Ethics

Celena Williams

University of Phoenix

Ethics

Introduction

Minkes, Small, and Chatterjee (1999) state that ethics is concerned with prescribing and describing moral requirements and behaviors. There are acceptable and unacceptable ways of behavior. People and organizations exist within a code of ethics. However, this code of ethics is framed by the culture in which the people and organizations exist. In some cultures, it is totally acceptable in a business environment to offer bribes and to accept bribes. In American culture, this behavior is considered unethical. Some organizations think their American code of ethics is the only acceptable behavior and other behaviors, regardless of culture, are unacceptable.

There are two ways of looking at ethics: One way is to determine whether or not something is ethical solely by the consequences of our actions or practices. An action or practice is right if it leads to the greatest possible balance of good. An example of looking at it this way—by examining the consequences—is Utilitarianism. According to Utilitarianism, actions are right in proportion to their tendency to promote happiness or absence of pain. Utilitarianism is committed to the maximization of good. The problem is how does one define good?

Discussion and Analysis

By comparison, the other way of looking at ethics relates to a sense of duty. It considers factors other than outcomes. Actions are not justified by their consequences. One must consider the importance of motives. Those who adhere to this second definition insist on the importance of motives and character. In other words, ethics is based on a set of principles that should be followed and not on the results of our actions.

Both of these definitions apply to philanthropy. Nonprofits, the “charitable” organizations seeking funds or the organizations making financial contributions, are judged externally by how we view their behavior. But what we learned from the Enron debacle was that the appearance of doing good (Enron was viewed as a model corporate citizen) is not enough. Ethics is also about what people believe including if they believe they have a duty to do what is right.

Teaching can be considered as an ethical profession. The teacher's job has been understood slightly differently at different times. It has been described, for instance, as a combination of skills, a form of art, or an applied science. Partly due to this, teacher education has also been organized differently. It has been asked whether there should be teachers training for that concentrates purely on necessary skills or teacher education with the aim of creating autonomous, reflective professionals who evaluate and develop themselves and their work (Mohr 2008). It has been questioned whether a teacher (or an educator) is merely a transmitter or maintainer of the prevailing culture or also its interpreter and evaluator. Is the teacher only a civil servant realizing what books, curricula, and authorities state or should he/she have a more active role in selecting and evaluating the aims and contents? In both cases, values are transmitted (Weis 2009). One can only ask whose values they are; are they discussed and evaluated? ...