The History of Ethical Theory - Essay Example

?Running Head: Ethical Theory Ethical Theory [Institute’s ETHICAL THEORY Introduction For many centuries, ethics has enjoyed a significant importance in almost every sect of human existence in this world due to its strong influence on norms and values of the society. In addition, while ethics and ethical standards have remained important notions, they have always been a major part of debate along with religion regarding right and wrong in the society. Due to such significance, from time to time, philosophers and scholars have endeavored to offer their explanations and theories regarding what can be the authentic definition of ethics and the role that it can play in different sections of life (Everson, 1998). Unfortunately, despite of the huge popularity of ethics in academia, it has been an observation that individuals informally and even organizations formally have ignored the importance of ethics and its implementation in different procedures intentionally and/or unintentionally, which has resulted in rising of various ethical dilemmas globally. This paper is an attempt to contribute towards the similar debate regarding the role of ethics in understanding and resolving ethical dilemmas in our society. Particularly, focus of the paper will be on ethical dilemma in the business world while an ethical theory Utilitarianism will be under utilization for analysis purpose. In the corporate world, majority or almost every decision involves the factor of profitization, and for this purpose, business organizations develop their own code of ethics to suit their decisions and justifications. As the result, one can observe a conflict of ethical standards when it comes to comparing different organizations that are resulting in creation of global issues that are directly or indirectly affecting millions of people around the world. Experts believe that “business ethics is a set of principles and ideologies that offer understanding and methodology to earn fair income in the business organizations” (Crane, 2007, pp. 23-28). Unfortunately, analysis has indicated that there has been a similar understanding in majority of organizations; however, it has remained limited to the level of understanding only rather than implementation (Furrow, 2005). Ethical Dilemma In every business organization, accountancy is one of the major aspects that play a significant role in determining its success or failure. Due to such significance, accountancy includes dealing with sensitive information that results in a very big responsibility on accountants, which at the same time, opens doors for unethical acts and fraudulent behaviors (Kotler & Lee, 2005). Unfortunately, literature has identified a number of instances in which accountants and particularly, organizations failed to abide by the ethical code of conduct resulting in heavy prices (Beenen & Pinto, 2009), and the case of Enron Corporation is a very famous example of ethical dilemma in business field. This case resulted in a new debate that now focuses on white-collar crimes and possibility of organizational corruption due to presence of loopholes in organizational setup that then lead to unethical activities globally. The paper will analyze this ethical dilemma in light of non-religious ethical theory of Utilitarianism; however, from analysis of other literature, work pressure has turned out to be the most evident factor that enforces individuals to incline towards unethical activities (Johnson, 2008). Work pressure can be in the form of overload work that results in lesser time for individual to spend at home or out of organization, which creates pressure. On the other hand, work pressure exists in the form of financial pressure that involves using organizational structures and loopholes for personal advantages and success (Beenen & Pinto, 2009). Utilitarianism As earlier mentioned, many philosophers and scholars proposed their theories for explaining the notion of ethics; however, many of these theories faded in darkness but Utilitarianism (Mill, 2001) is one of the non-religious ethical theories that have been able to enjoy their significance even in today’s modern world. Besides James Mill, Epicurus and Bentham have been few scholars that came forward with what Utilitarianism stands in front of us today. According to Utilitarianism, consequences that follow after an action determine its ethics and one can then justify such an act as ethical correct or ethical wrong. In other words, ethical theorists have used the term of ‘consequentialism’ (Mill, 2001) in Utilitarianism that signifies that every act that result in good outcomes for the majority can be considered as ethical correct action and vice versa. On the other hand, analysis has identified some of the drawbacks of this ethical theory that is mainly regarding avoiding internal factors. For example, if an organization carries out an act of corruption, which then results in advantage of majority of people, advocates of Utilitarianism will consider this act as an ethical act that is purely a drawback of this ethical theory. In addition, this theory also ignores acts of encouragement that incline someone to carry out corruption and/or fraud in an organization, which is an unethical act but ethical from the lens of Utilitarianism. Another proposition of Utilitarianism that can be used to analyze any act or any ethical dilemma as in this paper’s context is that advocates of this theory emphasizes that any action that causes the least amount of adversity to majority number of people can also be considered as an ethical act. For instance, from the perspective of Utilitarianism, a dental surgeon that will be causing the least amount of pain will be more ethical in comparison to the surgeon causing more pain to the patient according to this theory. In this regard, Utilitarianism considers all the actions with good consequences as ethical and closer to human wellbeing. Moreover, scrutiny of literature related to the ethical theory of Utilitarianism has signified that happiness and/or pleasure, and similarly, sadness and/or pain enjoy importance as determining factors for considering any action as ethical or unethical. Advocates of this theory argue that every person after carrying out an act either enjoys the pleasure of doing the act, or feel happy after completing the act, or on the other hand, he/she feels sad after carrying out the act or confronts pain due to its consequences. From this justification, advocates of Utilitarianism argues that any action that gives pleasure to the majority will be ethically justified and right. On the other hand, any action that will cause pain to the majority or will cause suffering will be ethical incorrect and wrong. However, one thing that distinguishes Utilitarianism from other ethical theories is that advocates of Utilitarianism have not bounded the terms of pleasure, happiness, pain, and sadness to only physical aspect but they have expanded it to emotional, psychological, intellectual, and spiritual pleasure and suffering (Mill, 2001). Further analysis of Utilitarianism has identified another problem with this ethical theory, particularly with its understanding of self-interest. For example, advocates of Utilitarianism will consider a stealing act of poor from rich resulting in benefit to poor’s family of six people as ethical that is one of the major reasons of huge criticism on Utilitarianism. In reply, supporters of Utilitarianism argue that self-interest must include priority given to interest of the others than interest of oneself (Furrow, 2005). From Utilitarianism’s standpoint, various acts of fraud and corruption in today’s corporate world seem ethical, which are taken as ethical dilemma on the other hand. For instance, organizations that get involved in acts of corruption are able to acquire financial benefits on enormous levels that subsequently results in benefit to every employee of the organization that can be taken as benefit of majority of the people from the lens of Utilitarianism (Robbins & Judge, 2009). However, from another side of the Utilitarianism coin, such corruption causes huge losses to thousands of small investors, as happened in the case of fall of Enron corporation that resulted in losses of millions of dollars indicating their acts of corruption as unethical from the same lens of Utilitarianism. In this regard, it is very imperative to consider an ethical dilemma on macro basis when viewing from the perspective of Utilitarianism (Garber, 2008), as short-term micro analysis might indicate the act as ethical but on long-term, it will always stand out as an unethical act that will not allow organizations to justify their acts of corruption. Conclusion Finally, today’s modern corporate world has many loopholes that incline organizations to involve in acts of financial and moral corruption. Analysis from the perspective of Utilitarianism has identified that although such acts may result in benefits to employees of the organization but when viewed holistically, it will always result in losses to many more and thus, one cannot justify such acts as ethical for personal interest. Lastly, it has been an observation that leadership plays a crucial role in encouraging ethical actions in employees at lower level, and thus, the leadership can contribute by ensuring ethical actions on their level that will be helpful in resolving this ethical dilemma of corruption in the corporate world. Convincingly, the paper has identified and analyzed significant aspects and factors related with ethical dilemma of organisational corruption from the perspective of Utilitarianism. It is expectation that discussion and arguments given in the paper will be beneficial for students and professionals in better understanding of the topic. References Beenen, G. & Pinto, J. (2009). “Resisting Organizational-Level Corruption: An Interview with Sherron Watkins.” Academy of Management Learning & Education. Volume 8, Issue 2, pp. 275-289. Crane, A. (2007). Business Ethics. Oxford University Press, USA. Everson, S. (1998). Ethics. Cambridge University Press. Furrow, D. (2005). Ethics. Continuum International Publishing Group. Garber, P. R. (2008). The Ethical Dilemma. HRD. Johnson, C. E. (2008). Meeting the Ethical Challenges of Leadership. Sage Publications. Kotler, P., & Lee, N. (2005). Corporate Social Responsibility: doing the most good for your company and your cause. John Wiley and Sons. Mill, J. S. (2001). Utilitarianism. Hackett Publishing. Robbins, S. P., & Judge, T. A. (2009). Organizational Behavior. Pearson Prentice Hall. Read More