THE IMPACT OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ON THE ETHICS OF PUBLIC SECTOR MANAGEMENT IN THE THIRD MILLENNIUM

Nada Korac-Kakabadse

Cranfield School of Management

Alexander Kouzmin

University of Western Sydney-Nepean

Phillip Reeves Knyght

University of Canberra, Australia

and

Andrew Korac-Kakabadse

Cranfield School of Management

Abstract

This paper explores the troublesome and in-escapable fundamental question posed by Socrates: "What ought one do?" in the context of public policy management of change and innovation from an ethical perspective within the emerging "realities" of socio-economic life. The opportunities posed by advances in information technology (IT), the changing demands of the public for improved service delivery and the convergence between the characteristics of public and private sector organizations and employment create an ethical dilemma for many public sector actors bound by public policies laden with the legacy values and socio-economic morality of the second millennium (a sense of public duty; loyalty; probity; neutrality; universalism).

The proliferation of "soft-core" crises (crises that do not result in catastrophic, destructive or life-threatening changes to the victim's environment); the continuous re-drawing of the boundaries of what constitutes "the public service"; the increasing demand for "gifted" actors who are confident in their own abilities and are prepared to call ethical judgements dis-passionately against personal interest, even in the absence of an external threat; the "new professionalism"; as well as the need to deliver technological benefits within a framework of social justice, have created a trend towards the codification of ethical conduct within both national and international bodies of public and private sector organizations. Contemporary ethical incidents of public sector praxis and policy design are used to illustrate current dilemmas. It is argued that the achievement of ethical conduct within the new morality of economic life remains a difficult problem for the public sector and cannot be overcome by the mere codification of ethical behaviour.

Introduction

The troublesome, and impossible to escape, question posed by Socrates "What ought one do?" (Plato, 1984) projects the same multitude of ethical dilemmas onto decision makers of today as it may have done to philosophers in ancient times. For Socrates, the force of his original question lies in the fact that it demands some sort of account from actors as to why they choose one "good" over another. In fact, at its deeper level, Socrates' question requires actors to articulate some sort of founding vision of what they consider to be "good".

Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Kant promoted a virtue-based approach which emphasized the will, intentions and character of the individual. The virtuous actor behaves according to inner conviction and strength, irrespective of the consequences of the action and its impact on any relationship - whether it be based on kinship, professional or friendship ties. This focus on the individual as the pillar of ethics has the advantage that the onus is clearly allocated; but it has the disadvantage of being rigid and presuming, wrongly, that all that is needed to achieve an ethical society is for its members to act according to subjective notions of virtue.

Ethics is a philosophical term. Germane to effective leadership in organization is the philosophical definition of ethics as derived from the Greek word ethos, meaning character or custom. It connotes an organizational code conveying moral integrity and consistent values in service to the public. More formally defined, ethical behaviour represents that which is morally accepted as "good" and "right" as opposed to "bad" and "wrong" in a particular context (Simms, 1992: 506). The challenge of what constitutes ethical behaviour lies in a "grey zone", where clear-cut right versus wrong and good versus bad dichotomies may not always exist. Ethics is concerned not only with distinguishing between the dichotomies but, also, with the commitment to do what is right or what is good. As such, the concept of ethics is inextricably linked to that of values; enduring beliefs that influence the choices actors make from the available means and ends. While some values (wealth, success) have relatively little direct connection with ethics, others (fairness, honesty) are, in essence, concerned with what is right or good and can be described as ethical values (Kernaghan and Langford, 1990). The critical link between ethics and values is that ethical standards and principles can be applied to the resolution of value conflicts or dilemmas.

Duty Versus End-Point Ethics

Notwithstanding that a number of ethical theories have been developed (utilitarianism; justice; rights; cultural relativism), much of contemporary work on ethics is built on two major philosophical perspectives - theology and deontology (Cavanagh, Moberg and Velasquez, 1981; Tsalikis and Fritzsche, 1989). These two philosophies have been pivotal in the development of numerous theories emanating from these perspectives; leading to other theories aimed at their synthesis - all of which can give rise to moralities (so understood).

The teleological philosophy has its origins in ancient Greece and centres on the final causes of human action (Fulton, 1967). The teleological philosophy of ethics links the moral worth of human actions with their consequences, thus giving rise to consequential or teleological theories (utilitarianism, egoism) (Pettit, 1993). Hence, behaviour itself has no moral status: moral worth attaches with the consequences. Conversely, the deontological philosophy maintains that the concept of duty is logically independent of the concept of good and that actions are not justified by the consequences of the actors; insisting on the importance of motives and character of the actor rather than the consequences actually produced by the actor - sparking the non-consequential theories of ethics (Bauchamp and Bowie, 1983).

The Teleological Perspective and Consequential Theories

The two most influential consequential theories to date have been born out of the very nature of the teleological perspective: whether the consequences focus on the outcome of the individual or collective behaviour - egoism and utilitarianism. Egoism focuses on the individual's long-term interests (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990). Philosophers supporting egoism contend that acting against one's own interest is actually contrary to reason. Egoism, as a means to the common good, a view shared by Adam Smith (1976), maintains that under some conditions the best way of promoting the common good is to promote individual good and well being. Rational egoism centres around the idea that it is always rational and always right to aim at one's own greater good. Ethical egoism, derived from accepting the premise that what is ethical must be rational, and that since acting out of self interest is rational and, therefore, also ethical, holds that conventional morality is tinged with irrational sentiments and indefensible constraints on the individual (Beauchmap and Bowie, 1983). Hobbes (1962) implied this to both rational and ethical rationalism. Egoism has no way of solving conflicts of egoistic interests and, thus, does not satisfy the goals of ethical philosophy; the development and maintenance conditions that allow actors in a society to pursue a stable and happy life (Reidenbuch and Robin, 1990). Ethical egoism is criticized on the basis that it ignores what most actors would agree are blatant wrongs (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990).

Utilitarianism, like egoism, is teleological in structure with the main difference between the two schools of thought being the subject of the decision. Utilitarianism focuses on a society's long-term interests and is concerned with the consequences of corporate decisions to society at large, in economic or non-economic terms, that may be applicable to any stockholders and measured by net costs and benefits (Boal and Perry, 1985; Frederick, Davis and Post, 1988). It is rooted in the thesis that an action is right if it leads to the greatest good for the greatest number or to the least possible balance of bad consequences (Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983); its telos (purpose or objective) is popularly characterized as the greatest good for the greatest number (Shaw and Post, 1993). Utilitarian theory proposes that the actor should evaluate all outcomes of an action or inaction and weigh it against another to determine what is best for society in terms of its social consequences (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990).

In its purest form, the utilitarian standpoint would argue that the actor should calculate the amount of both good and wrong in an action and reach a conclusion on whether to carry it out. Utilitarianism is further branched into act and rule models. Act utilitarianism deals with each and every action a person takes (no act is wrong in itself); Rule utilitarianism deals with the matter of consistency in the way an actor acts in different situations (rules for what to do regardless of situation). Act utilitarianism holds that in every situation one ought to act to maximize the total good, even if this means rules are violated. On the contrary, rule utilitarianists develop rules they believe are in the public's interest (Wiley, 1995). The utilitarian standpoint is most famously associated with Jeremy Bentham (1789) and John Stewart Mill (1969), who argued that businesses operating in their own self interest would produce the greatest economic good for society through an invisible hand metaphor. Fascination with this theory is prominent amongst economic rationalists (Kouzmin, Leivesley and Korac-Kakabadse, 1997) and those interested in cost/benefit analysis - both dogmas rapidly having been accepted by business.

Act utilitarianism focuses on how right an act is in terms of it producing the greatest ratio of good to evil for all concerned; Rule utilitarianism advocates that the actor should try to formulate a set of rules for ethical conduct and that those rules should be evaluated according to the ratio of good versus evil which is produced for all concerned, whether the rule is obeyed or disobeyed. This teleological doctrine differs according to how the conception of good is specified (Neitzsche, 1976; Aristotle, 1982). If good is taken as the realization of human excellence in the various forms of culture, it is perceived as perfectionism (Rawls, 1971). If a good is defined as pleasure, it is perceived as hedonism; if as happiness, eudaimonism, and so on; or, in utilitarian terms, the satisfaction of (rational) desire (Rawls, 1971: 25).

Many of the criticisms levelled at utilitarianism comes from deontologists, whose primary argument is that some actions are inherently wrong and could never be justified as a means to happiness or a good, maximizing end. Utilitarianism has difficulties dealing with the choice between actions or rules which provide much good for a few actors or little good for many actors (Abelson and Nielson, 1967). The weakness lies in determining how one ever knows what is, in fact, the greatest good for the greatest number (Hansen, 1992); hence, it ignores actions that are wrong in themselves as long as the end justifies the means (Tsalikis and Fritzsche, 1989; Hansen, 1992). Thus, although equality is a key component of utilitarian calculus, the focus is on the consequence or ends - labelled end-point-ethics; often in ignorance of the means by which these ends were achieved. It could be argued that utilitarianism's pre-occupation with maximizing good is overly focused with efficiency and is indifferent to distribution considerations involving merit and need; in some instances favouring the adoption of actions which violate the actor's basic sense of justice (Abelson and Nielson, 1967).

The Deontological Perspective and Non-Consequential Theories

From a deontological perspective there is no need to justify duties by showing that they are productive of good; the philosophy focuses on universal statements of right and wrong. However, where exceptions exist, philosophers have suggested that prima facie universals allow these exceptions in certain situations (Robin et al, 1989). The principle is always to act so that everyone, faced with the same situation, should take the same actions. From the deontological (or duty-bound) philosophical perspective, the moral system of thinking is based on the view that particular types of action and/or behaviour are intrinsically ethical or unethical, within rights and justice principles (Robin and Reidenbach, 1987). For example, cheating is always dishonest and, hence, always unethical; the behaviour or action being wrong is not mitigated by how good either the motive behind it or the consequences flowing from it are. Deontological assertions are not found in observable phenomena but in a priori laws and reasons (Kant, 1909), "divine law" (St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, quoted in Nitsch, 1990) and "intuition" (Scheler, 1963). Kant (1909) was the first to develop an unambiguous formulation of a deontological theory of ethics (Olson, 1967a; 1967b). He considered that both contextual parameters (Kant's external world) and human behaviour (Kant's internal nature) have to be formed, organized and dominated by rationality (Kantian understanding and reason) as well as rationality-guided volition in order to make them safe (Kant, 1909). The Kantian (1901; 1909) categorical imperative, or the "formalism of moral rights", is the leading example of deontological ethics with an universal approach; where "reason", in Platonic and Kantian traditions, is interlocked with the notions of truth as correspondence, of knowledge as the discovery of essence and of morality as obedience to principle.

Deontological (non-consequential: duty, justice, Kantian theory) ethics have been criticized for being overly reliant on over-riding moral principles dictated by reason (Abelson and Nielson, 1967); hence its weakness in explaining away exceptions to universal truths (Tsalikis and Fritzsche, 1989). Criticism of Kant's theory (1901; 1909) from a consequentialist perspective contends that if consequences are dis-regarded, the actor ends up with a blind acceptance of duty regardless of any consequence. Problems in the business arena may centre around conflicting duties and loyalties, as well as the dis-obedience of duty to overt. unpleasant consequences (whistle blowing being an example) (Dancy, 1994; Pence, 1994). Accordingly, the "fundamental moral rule" (Kant, 1909) has a limited capacity for dealing with clashes of duties and rights; providing little assistance in situations where the fundamental rules are in conflict or the rights of two different groups, or actors, cannot both be met by any of the actions or rules which might apply. The rights may both be legitimate according to deontological ethics. However, the ethics do not aid conflict resolution between them - incising the right of some actors, through the Freedom of Information Act, to have access to information held by government agencies may decrease the rights to privacy of other actors, groups and corporations.

Notwithstanding that ancient and modern approaches to ethics aspire, at least indirectly, towards justice in society, where "justice" is a cover-all term to describe the end-state of those other attempts to perform good, the justice perspective first gained recognition during the social movements of the 1960s. The justice perspective has been developed from the writings of Aristotle (1982: 257), who held that "just" means is 'that which is lawful and that which is equal and fair and unjust means that which is illegal and that which is unequal or unfair'. Hence, an actor has been treated justly when the actor has been given what is due or owed, what the actor deserves or can legitimately claim (Aristotle, 1982). What is deserved may, however, be either a benefit or a burden (Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983: 40). Justice in the contemporary context is concerned with the fair distribution of benefits (and handicaps) within society; characterized by an economic focus in terms of interaction (context and relationship). Justice is embedded into the social landscape; "embeddedness" referring to the fact that economic action and outcome, like all social actions and outcomes, are effected by the actors' dyadic (pair-wide) relations, by the structure of the overall network of relations as well as the context and relationship of the interactions.

Justice components (distributive and procedural) are based on the principle of equitable distributive means; social benefits and burdens should be borne by different groups, where the basis of equity may be needs, rights, efforts, contributions, merit or the equal distribution of efforts (to each actor an equal share; to each actor according to individual need; to each actor according to that actors rights; to each actor according to individual effort; to each actor according to societal contribution; and to each actor according to merit) (Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983; Frederick, Davis and Post, 1988; Hansen, 1992). Where the rights principle calls for the prevention of harm or protecting the rights of others affected by actions (individual, group, business), procedural justice depends upon the outcomes that may take three distinct forms: pure, perfect and imperfect (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990; Hansen, 1992).

The main criticism of justice ethics has been by utilitarianists, for overly focusing on the rights of the actor, where the basic needs and rights of actors, as individuals, are more important than the maximization of overall good (Abelson and Nielson, 1967). Right theory rests on the assumption that every person has basic rights in a moral universe. These rights include the right to free consent, the right of privacy, the right of freedom of conscience, the right of freedom of speech and the right to due process (Wiley, 1995). In addition to individual rights, rights can be granted to certain entities; the state has the right to enforce the law if someone breaks it. Thus, although rights imply the actor has power all the time, this power can be taken away when bad choices are made (Wiley, 1995).

Theoretical Synthesis: Theories of Multiple Rule Non-Consequentailism

Both teleological and deontological perspectives and, thus, consequential and non-consequential theories have been equally accused of "ethical absolutism": the belief that there is one true ethical code or guide for behaviour (Tsalikis and Fritzsche, 1989), leading to the emergence of a hybrid of the two former perspectives attempting to achieve a theoretical synthesis (Ross' prima facie duties, Rawls's maximum principle of justice, Garrett's principle of proportionality, ethical relativism). Garrett (1966), for example, tries to synthesize consequentialism and non-consequentialism. He proposes the principle of proportionality, postulating that moral decisions have three elements: intention, means and ends.

In a similar manner, Ross (1930) attempts to join aspects of utilitarianism and Kantianism in his theory of prima facie duties. Ross (1930) contended that there are duties and obligations (fidelity; gratitude; justice; beneficence; self improvement; and non-injury) which bind actors morally and in making an ethical decision an actor should weigh up all the duties involved and their options - determining from there which duty is most obligatory or prima facie.

Rawls's (1971) justice-based theory of ethics attempts to use a classic "multi-method" approach to ethical theory: using the strengths of consequentialist and non-consequentialist philosophies whilst avoiding their weaknesses. Rawlsian (1971) social justice (Rawlsian utilitarianism) is based on the view that actions which produce the greatest good for the greatest number are ethical and are so because the objective measure of good is more reliable than other approaches, as it is based on realism to ensure an ethical society. He proposes two principles: the equal liberty (impartial and equitable administration of rules which defines a practice) and the justice principle. For Rawls (1971), a just society is one in which inequalities can be justified. Rawls (1971) specified under what conditions the equal liberty principle can be violated.

Relativism

Ethical relativism maintains that decisions concerning what is ethical are a function of a culture or individual and, therefore, no universal rules exist that apply to everyone (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990). The relativist perspective has its roots in the great thinkers of ancient Greece; Protagoras in the fifth century BC held that moral principles cannot be shown to be valid for everyone and that people ought to follow the conventions of their own grouping. Cultural relativism posits that moral standards cannot be universally valid, because of value differences in culture. Hence, moral norms are culture-specific, where each culture and society has its own norms - morality is a matter of conforming to the standards and rules acceptable in one's own culture (Brandt, 1959; 1983; Hansen, 1992). Moral views are simply based on how an actor feels or how a culture accommodates the desires of its actors, not on some deeper set of objectively justifiable principles (Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983). From a relativist perspective, a moral standard is simply a historical product sanctioned by custom (Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983; Hansen, 1992). Hence, an actor's initial position is bound to be the dialectical situation in which the actor experiences in the temporal period in which the actor resides - the problems of the actor reflect the truths and virtues the community generally accepts, excluding societal deviants (Dewey, 1930).

Extreme relativism (Robin, 1980) asserts that since there are two sides to every moral dilemma, and since every individual is entitled to their own system of values, neither side is more correct than the othere. The relativist weakness is the assumption that, deep down, there is no real difference between moral beliefs; that if analysis probes deeply enough into the decision-making processes, one would reach a point where the basic rationales were the same; not satisfying ethical philosophy (Reidenbach and Robin, 1990).

Ethical Moralities

The moralities (and they are varied) are contextually constructed through the history of the social landscape. There are a multitude of contexts: Christian; Jewish, Islamic; Buddhist; Hindi; Confucian and so on. Each milieu has something distinctive to convey, although they may all share certain things in common. The similarity between ultimate moral principles or Kantian categorical imperatives (Kant, 1909); between the Confucian rule of reciprocity - do unto others as they should do unto you; and the Jewish "golden rule" - 'what is hateful to you do not do to your neighbour,' are obvious and significant. In a sense, contemporary deontological ethics are centred on reason and the individual, being a re-statement or "ghost" (MacIntyre, 1981) of the traditional Judeo-Christian morality founded on the divinely-revealed commandments. However, some common components may also have different values attached to them; although many culturally different milieus have common meaning of time (for example, mornings, midday, evening, night), they often view time differently. Most western cultures have a pre-occupation with time - to be late for an appointment is regarded as rude, thus unethical. Setting a deadline is quite acceptable and is indicative of the urgency of the activity or its relative importance and, thus, considered ethical behaviour. However, time takes on different meanings in other parts of the world. In many parts of Africa or the Pacific Islands, time is viewed as flexible, not rigid or segmented; people and friendship come ahead of time. If an individual is pressed for time and hurries throughout a meeting, agenda or negotiation, they will generally be suspected of cheating and, thus, unethical behaviour (Hawkins, 1983: 50-51).

An actor's morality (moral personality) is mediated by their own motive force through duty and obligation (Kant, 1909). Consequently, motives undermine morality, teaching individuals 'to make a better calculation' and in this calculation remain indifferent to the separation of virtue from vice (Kant, 1909: 15:61). The social process (organizational decisions) both socially structures and conditions the internal psychological processes of individual actors and, as such, the actor's decisions. However, within Western utilitarianism (maximization of self-interest through economic deriving and success) and expressive individualism, or egoism (realization of individuality through each person's unique core of feeling, intuition and experience), the actor's choice is influenced by motivation which is dualistic in origin: empirical (sensibility) and a priori (super-sensible) - both sources of feelings (the subjective elements of an idea) (Kant, 1909: 16; 266). The empirical precedes the a priori in consciousness, however, both are concurrently present in the subjectivity of the consciousness when seeking principles of volition to govern the choice of acts.

Thus, whether an organization has a moral status, an existence or, even, a moral intent independent of its members, is debatable (Bower, 1974; Goodpaster and Matthews, 1982; Velasquez, 1983; French, 1984; Ewin, 1991). Ethics, like culture, may not be something that organizations posses (Sinclair, 1993), but create and enact. Accordingly, ethics may not be the sole expression of an organization's moral personality (Ewin, 1991) but may be also a reflection of the principles of right and wrong which govern actors' interactions within the organization when engaged in organizational activities. Inevitably, these principles are formed by long-standing influences on actors which extend far beyond the organizational realm, though it can be argued that some organizations shape the ethics exhibited by organizational members (Sinclair, 1993).

Development of Business Ethics

Societies are a product of their past (Dewey, 1930; Cavanagh, 1976; Beauchamp and Bowie, 1983; Hansen, 1992) and 'no matter how rapidly society changes, current attitudes have their roots in history' (Cavanagh, 1976: 28). The moral ethos of a social actor emerges out of the "formative context" (Unger, 1987; Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a), where the boundaries of ethical conduct are not static, but contextually defined and vary over time. It is an ethos most notable for its lack of fixedness - in the wealth of practical affairs in the business world, 'morality does not emerge from some set of internally held convictions or principles but, rather, from on-going, albeit changing, relationships with and between persons, soce coteria, some social network, some clique that matters to a person' (Jackall, 1988: 101). Since these relationships and interactions are always multiple, contingent and in flux, managerial moralities are always situational, always relative (Jackall, 1988).

Disenchanted with the limitations of control by means of economic or bureaucratic sanction (Kouzmin, 1980a; 1980b; 1983), management theory widely promulgated, through the 1980s, the development of corporate culture as a means of enhancing managerial control (Peters and Waterman, 1982; Kilmann, Saxton and Serpa, 1985; Denision, 1990). Thus, the view that ethical business practices stem from an ethical corporate culture (Murphy, 1989; 8) is widely echoed, as were prescriptions of how the culture should be cultivated to this end. Practitioners and theorists converting flawed organizational ethics assert that it is the culture that needs to be fixed (Redienbach and Robin, 1991).

While the media portrays business ethics as an oxymoron, which suggests that successful business actors must behave immorally (Murray, 1986), being possessed of a cut-throat mentality (McDonald, 1992), some argue that separating business ethics from the other spheres or arenas of activity is to create an artificial distinction between business and the rest of life (Drucker, 1991). Lewis (1985), on the other hand, defines business ethics as a set of rules, standards or code of principles that provide guidelines for the morally right behaviour of truthfulness in a specific social space and time. Hence, 'actors do not behave or decide as atoms outside a social context nor do they adhere slavishly to a script written for them by the particular intersection of social categories that they happen to occupy' (Granovetter, 1985: 485).

Human cognition has a remarkable capacity to file away the details and, especially, the emotional tone of past relations for long periods of time, so that even when one has not had dealings with a certain person for many years, a re-activation of the relationship does not start from scratch but from some set of previously attained common understandings and feelings (Granovetter, 1985). In non-temporal (on-going) relations, actors invoke the schema (baggage) of previous interactions with each other into each new one. Thus, the philosophical approaches to the issue of ethics needs to be synergized with the social interaction approach in order to understand business ethics (government-business, medical, legal, accounting) embedded in the milieu's ethos.

Professional ethics, for example, as distinct from business ethics, centre on particular professions (law; medicine; communications; counselling; journalism; engineering; accountancy) most professions have a code of ethics (un code de deontologie) which often provides the focus of that profession's ethical behaviour. Unlike corporate codes of ethics, professional codes in western societies are often legally enforceable. Moreover, entry into professional life is usually much more uniform and regulated than is entry into a career in business (McDonald, 1992).

The medical profession, for example, was the first to develop a modern code of ethics, based on the work of a birth physician, Thomas Perciebval, in 1803. In an attempt to abate the decline of the status of the medical profession, at the first meeting of the American Medical Association (AMA), in 1846, a committee was appointed to report on a code of ethics for the organization (Fishbein, 1947). Some 60 years later, the legal profession, through the American Bar Association (ABA), adopted its first code of professional ethics (Canons of Ethics), in 1908, based on the work of Judge George Sharswood and written in 1854. The accountant's desire for professional prestige led to the development of a code of professional ethics in 1907 (Backof and Martin, 1991). The development of a market forces ideology was the major component underpinning the development of the business code of ethics - prior to 1960, business ethics was primarily theological and religious (De George, 1982). The emerging interest in social issues in business, during the 1960s, corresponds to an anti-business and anti-military movement amongst the youth of the US, although the 1970s saw the rise of business ethics as an emerging field (De George, 1982). While the 1980s could be viewed as a period of initial consolidation of business ethics, the 1990s may be seen as the era of ethics codification.

Economic Rationalism and Changing Ethics

There is an enormous range of values by which actor's attitudes and actions are influenced, such as social, political, personal and administrative (or organizational) and where post-modernism may be seen to have had an epochal influence on business ethics (Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a; 1997b). The changes between 1968 and 1981 can be described as a shift away from a collective morality value orientation (utilitarian ethics) to a personal competence value orientation (egoistic ethics). Changes caused by socio-economic dynamics had moral and political consequences too. There has been an on-going concern about the standard of behaviour in politics, particularly with respect to the emergence of recent buzz-words; sleaze, amongst others (Lindsay, 1995). Notwithstanding that a complete conception defining principles for societal virtue is a social ideal, a vision of the way in which the aims and purposes of social interactions are to be understood is required (Rawls, 1971:25).

In the tradition of "genteel traditionalism" (Santayana, 1913), stemming from a combination of Calvinist guilt ("agonized consequence" of Calvinist ancestors) and metaphysical egoism, Western management also attempts to concurrently retain elements of idealistic metaphysics (human reason or the human distinction between good and evil). Arguably, this attempt at weaving three filaments of thought could be viewed as somewhat illogical, considering the transcendental successor of the latter stream of consciousness (Santayana, 1913) represents the love for business and the rise of corporatism (Murphy, 1939). The period between the World Wars was one of prophecy and moral leadership - the heroic period of pragmatism (Dewey, 1930); the period since has been one of professionalization.

Under contemporary circumstances of professionalism, increased interdependencies and vulnerabilities, defining a rational answer calls for the critical re-examination of the prevailing notions of management endeavours: conceptual creativity (system or architectural ability); contingent application of knowledge (technical inductive ability) and the speculative negotiation of order (teleological unity - present actuality and the power by which it becomes a future order). Thus, management theology is defined as the management of a rationally unified system of techniques in accordance with the conception of an end.

Economic rationalism has been an influential factor in shaping managerial values in both private and public sector organizations (Kouzmin, Leivesley and Korac-Kakabadse, 1997). Many managers in private sector organizations, and recently in the public sector too, have developed cognitive methodologies, such as the bottom-line-mentality or scripts, of which they may be quite unaware and that often foster unethical action (Kouzmin, Korac-Kakabadse and Jarman, 1996).

As documented by both Habermas (1975) and Offe (1984), amongst others, these scripts lead to a transformed rationality by which both private and public activities are legitimized in society. Thus, especially during transitional periods, there are conflicts between forms of rationality over which actions are seen to be legitimate. The bottom-line-mentality is a script that supports financial success as the only value to be considered; promoting short-term solutions that are immediately financially sound, despite the fact that they may cause problems for others within the organization. An unrealistic belief is promoted, where everything is just a monetary game; rules of morality are merely obstacles - impediments along the way to bottom-line financial success (Wolfe, 1988; Simms, 1992).

The basic logic of the free-market economy is competition, where success requires strategies based on creativity, inequity, manoeuvrability and flexibility. In public sector organizations, the financial-bottom-line mentality is increasingly being coupled with the traditional political-bottom-line mentality (Simms, 1992); stemming from the unresolved conflict over minister-civil servant and Parliament-civil servant relationships (Dixon, Kouzmin and Korac-Kakabadse, 1996). Fear and favour are still alive and well in the public service but in a vastly different form. The entanglement of political strategies from the government of the day with the machinery of government has thrown into question the political independence and integrity of the public sector (Kouzmin, Dixon and Wilson, 1995). This politicization has gradually seeped down the ranks of the public sector, with officers being confused about to whom they are answerable - their political masters of the day or the wider concept of the community (Dixon, Kouzmin and Korac-Kakabadse, 1998). Accountability, the buzzword of the past decade of reforms, has given rise to the question: accountable to whom? (Walsh, 1993). Furthermore, opening a window on government operation, exemplified by the Freedom of Information Act, in some instances, made public officers more unwilling to provide written advice that could be seen as conflicting with the wishes of their ministers (Walsh, 1993).

The codification of ethical conduct for the public sector has received considerable attention in the last two decades. The models being adopted vary in their forms and context, as exemplified by the United States' ten-part Code of Ethics for Government Service, adopted in 1958 (USA, 1958; American Society For Public Administration, 1984) and in a Ten Commandments approach (small number of general precepts which are expressed in broad terms with no provision for the code's administration). Australia's Guidelines on Official Conduct (Commonwealth of Australia, 1982), takes a Justinial Code approach (comprehensive coverage of ethical rules with guidelines for their implementation) (Kernaghan, 1975), with Canada's Conflict of Interest Code (revised with the Armstrong Memorandum in 1987) being near the middle of this continuum (Canada Treasury Board, 1985). Whether ethical rules, in general, or codes, in particular, take the form of legislative or administrative measures varies in each society. The United States, for example, relies more on legislation to regulate public service ethics than Australia, Britain and Canada.

From a Duty to End-Point Ethics: The Public Sector Dilemma

In response to media attacks and political corruption in the 1980s, many western governments decided to put ethics onto the agenda of their public service during the transition to a market discipline. The Australian government has followed the Canadian situation and introduced a re-vitalized ethical code of practice for the public sector. However, despite considerable evidence in the corporate world and the lingering reputation of "fallen entrepreneurial heroes", myths of market-discipline entrepreneurialism has been tirelessly advocated by the British, Australian, and Canadian governments, amongst others, as the means of accountability (Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a). This is un-surprizing considering that ancient writings, exemplified by the Ciceros' (1981: 157) works - On Duties Ill or A Practical Code of Behaviour (addressed to his son who was, at the time, a student in Athens), show that ancient societies were going through the processes of drawing up guidelines for what was deemed acceptable behaviour.

The merit principle (making appointments and promotion decisions based on the demonstrable merit) is of in-estimable value in creating a culture of service where ethics is integral to the process. Considering that under the Westminster style of government public servants are employees of ministers, their discretion on merit, in many cases, is non-existent. This raises the question as to whether the selection, tenure and promotion of public servants on merit has diminished?, especially if accountability, in the broad sense, means the accountability of the moral responsibility for actions and decisions in the light of knowledge about the results of those decisions.

In the context of "morals" of western society associated with reason, competence, expertise and probity, the constitutional model of public administration, exemplified by the US and Australia, implies a responsiveness to broad concerns of public interest, civic responsibility, law, morality and competence, as well as to the values of political leadership. The responsiveness of public administration is fundamental to the totality of the governmental regime's values. Being the servants of the government and servants of the law and the constituency (the public), public servants have traditionally been advised to act in the public interest; be politically neutral; guard confidential information; protect the privacy of citizens and employees; provide efficient, effective and fair service to the public; avoid conflicts of interest; be accountable and so on (Kernaghan and Langford, 1990) which, in the contemporary context, causes many difficulties stemming from ambiguities and contradictions in that advice. For example, being accountable and efficient is rather difficult to achieve, as well as maintaining loyalty and confidentiality and, at the same time, acting in the public interest when the imperative is to implement what is, in their opinion, misguided policy. Striking a balance between representative public service and an efficient and effective public service remains a considerable challenge.

The situation may further be complicated by the fact that public servants may be subject to not only their government's code of ethics but also to codes developed for their profession and codes developed by professional associations of public servants (Institute of Public Administration of Canada; American Society of Public Administration). In Britain, cases of AIDS (X. v. Y., 1988) and prisoner release (W. v. Edgell, 1989) litigation, illustrate the problems over public professionals revealing information concerning private citizens.

Furthermore, there is the question of public servants having justification for leaking government documents to the press. A public official, for example, may, without disclosure, continue to act in a position with a conflict of interest in a fashion which is fair, impartial and high minded. Conversely, for the most meritorious reasons of sympathy and compassion, the official may act to alleviate the plight of a member of the public by the provision of a benefit where the applicant, in fact, has no lawful entitlement to that benefit.

Notwithstanding that in both cases the officers acted unlawfully and significantly in a manner that puts at risk the very public interest their office binds them to serve, the official may hold within their own belief system that the action was ethical and proper. However, for reasons of public confidence in the institutions of government in the first case, and because of the risks to the public in allowing an official a dispensing power on the other, their conduct cannot be countenanced. Varying, and often conflicting, public interests - privacy protection; state interests; the promotion of candour; accountability; and client focus; are of vital significance to the determination being made in a given context.

Furthermore, the proliferation of IT and the associated ease of information sharing; flattening of organizational hierarchies and increasing formal and informal networks, pose additional difficulties for traditional confidentiality. An error in a computer program carried out by a Department of Social Security employee caused the distribution of thousands of social benefit payments to be sent to the wrong addressees (Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994). IT facilitates influence on policy design and implementation from background actors who play no direct role in the observable interaction but are connected through various networks, such as the role of consumers in transport policy (Dudley, 1994).

Social, political and technological features of the policy context require the development of conditions for highly complex and inter-dependent decision-making; the rules are the challenge of joint action and its implementation. Integration often requires input from various government and semi-government agencies, as well as active participation by members of target groups and their representatives in implementation structures. In many instances, un-anticipated, complex patterns of inter-dependence have resulted, through the adoption of new technologies and bottom-line management models, in efforts to re-orient and re-structure patterns of action on behalf of previously neglected values; namely those of the private sector organizations, efficiency and client service. Developing cross-sectoral links, exemplified by a common database of clients, pose challenges to the traditional public sector stability of sectoral and sub-sectoral structures and, at the same time, signals an eventual shift in the scale of network arrays towards many more actors tied across broader policy spaces (community-issue network dimensions), on the one hand, and the shift from public administrators to public managers modelled on the image of private sector managers.

The shift from the old system of operation and ethical beliefs (one that ensured control and conformity) to new systems often exert considerable emotional stress on public sector actors (Dixon and Kouzmin, 1994). The example of building organizations, reflecting the abilities of their members, shows there is a shift from the "organizational man" image to "individualized corporations" which also signals the shift from utilitarian ethics towards egoistic ethics (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1995). This shift is part of a broader re-definition of top management's role resulting from the need to replace the obsolete strategy-structure-systems doctrine with a leadership philosophy built on purpose, process and people (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1995; Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a; 1997b). The shift from systems-driven to people-oriented management is pivotal because only then can top-level management broaden its role from defining strategy to building a corporate purpose and framing structure as well as developing organizational processes.

Thus, creating an individualized corporation requires the re-definition of formal systems, policies and procedures so that they support, rather than subvert, top management's ability to focus on the organization's actors (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1995). This shift has left many public managers confused about what constitutes ethics for public servants in particular situations. This is particularly prominent in departments where strong elements of commercialization exist (Australian Department of Administrative Services; Employment, Education and Training; and Defence) (Dixon, Kouzmin and Korac-Kakabadse, 1996). Often, the assumption is that when an organization becomes commercial the manager enters the commercial world, dealing with business in the way other players in the field deal with it (Gaze, 1995). This introduces the question of 'gifts, freebies, dinners, mates and favours and a bit of nepotism here and there, because, in business, you are building relationships' (Gaze, 1995: 3). The frenzy of adopting private sector praxis in bottom-line management, where deals are made with exchange of gratuities and gifts, poses an ethical dilemma - what kind of gifts or entertainment (if any) should public servants accept from someone with whom they do business?

For example, during the launch of the new software product, Natural New Dimension system for personal computers, the software corporation, SPL Worldgroup (Australia), presented each attendant with a free software package. Of the 210 attendants, 180 were public sector employees who attended the two-hour presentation during working hours as part of a government initiative to keep abreast of IT developments (SPL Worldgroup Australia, 1995). Considering that software licences were issued under individual names, not organizations, and that individuals were IT professionals, each individual took a package worth AUS$2100 home (SPL Worldgroup Australia, 1995).

The problem is that public servants in the new context of commercialization still play a role in public trust and still have to maintain some independence. Thus, they cannot take private benefits from their public role and, therefore, there is a need to make a distinction (and apply a standard of conduct) for the whole public service and assist those managers to acquire new capabilities to cope with new environments.

The very concept of the public service social milieu and ethos as the all-embracing field within which different types of values (ethical, socio-economic, cultural) (Walton, 1969: 24) are found, need to be incorporated in the transformation ideology (Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a; 1997b). For this reason, management ethics cannot be treated lightly or in isolation from influential variables such as culture, belief system (religious or other) and local laws.

Psychological Dilemmas

It could be argued that public sector organizations, due to their traditional focus on security and non-competitiveness, attract more than their share of scrutiny for their new focus on money and profits. As the competitive pressures increase and resources become limited, top management (public and private) turn to old favourites, The Prince (Machiavelli, 1965) and The Art of War (Sun Tzu, 1976). A review of various studies on Machiavellianism (Robinson and Shaver, 1973) revealed that differing degrees of Machiavelliansm between generations indicates that social actors are becoming more manipulative and impersonal. Noting that the Machiavellian label has become a negative epithet, indicating at least an amoral (if not immoral) way of manipulating others to accomplish one's objective (Hunt and Chanko, 1984: 30), those perceptions are of considerable concern, especially in an information society where technology can be effectively utilized for the manipulation and control of information (Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994; 1995). Even standard marketing text books encourage the manager to compete through choosing the best arena - using strategic thrust, analyzing defensive capability, assessing competitor vulnerability, retaliatory behaviour and offensive strategies (Leavitt, 1989). The conflicting message given to struggling managers is that there is little room for ethical consideration when "battling" in a war zone (Leavitt, 1989). Managers forced to make tough decisions during tough times need to be able to draw upon the more creative, philosophical thought processes in order to balance the hard-line analytical approach to decision-making.

An individual's level of cognitive moral development strongly influences the person's decision regarding what is right or wrong - the rights, duties and obligations involved in a particular ethical dilemma (Kohlberg, 1981: 602; Trevino, 1986). The intriguing issue which arises, therefore, is the extent of congruence between the ethical dilemmas faced by public sector actors in their daily practice, their own attitudes towards such dilemmas, their behaviours when confronted by those issues and the encoded code of conduct.

Ethics and Praxis

A study of retired middle managers in Fortune 500 companies revealed that corporate crime was determined by top managers who pushed their subordinates so hard that illegal practices were tacitly necessary to survive (Clinard, 1983). A number of studies suggested that corporate cultures are an important element of precipitating events in corporate law-breaking (Werhane, 1991). The operating cultural norms socialize their members into patterns of ethical or unethical behaviour (Clinard, 1983).

Illegal activities can take on an aura of normality amongst those engaged in them, through cultural and linguistic techniques of "neutralization", exemplified by the dark-side of networks such as group-thinking, in-group biases, collusion and corruption demonstrated by the External Affairs and International Trade of Canada (EAITC) travel fraud (Allen, Fisher and Fulton, 1992; Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994), NASA's Challenger disaster (Jarman and Kouzmin, 1990; 1994) and the Australian Stock Exchange's (ASE) insider trading practices (Tomasic, 1991; Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994), leading to institutionalized creeping crises (Jarman and Kouzmin, 1994; Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994).

The Australian Commonwealth Department of Customs, for example, experienced numerous ethical deficits and fraudulent activities, where officers were freely accepting expensive gifts from clients (Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997b). The practice was so widely accepted that it had become normal procedure (Codd, 1995). Furthermore, an information technology consultant, dealing with diesel excise rebates, managed to channel funds into numerous bank accounts over a period of time amounting to A$1.3 million (The Daily Telegraph Mirror, 1994: 9). Similarly, the two largest Australian social benefits departments, the Department of Social Security (DSS) and the Department of Employment, Education and Training (DEET) have encountered similar financial embellishments by clients, as well as employees, which, after media leaks, led to the adoption of the Fraud Control Action Plan (Ives, 1993; Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1995).

Similarly, officers on overseas postings on behalf of the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade have made a healthy second income on the duty-free luxury car market (Walsh, 1993:34). A similar case was reported in the Canadian department of External Affairs and Trade and other societies (Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994). Although the majority of public servants are dedicated and honest, there are significant rorts that are not publicly disclosed and, in many instances, are protected (Walsh, 1993).

When such a culture is embedded in an organization, through evolution, the re-definition of what was initially considered maleficent behaviour occurs. How widely fraud and disorder spread depends very much on how the network of social relations is structured (Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994). Sometimes the most elaborate and blatant schemes of political corruption take on the solidity of established institutions, so that public officials finally brought to account for their actions invariably defend themselves by explaining that they participated in the system as they found it.

Canada's reputation for a reliable, and neutral, public service has been steadily eroded by episodes such as the travel scam by the External Affairs and Trade department, where officers actually used excursion air-fares but full-fare ticket stubs were submitted as expense claims, with the difference being pocketed - in many cases more than CAN $1,000 per ticket being involved (Allen, Fisher, and Fulton, 1992; Korac-Boisvert and Kouzmin, 1994). In some instances, full-fare airline-tickets were booked then cancelled, travel never being undertaken but full-fare stubs being submitted for reimbursement - sometimes over CAN $5,000 per ticket being involved. In addition to fraudulent travel claims, the investigation turned up evidence of further illicit activities by a dozen other employees such as 'falsification of exchange-rate receipts, failure to report salary over-payments, contravention of conflict-of-interest guide-lines and visa fraud and harassment' (Allen, Fisher, and Fulton, 1992: 17; Korac-Boisvcert and Kouzmin, 1994). The Canadian Federal Justice Department's latest investigation of then Prime Minister, Mulroney, concerns allegations that he was party to a scheme in which European aircraft manufacturer Airbus Industries paid US$20 million in kickbacks to win a US$1.2 billion order from Air Canada, with a direct benefit of US$5 million (Serrill, 1995).

In Australia, in addition to federal government incidents of unethical acts, each state is plagued with Royal Commission Inquiries into the activities of public offices with a variety of acts: from Queensland, where the Minister for Health and the Deputy Speaker of the House had to resign because they had been identified by the Criminal Justice Commissioner for mis-using parliamentary travel allowances; through to the New South Wales inquiry into the activities of the Police Service alleged to be involved in a bribery and corruption scandal; to Western Australia, where corruption occurred on very large scale concerning a number of commercial deals in which the government, its ministers and associates where involved (McMahon, 1995). In 1992-1993, for example, the New South Wales (NSW) Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) received 3,951 complaints of potentially unethical and corrupt practices of the NSW public sector (Australia, ICAC, 1995).

In response to a wide-spread ethical crisis, a number of Australian state parliaments and the Federal government adopted The Public Sector Ethics Act, aiming to declare particular ethics as the basis of good public administration. Additionally, a number of federal departments supplemented this act with departmental codes of ethics. Following reports by the Electoral and Administrative Review Commission (Australia, EARC, 1992), and its parliamentary committee (Australia, PCEAR, 1993), in December 1994, a national Network for Public Sector Ethics was formed to increase public sector ethical awareness. Some of the paradoxes that public service actors have to contend with are summarized in the table below:

Free Market Economy (utilitarian)	versus	Accountability (deontological)
Freedom of Information (deontological)	versus	Privacy (deontological)
Public Sector Codes (deontological)	versus	Ministerial Discretion (utilitarian)
Public Servant (deontological)	versus	Political Servant (utilitarian or egoist)
Information Sharing (utilitarian)	versus	Confidentiality (deontological)

Globalizing Ethics

While unethical acts are numerous in western societies, exemplified by the resignation of a British minister after widespread press allegations of sleaze (Elliott, 1994), the Australian Labour Minister for Environment, Sport and Territories, Ros Kelly, resigned over poor administration of an A$ 60 million program of grants to local government and community organizations (analysis of fund distribution showed that grants to organizations in opposition electoral areas ran a poor second) (Walsh, 1993). Unethical acts such as corruption in developing economies and economies in transition (from planned-market to free-market) are even higher. In the former Soviet Republics, corruption is not necessarily organized, however bribes are taken independently, making corruption more discretionary (Elliott, 1994).

The scale of graft in economies in transition is so great that it risks causing political unrest or a backlash against free-market reforms. In Venezuela, in 1993, it was discovered that Venezuela's Central Bank had made a payment of US$ 17 million to the then President Perez's "discretionary" fund (Elliott, 1994). Argentinean President Carlos Menem accepted a US $100, 000 Ferrari Testarossa from an Italian company bidding for government business (Elliott, 1994). Furthermore, Western bribes to foreign governments contribute to this practice. For example, it is estimated, that 500 to 600 million Deutsche Marks are deducted from German corporate tax returns for foreign corruption, passed off as "necessary expenditures" (Elliott, 1994). Although the US has adopted anti-graft codes of ethics (American Foreign Corrupt Practice Act), the code does not work very well because nobody else has such a law.

Considering that morality is economically valuable and that the moral character of a society's population is a valuable economic resource, trust, then, provides 'an important lubricant to a social system. It is extremely efficient, saving much trouble by having a fair degree of reliance on other people's word' (Arrow, 1974: 23). Trust in light of Kantian (1901) formalism of moral rights provides an ethical dimension with an universalistic approach. Notwithstanding that the deontological approach has been increasingly under challenge from social science perspectives, less concerned with universal absolutes than with the values which inform behaviour in less macro locations or areas such as organizations and industries, as well as social and professional settings (Trevino, 1986), the "pure" understanding of ethics as independent of context appears appropriate in the increasingly globalized world and its worth is its contribution to the promotion of positive values. Enormous resource costs could be saved in a 'perfectly honest and open world that would permit do-it-yourself cash registers and communal lawn mowers' (Okun, 1981: 86).

Notwithstanding that expunging unethical behaviour is an impossible task, minimizing such practices is necessary for any organization and society at large. Certain values, such as honesty; respect for the person (which suggests inter alia that officials should avoid patronage and favouritism and exercise powers fairly and equitably); integrity (justice appears equally respected in developed and developing economies alike); Socratic virtues (Plato, 1956) - willingness to talk, to listen to other people, to weigh the consequences of actions on other people, are simple moral virtues widely acclaimed in current leadership literatures (Kakabadse, 1991; Fairholm, 1991; 1993; Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a).

Identifying fundamental international rights, such as the right for subsistence and political participation are defined as international goods (Donaldson, 1989). There is a requirement that public and private organizations, alike, need to respect individual rights as a 'universal objective minimum' (Donaldson, 1985: 360) irrespective of culture. In the presence of a conflict, the lower standard (such as consumer safety) of the host country norms should be rejected. Where fundamental rights are not involved, however, cultural differences may influence the outcome - some forms of questionable employment practices in Saudi Arabia, for example. In developed economies, business behaviour is regulated by legislation based on broad social consensus. In the global arena, such moral consensus may be lacking, as is regulation and its enforcement in particular developing societies (Simpson, 1982).

Thus, virtue as the ethical order reflects the individual actor's character so far as that character is determined by its natural endowment (Hegel, 1952). When virtue displays itself solely as the actor's simple conformity with the duties of the station to which the actor belongs, then it is rectitude (Hegel, 1952). Ethnic models of ethics are constructions of a group ethos (the guiding beliefs, standards or ideas that characterize that group) and aboriginal observations made by a social group to keep order and codify interaction relevant to their particular social time and place; as such these models are not capable of universal application. The usefulness of ethical models is in their interpretative ability concerning particular social space and time; thus they are learning tools for increasing the awareness and understanding of human diversity and interaction.

For example, the ten values shared by American democracy are not so uniquely American: achievement and success; activity and work; efficiency and practicality; moral orientation and humanitarianism; freedom; equality; patriotism; material comfort; external conformity and rationality; as well as measurement, could be applied to almost any other Western-style democracy (Cavanagh, 1976: 19). Classical Greek and Roman writers recorded that sharp business practices existed in ancient times; that business persons where just as keen then to make a fast drachma as business actors are today. Plutarch (1981: 113) cites Aristidles (520-486 BC) who describes Themistocles as a clever fellow, but apt to be light-fingered. In another extract, Plutarch (1981: 181) cited Thucydides and members of his party who denounced Percicles (495-429 BC) for 'squandering public money and letting the national revenue run to waste'. It is no surprize that the first known legislative action in Roman criminal law relates to bribery taking place in 432 BC, to extortion in 149 BC and to embezzlement and forgery, both in 81 BC (Cowel, 1956: 202).

The field of organizational ethics can afford to be no less vigilant then other disciplines in the pursuit of knowledge concerning the implications of multi-cultural similarities and differences for successful international professional practices. Particularly critical is the need to test the assumptions that ethical standards for professional conduct are transportable to other societies. Globalization of technology, in its broader context, often lays the groundwork for the transfer of respective values; goals; needs; skills; abilities and praxis - IT technology is not culture free (White and Rhodeback, 1992: 664; Korac-Boisvert, 1992). Although written ethical rules, in general, and codes of ethics, in particular, are important elements in building an ethical society, there has been an insufficient means of promoting global ethics.

Aligning Ethics With Social Change

The term ethics is often bandied about in both the popular and specialized press - being applied to nearly every facet of an actor's life, from the workplace to the locker room (Simms, 1992). Technological advances in fields as diverse as medicine and electronics pose antecedent ethical quandaries to secondary fields such as sport, cosmetics and communications and law enforcement. A proliferation of medical end-products pervades modern consumer life, unintentionally testing the ethical standards of administrators in organizations as diverse as sporting bodies and governmental health departments. Sporting organizations, for example, have found that technological advances in the form of performance enhancing drugs has grown to be a major issue. Although synthetic testosterone has been available since the 1940s and synthetic derivatives (anabolic steroids) since 1954, the International Olympic Committee did not ban the use of these substances until the mid-sixties (Booth and Tatz, 1993); their use becoming unethical at that point. Interestingly, the American Medical Association (AMA) has, for the past fifteen years, maintained that anabolic steroids do not affect muscle growth ergo sports performance. Both the IOC and the AMA would argue that they were acting ethically. However, the contribution to the perceived public good through mis-information again raises issues of end point ethics, somewhat at odds even with the rule utilitarianism from which such policies spring; analysis is contingent on the public health model adopted and the weight given to individual rights and freedom (Booth and Tatz, 1993; Hoberman and Yesalis, 1995). The individual's (athlete's) health is often forwarded as a major concern in formulating drug use guidelines and, hence, defining what their ethical use is; the AMA and IOC contending that performance enhancing drugs are detrimental to an individual's health (which is detrimental to the societal good in terms of costs to the health care system and lost productivity in rational economic analysis). However, the World Health Organization (WHO) has trialed the use of anabolic steroids as a form of male contraception at a dose exceeding common sport usage (Hoberman and Yesalis, 1995).

The legal and medical professions have made no change in their codes of ethics for a long time - 54 years for law (from 1908 to 1961) and 110 years for medicine (from 1847 to 1957). When the codes were changed it was in response to a crisis faced by the profession. In sharp contrast, the accounting profession, from 1928 through 1988, did not have one decade without a significant journal article, committee statement of need or proposal regarding professional ethics (Backof and Martin, 1991). Perhaps public policy should adopt the accounting philosophy of continually updating its code of ethics instead of waiting for a crisis. Ethical issues need to become a vital component in the process of policy development; policies and procedures need to reflect a genuine commitment to building a culture in which important values are explicitly acknowledged. Only continuous generative (double-loop) learning (Argyris, 1982), reflection and adjustment can accommodate this requirement (Korac-Kakabadse and Kouzmin, 1997a; 1997b).

Complex problems, new technologies and uncertainty caused by them are increasing, suggesting that there is a need for aligning ethics with a new societal modus operandi. Society needs to deal with difficult and complex problems such as DNA-based testing for breast cancer, the safety of genetically- engineered food or risks of cancer from living close to petrol stations and power lines. Each problem is complex with uncertain outcomes; risks to life are inherent to new developments in many fields, urgently requiring systematic strategies for assessing and communicating these risks. Risk communication requires advancing knowledge about risk and is central to managing the impact of new technologies such as biotechnology and food irradiation.

The British government's handling of the Bovine Spongiform Encephalophaty (BSC) or "Mad Cow Disease", is the latest result of a cultural denial that has mis-managed hazard in Britain - from asbestos to lead in petrol, from radiation to acid rain, from pesticides to threats to the ozone layer (Lean, 1996). The long, outright denial of danger that the BSC is transmissible to people, the reliance on a limited range of selected scientific evidence, the marginalization and ridicule of experts who issued warnings, the demand for proof, the reluctant half-measures and, finally, after the damage was long done, the hurried and humiliating U-turn highlight the need for code of ethics in politics as well as for the need for supplying scientific information to the public (Lean, 1996:1).

An actor's ability to respond to environmental hazards (food, drugs) is determined, in part, by their understanding of the processes that govern their creation and control. Lacking scientific evidence, actors often have to make an educated guess based on whatever they know about a hazard. This may lead to mis-perception and confusion. Information is particularly susceptible to modification by actors with different values, with some groups presenting arguments for, while others emphasize arguments against - exemplified by consumer groups and industry spokespersons. Typically, groups forward carefully selected evidence to support opposite sides of the same argument, avoiding the assessment of all available evidence and making it public. The toxicological evaluation of the carcinogenicity of new compounds (many already in use) needs to be presented to the public through information that is easily understood.

Similarly, explaining ideas that are difficult to understand (that wholesome foods may contain natural carcinogens at higher levels than humanly produced carcinogenic pesticide residues) may prevent mis-understandings and mis-interpretation of the risk information as well as assist society in adopting new values. Accurate knowledge about new food technologies, such as food irradiation, translates into greater acceptance. Information and scientific evidence need to be presented in a manner which explicitly conveys uncertainty and limits in knowledge. A range of complex ideas (some signifying real, and some only nominal, essences), as well as "simple ideas" or "passively received intuitions", conveying positive attributes and objections (either as a woven element of argument or as an addendum), can begin to look acceptable if communicated well. The latest example of British government's mis-handling of the BSC crisis highlights the need for establishing a method for delivering scientific information to the public untainted by the suspicion of political and commercial calculations (The Economist, 1996: 28). Scientific evidence and advice to the consumers need to be delivered by scientists, not politicians (The Economist, 1996: 28).

Although ethical issues in bio-technology capture the popular imagination, ethnology development in other areas give rise to equally pressing issues. The use and potential abuse of information and communications technology has to radically affect the nature of society (Longstaff, 1995: 5). New forms of surveillance may limit an actor's effective zone of privacy while genetic-engineering gives size to new life-forms which, as commodities, may save commercial interests while defying nature's laws of evolution.

Towards An Ethical Society

Notwithstanding that promoting ethics takes time, the widespread interest in ethics is the best means of promoting ethical behaviour and encouraging a general sense of civic virtue (Elliott and Raghavan, 1994). The notion that all government must be in the public interest and its corollary, that the interest of the government of the day does not exhaust the public interest, needs continual reiteration, leadership and public discussion. Cicero (1971: 120) held that if, 'we firmly adopt moral goodness as our guide - in each and every one of its forms - it will follow automatically what our practical duties or obligations must be'. His moral goodness consisted of three themes: an ability to distinguish the truth from falsity; an ability to restrain the passions and make the appetites amenable to reason; and the capacity to behave considerately and understandingly in our associations with other actors.

Cicero (1981: 161) also observed that 'to every one who proposes to have a good career, moral philosophy is indispensable'. Professionalism, like pragmatism, is a synthesis of the theory and practice of enlarging human freedom in a precarious and tragic world by the art of intelligent social control (Hook, 1974). Perhaps this synthesis is a lost cause, however, there may not be a better one. This cause is contingent on the formulation of moral principles and moral education which, in turn, require choosing and defending a cause. As Plato (1987) argued, "political and social good" is brought about by the "virtue of the citizens", not by wealth, power and amusement, and that virtue and virtuous citizens can only be brought about by a carefully constructed education system.

Codes of ethics are probably the most visible signs of an organizational ethical philosophy. However, codes are not an absolute guarantee of ethical behaviour within an organization - they are merely a set of guidelines available to be followed (Alderson and Kakabadse, 1994). Organizational codes have been viewed as the major organizational mechanism for implementing ethical policies. These codes commonly address issues such as conflict of interests, privacy and the receiving and giving of gifts (Wiley, 1995). However, simply developing codes is not sufficient, the code must be tailored to focus on its major line of business. Furthermore, codes should be specific; public (available to the whole constituency to determine the organization's commitment to fair and ethical practice); clear and practical (realistic and to the point about what happens to violators); revisable (leaving document open to revision); and auditable (regular social or moral audit).

The purpose of an ethics audit is to determine if changes are needed in the environment of codes and the enforcement of ethics policy. Such audits require a careful analysis of the existing state of ethical behaviour in the organization, including the validation of current practices, as well as determining questionable external ethical issues (offers of kickbacks from clients) and internal issues (whether the organization's own compensation system hinders the performance of certain quality procedures). Furthermore, implementing an ethical policy requires support in the form of an ethics training program for all employees. These programs need to interpret the underlying ethical and legal principles and present practical aspects of carrying out procedural guidelines (Drake and Drake, 1988).

Most actors (whether consciously, or not) develop heuristics for dealing with organizational issues and dilemmas (Frell and Gresham, 1985). Newstrom and Ruch (1975: 32) found top executives to be a key reference group in providing an important source of the manager's ethical standards. A survey, by Weaver and Ferrell (1977), of marketing practitioners reached a similar conclusion - finding that the existence of an enforceable corporate ethics policy influences beliefs toward various ethical behaviours. A cross-cultural study of Irish, British and US managers (Alderson and Kakabadse, 1994: 439) highlights that the impact of top management influence on the behaviour and attitudes of personnel lower down the organization varies according to national culture and identity. The study emphasized that British and Irish top management need to behave according to the ethical standards they set. The whole of the executive team needs to constantly display a behaviour pattern that accent their commitment to their organizations ethical code (Alderson and Kakabadse, 1994). The study concluded that codes of ethics, in whatever form (lengthy documents to a brief section in the mission statement), require the clear communication of the organizational values which they espouse and that this 'responsibility falls inexorably on top management' (Alderson and Kakabadse, 1994: 439). Thus, although socialization and cultural differences shape one's ethical beliefs (Preble and Miesing, 1984), learning and reinforcement processes are instrumental in re-learning and substituting newly desired behaviour for existing inappropriate ones (Mathews, 1988). Managers need courage, fortitude and wisdom, as well as an ethical infrastructure (regulations, law, code of ethics) to lead organizations forward in achieving organizational and social good.

While no one is likely to learn morality in training programs, such causes can improve ethical behaviour by sensitising participants to the importance of enduring ethical principles and facilitating the development of skills for analyzing the application of such principles to ethical and value issues. Training programs can foster an understanding of what the adopted code of ethics means in praxis, possibly stimulating formal changes to unrealistic rules. The value of training programs is particularly evident in organizational changes where actors need support to adjust. Furthermore, training programs provide an intellectual basis and stimulus for a continuing dialogue on ethical issues. Given the complexity of ethical issues, combined with the need for exemplary role models in the executive ranks of the public service, training courses are especially important for top-level officials. Training programs can provide formal opportunities for executive officers to articulate their values and assess the extent to which their values are shared by their colleagues. Alderson and Kakabadse (1994) argue that the training and development of non-executive directors also need to be included in business ethics programs. Recent spectacular incidents of mis-government, moral confusion and mis-administration suggest that the need for more open discussion and focused programs may be greater than ever. Furthermore 'deliberate educational attempts (formal curriculum) to influence awareness of real problems and to influence the reasoning/judgement process can be demonstrated to be effective in the long-term' (Rest, 1988: 23). Public sector actors need training to understand and develop sensitivities to the nuances and ambiguities of ethical situations, recognize ethical problems, appreciate the ethical dimensions in decision making and accept the multiple and sometimes conflicting obligations of the management role.

Leadership is the locus of ethical responsibility; executives, managers and professionals at the strategic and operational levels (Mathews, 1988; Amba-Rao, 1993). The executive role model provides the attitudes, values, behaviour and cues for performance (Vitell and Fastervan, 1987; Mathews, 1988; Amba-Rao, 1993). Communication of the values of the organization is really displayed through top management behaviour and not through written and spoken words (Alderson and Kakabadse, 1994: 439). Furthermore, executives acculturate levels by reinforcement through organizational means such as training, reviews, audits, rewards and sanctions (Mathews, 1988); exercising an important influence on the ethical (or unethical) behaviour of their immediate subordinates, who can, in turn, pass the message down the hierarchy. The efficacy of a code of ethics can be promoted by executives who live by its precepts and who translate precepts into action. The influence of an administrative executive, both in public and business organizations, is extremely important in promoting ethical behaviour. For example, if an executive services his friend's car in the departmental garage (as in the case of the Department of Administrative Services, in Australia) then the praxis become endemic as other staff adopt the same practice (Gaze, 1995).

On the other hand, setting an example of ethical conduct as did Sir Edward (later Lord Bridges), it was said of him that his personal code of professional ethics was a very serious matter for him. His standards and his rules become known by example, not by precept (Winnifrith, quoted in Burnard and Chapman, 1988: 30-38) and had a positive effect. In an Aristotelian tradition, the good for man was to be sought in a community or polis that recognized and honoured such character traits (virtues) as liberality, magnificence and pride. In contemporary times, a "propensity to excellence" and keeping with the traditions of public spirit, generosity and compassion could define the ideals of "good characters" (Solomon, 1992).

However, setting an example is not sufficient - ethical behaviours need to be communicated through the organization as well. Often there is a difference between the ethos of an organization articulated by senior management and the staff perception of what is right and wrong - the ethical culture on the ground (Gaze, 1995). Thus, there is a need to conduct ethical audits to determine existing staff and management attitudes and levels of awareness. Shifting to new values will have long-term consequences which can be viewed through concurrent understanding and ideology with regard to the praxis of corporate philanthropy undertaken with prudence. However, it is unrealistic to expect that the executive role model or champion can serve as the sole means for promoting ethical behaviour; a code of ethics and ethical leadership are necessary, but insufficient, for building an ethical organization. There is a need for commitment from all actors alike to uphold those codes and to act ethically. Judgements and decision-making have long-term consequences. However they may also be enhanced or clouded by subjective ethical views, morals and values of decision makers.

Conclusion

The exploration of the central thesis - how is one to build an ethical organization or workplace culture? - has been canvassed. This question needs to be raised in any program of ethics for the public sector. It is axiomatic that ethical behaviour is not improved by education or a code of ethics alone. The desirability of institutionalizing ethics in an unsatisfactory, undemocratic, hierarchical work-culture is certainly questionable. Attempts to raise the profile of ethics in organizations without supportive regulatory measures and a re-inforcing workplace culture may be futile and counter-productive, giving credence to the view that a code of ethics and its associated measures are but a public relations exercise or that they border on moral authoritarianism. Without open discussion within an organization there is a distinct possibility that ethics will become just another managerial tool. There is a need to audit the ethics of an organization, the ethical expectations of particular roles and what is meant by an official or public conscience. More basically, the debate needs to centre on institutional purposes. A fundamental feature of an institutional ethics program is the clarification and exposition of the particular values justifying an institution's existence, the starting point and the on-going reference point for ethics in public life (Preston, 1995).

Policies and procedures need to reflect current social realities and a genuine commitment to building an organization in which irreversible values are explicitly acknowledged (Longstaff, 1995:6). This means going beyond a commitment to short-term commercial values of profit maximization, allowing a full appreciation of what underlies such commitment. Only then will other legitimate concerns be weighed in balance. Public sector organizations need to adopt policies that reflect current societal realities and needs before they can resolve many of their ethical dilemmas.

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Biographical Sketches

Nada Korac-Kakabadse is currently a Senior Research Fellow at the Cranfield School of Management. Previously, she was employed as a Senior Information Technology Officer with the Australian Public Service’s Department of Employment, Education and Training. She has worked for international organizations in Scandinavia, the Middle East and North Africa, as well as for the Canadian Federal Government. Her research interests include the strategic use of information resources and related organizational decision processes; information system dynamics; management best practice; organizational design; strategic decision support systems; and crisis management. She has a BSc in Mathematics and Computing, a Graduate Diploma in Management Sciences, a Master’s Degree in Public Administration and a PhD in Management. She has published in the Administrative Theory and Praxis; Information Infra-structure and Policy; Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management; Risk Decision and Policy; Science Communication; and Women in Management Review. She is currently co-editor of the Journal of Management Development.

Alexander Kouzmin holds the Foundation Chair in Management in the School of Management at the University of Western Sydney - Nepean, Australia. His research interests include organizational design; technological change; project management; comparative management; administrative reform; and crisis management. He has published eight volumes of commissioned work. Among these are his edited Public Sector Administration: Newer Perspectives (Longman Cheshire, 1983); his co-edited (with Scott, N) Dynamics in Australian Public Management: Selected Essays (Macmillan, 1990); (with Still, L and Clarke, P) New Directions in Management (McGraw Hill, 1994); (with Garnett, J) Handbook of Administrative Communication (Marcel Dekker, 1997); and (with Hayne, A) Essays in Economic Globalization, Transnational Policies and Vulnerability (IIAS, 1999, forthcoming). He has contributed chapters to many national and international volumes and has published some 150 papers, including scholarly and review articles in more than 40 leading international refereed journals. He is on the editorial board of Administration and Society; Administrative Theory and Praxis; Journal of Management Development; Journal of Management History; Journal of Public Affairs Education; Public Policy and Administration; Public Productivity and Management Review; Public Voices and Public Administration and Management: An Interactive Journal and is a founding co-editor of the international Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, published quarterly since 1993.

Phillip Reeves Knyght is currently a postgraduate student of Law at the University of Canberra. He has a BSc in Psychology and a Graduate Diploma in Law. His research interests include equity and social justice; modernity and the legal system; impact of IT on the legal system; and modernity and self identity. He has co-authored a number of papers and presented at international conferences.

Andrew Korac-Kakabadse is Professor of International Management Development at the Cranfield School of Management. He has worked in the health and social services field and then undertook various consultancy assignments concerned with local government re-organization and large capital projects in developing countries. He is currently a consultant to numerous organizations, ranging from banks, motor manufacturers, high-tech companies, oil companies, police and other public sector organizations and numerous multi-national corporations. He has consulted and lectured in the UK, Europe, USA, South-East Asia, Gulf States and Australia. His current areas of interest focus on improving the performance of top executives and top executive teams, excellence in consultancy practice and the politics of decision making. He recently completed a major world study of chief executives and top executive teams. His data base covered nine European nations and over 3,000 business organizations. The study of the strategic skills of top management has now extended into Japan, China, Hong Kong and the USA. He is also the Director of the Cranfield Centre for International Management Development. He has published 15 books, 11 monographs and 92 articles, including the best selling books - Politics of Management; Working in Organizations; and The Wealth Creators. He is a co-editor of the Journal of Management Development, is the out-going editor of the Journal of Managerial Psychology and is the associate editor of the Leadership and Organization Development Journal.