Ethical and Corporate Social Responsibility between PharmaCARE and Other Corporations - Case Study Example

Introduction

Corporations are continuously becoming a major force that determines many aspects of human life. They bring with them both good and bad influences to human life. With rising standards of living and globalization, are many expectations that a given society put on different corporations who are coming to conduct business in their community. These expectations can be viewed in legal, economic as well as ethical perspectives. This paper will look at the ethical and corporate social responsibility of PharmaCARE Corporation and compare it with other similar corporations pointing out weaknesses as well as giving out suggestions on improving the general corporate outlook of PharmaCARE.

PharmaCARE is not only a pharmaceutical company established in New Jersey with various facilities around the world to give discounted drugs to the low-income population but also it changes millions of lives through offering direct and indirect employment to many populations, therefore, it can be seen as one corporation that whose influence cannot be ignored. In fact, this corporation brings together various stakeholders for instance; poor local population, different health professionals through PhRMA board, health care students as well as healthcare trainers to name but a few. Therefore, it is clear that PharmaCARE offers employment to the local population, provides discounted drugs to the low-income population, supports education in healthcare and also generates profits to its chief executive officers.

Employment and Workers rights

Many multinational corporations employ many people to work for them. They usually go for cheap labor to maximize their profit and help them to expand rapidly in revenue and influence. Profits are the key driver of this corporation, therefore, any attempt to rise employees pay to meet the international standard through several regulations will be met with stiff opposition and can make the corporation move its business away to areas offering cheaper labor which translates to poor pay to the workers. However in conducting its business, the expectations of all the stakeholders must be met while observing various codes of ethics, laws that govern the conducts of the corporation and desist from carrying out activities that will contravene welfare of all its stakeholders while in pursuit of making a profit. It is ethical for these companies to respect human rights when handling both their employees and consumers so as to achieve positive impact to the society.

According to the discussions of this study, the PharmaCARE Company goes against various human rights. To begin with, every individual has a right to pay better. PharmaCARE underpays its employees, therefore, exploiting them. According to Giacalone, Jurkiewics and Dunn (2005), people living under 1 U.S dollar are susceptible to exploitation. Therefore, the company does little in the alleviation of poverty. Secondly, the workers who help the company in harvesting the plants work under poor conditions where they have to walk for 5 miles and carry a heavy load of harvested plants. In addition, they also live in primitive houses without necessary basic amenities like water and electricity. This is unethical because every individual has the right to proper working conditions and comparing how the harvesters are treated with the terms of employment of its executives and their living conditions where they earn huge salaries and live in expensive houses complete with basic amenities, it is disproportionately biased.

These circumstances facing the PharmaCARE can be compared to the case that involved Nestle company where it was accused of flouting labor laws where the cocoa harvesters were either underage or were forced to work under poor condition. Even though it was not directly implicated, Nestle still had to carry social and moral responsibility for this (Rendtorff, 2009).They carried moral and social responsibility because they ignored ethics of care where they were not much concerned with whether it was morally correct or wrong. In doing so, it is clear that they contravened their ethics and social responsibility, therefore, failing to realize common good for the society.

The solution that PharmaCARE can settle for in addressing this unethical working conditions may include: harmonizing wages for all employees working for the company to eliminate the wide gap that exists between the highest paid to the lowest paid worker even if it means cutting their profit margin and a review of working hours and quantity of work to the harvesters and provision of proper housing and basic amenities for all its employees. Also, the company has to conduct vigorous labor reforms and terms of employment so that it comes up with long term viable labor policies that will solve the problems of unequal pay for its employees. They should not exploit the people of Colberia because they are poor, It is not ethically right to exploit someone because of the condition of that person. It goes beyond virtue ethics, and most of this companies are only attracted to profit and nothing else (Rendtorff, 2009).

Environmental Concern

Many corporations fail in their environmental responsibility because they ignore corporate and social responsibilities that they have. A number of corporations have been on the criticism list for the wrong reasons. For instance, BP Oil Company was under sharp criticism over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. This scenario compares to PharmaCARE’s “we CARE about YOUR world” initiative in several ways;

To begin with, both companies are always on the front line advocating for environmental protection while on the other hand they lobby other regulations that bring down conservation efforts. The lobbying done by PharmaCARE against Superfund tax and Comprehensive Environmental Response and Liability Act shows clearly that the company is not really in the business of environmental protection. Again, they have destroyed natural habitat and in effect contributes to threats facing endangered species. BP Oil Company also has many initiatives towards environmental protection while they were slow to compensate those affected by the Horizon Oil spill.

Nestle was also accused of water pollution in many countries including China and due to the fact that the company is in the business of ensuring that the water people use are improved through its water bottling business, its beats ethics that they should be listed among those companies that pollute water (Giacalone, Jurkiewics & Dunn, 2005). In all the three cases, it is important to note that every individual has a right to access to clean water, clean environment through conservation of habitats and the general healthy environment. These basic human rights are known to these companies, yet they opt to do little in caring for these rights.

Most of these corporations hugely impact on the environment and this cost is bored by the local population because many corporations will never cut down their profit margin to prioritize environmental conservation. This is morally wrong because they know the results of their action leads to burdening of the population they ought to help by improving their living conditions (Bredeson & Goree, 2012). Many people fall ill due to consumption of polluted water while others lack clean drinking water, yet these companies work within these communities and uses most of the communities’ water at the same time releasing waste to pollute the water. It is clear that whatever these companies do to conserve the environment will be guided by their reward system. They will be more concerned with what will add to their profit margin rather than what will come out of destroying the environment (Giacalone, Jurkiewics & Dunn, 2005).

Secondly, many large corporations like Nestle and BP Oil Company polluted water with harmful substances which affected not only plants but fish and other animals living in riparian areas. PharmaCARE also is actively destroying already endangered species. It is clear that business according to Giacalone, Jurkiewics and Dunn (2005) is part of the ecological system and therefore should be more concerned with limiting what goes to pollute the environment because It will indirectly affect production in a number of ways. For example, when toxic substances from these companies pollute water, they will end up harming the local population which forms a larger part of the workforce, therefore, will have a lasting implication to labor supply market which will, in turn, affect the productivity of the company.

Thirdly, companies also engage in various lobbying efforts that are directed at disrupting laws and regulations that will tighten conservation laws that must be adhered to by a company for it to be licensed to operate. They use a lot of money in lobbying so that these conservationists efforts are thwarted (Sims, 2003). They also participate in interfering with and manipulating various agreements meant to curb environmental degradation by disguising as those who are in front line in promoting a clean environment and conservation of threatened and endangered species while they actively continue in the harmful exploitation of the environment. BP Oil Company is known to have lobbied for clean energy provision, yet they continue to fund various non-clean energy initiatives and also continue in active pollution of water and soil (Nish, 2005). In this aspect, PharmaCARE is seen to be in the front line by initiating a project known as “we CARE about YOUR health, yet they care more about the profit they make rather than the health of the local population because they continue to degrade the habitat and contribute to the extinction of endangered species.

Research reward

Many corporations have continued to receive help from various quotas which have been active in research work that is carried by the company to develop a product that is later sold to consumers. The example shown by PharmaCARE obtaining free information from several healers about the indigenous cures without paying them means that they are keen on making more money from the knowledge of the local population without taking into consideration their wellbeing.

Conclusion

Many corporate are driven by the urge to make more profit. Their main concern is finding ways of exploiting not only labor market but laws and regulation as well as the environment in order for them to have a huge profit margin. They will always look for new areas to exploit and will resist any force that will rise against their will of profit making. They involve themselves in both legal and illegal actions that are not morally right, and they are slower at taking social responsibility even though they continually became more powerful and richer. With more power, they take consequentialist and deontological ethical approach which is more concerned with public relations more than the real outcome.

These large corporations need to change their morality to focus on ethics of care where they will be more concerned with the better ways of responding to various situations that limit good morals. They also have to restructure their objectives to reflect pragmatically wellbeing of the society without being indifference to the plight of those who are affected by the activities of such corporations. Situations should be treated differently because each situation is unique and therefore specific interventions should be employed in solving the labor, environmental, social and moral issues within workplaces and communities to achieve global justice good ethics and morality.