not all judges or senior officers are corrupt and any officer should focus on doing the right thing and protecting the people as is stated in their job