Ethics, truth and consequence

This post reflects upon readings for week 5, on ethics.

Towards the end of the chapter, the concept of "ethical relativism" is introduced, whereby it is noted that some acts which are good in some circumstances or cultures may not be good in others. It ends up by saying there is a need to "consider the social environment in which the standards and actions exist, and the consequences of the action".

Consider the case of the Leeds Metropolitan University, as related by Philip Young. In the aftermath of the 7 July 2005 London bombings, an inquiry discovered that one of the perpertrators had studied at the University. The news of this broke during the graduation ceremony of that year's cohort. Lucy Laville, head of communications at the time, immediately withdrew all graduation videos and got all press inquiries to go through her, in order to prevent the graduation ceremony from becoming a media circus.

Here, it could be said that Laville's actions in withholding information was ethical because the hard truth would have a disproportionate effect not only on the image of the Univsersity, but would also negatively affect the memories of young adults who were supposed to go through one of the most important events of their lives, their university graduation. To have allowed the hard truth to go out unmitigated would have been unethical, not to mention unprofessional.

The 1982 Johnson & Johnson Tylenol recall serves as a useful contrast to the Leeds Met University incident. In this case, 7 people died after consuming the drug. Johnson & Johnson immediately recalled all of the drugs from stores and eventually discovered that the pills were laced with cyanide by an unknown person. The company eventually went on to create a tamper-proof packaging for their medicines.

In the Johnson & Johnson case, withholding information was NOT ethical, because the potential consequences of doing so were unacceptable. More members of the public could have been killed and the reputation of the company would have been severely damaged. This time round, allowing the hard truth to be disseminated clearly outweighed the consequences of withholding that information from the public.

So, the key thing to remember when considering the ethics of any particular situation and the contemplated actions, it is important to consider the consequences of any such action on the organization and its stakeholders before deciding on any course of action. What might work for one situation might not be the right solution for the next.