Herald Sunday Edition

The Need for Professional Ethics

— July 14, 2019 284 comments

A. Need for Ethics: Do we appreciate and practice professional ethics in its true sense? This question is nagging everyone whenever he/she is confronted with malpractices, abuse of authority, and lack of accountability at service delivery points. These services could be public or private, but essential for a citizen seeking them. This citizen is deemed to be a tax-payer demanding services with officially fixed charges. He knows he is entitled to these services with or without charges. But, he is dumbfounded or amazed when confronted by a guard, a messenger, a typist, an office secretary, an archivist, an expert, a legal officer, deputy manager, or even a manager who require him to meet certain conditions to get the service he needed from the office they run. Some of the staffs have a common stand on the terms and conditions of delivering their services to a polite citizen.

The maltreatment of a tax-paying citizen by some impolite public employees, particularly civil servants, is impudently audacious. They demand extra service-charges over and above the officially fixed one. The extra charge is a misnomer for bribe. Delays in service delivery are penalties for a non-conforming client. The delay may take not a few days or weeks, but months. It is very exhausting. The client has to appear at the public office on the date of appointment, just to take another one. He figures out ways and means of reducing the cost of doing business, but end up increasing this cost. To add insult to injury, he may be told that his file is missing from the archives. The most intriguing act is taking bribes and doing nothing with impunity.

For those who could afford to pay the extra charge or bribe, they have to do it with some kind of ingenious skill. They have to avoid the so called “Anti-corruption Cadre,” if the recipient of “service-charges” is to go scot-free. Sometimes, the clients fail to realize that they are dealing with such a cadre, acting as a double-dealer. I think this is a perfect “ease of doing business,” as you could achieve your purpose, greasing the bureaucratic machinery. If you don’t pay, service delivery is rough. If the client is a businessman, he would be willing to ride the rough road wisely. He is, of course, forced to be friendly with the corrupt officials and employees of an agency, the services of which he needs badly.

The “Cost of Corruption”: The businessman tries to recover his corruption cost by increasing the selling prices of goods and services he sells to customers. But, this is conditional on the monopolistic power of the businessman, who faces no serious competition in the market. But, this is an illegal act. He shouldn’t include corruption costs on prices of goods. I think corruption is becoming an unavoidable part of doing business in this country. Thus, it leads to inflation, a high price that doesn’t reflect the true value of goods and services. The process may evade auditing of business activities. Such evasion also leads to tax avoidance. It takes a genius auditor to seek the loopholes.

Such malpractices forced me to read about ethics, particularly “professional ethics.” I believe that business ethics may also help reduce greed. Businessmen, professionals and their collaborators at public and private service-delivery points have to be refrained. At these points polite citizens are bound to encounter the so-called professionals and thieves ready to “steal” the public. “Governments of changes” have the heavy burden of cleaning their bureaucracy. The same is demanded of business enterprises that should serve the public faithfully.

Mannav and Kumar Sahu in their “Professional Ethics,” modules presented the meaning and origin of ethics, types of professional ethics, work ethics, morals, values and virtues. I have tried to make a concise presentation in the following manner befitting this short article.

B. Meaning and Origin: According to the Sahus, ethics is the science of conduct which considers the actions and deeds of human beings with reference to their rightness or wrongness. The word ‘ethics’ is derived from the Greek word ethos, which means character. Ethics is defined as “the study of what is right or good in human conduct.” It is the science of the ideal involved with the conduct of human beings. It is a branch of moral philosophy that studies the evolution of concepts, such as right or wrong behavior. It is said that ethics discuses human habits or customs or characters. It refers to morals, values, and beliefs of individuals, families or the society. Ethics has several meanings: first, it is an activity and process of inquiry; second, it is different from non-moral problems when dealing with issues and controversies; third, ethics refers to a particular set of beliefs, attitudes, and habits of individuals or family or groups concerned with morals; fourth, it is used to mean morally correct.

The study on ethics helps to know the people’s beliefs, values, and morals, learn the good and bad of them, and practice them to maximize their well-being and happiness. It involves the inquiry on the existing situations, forms judgments and resolves the issues. In addition, ethics tells us how to live or to respond to issues, through the duties, rights, responsibilities and obligations. In religion, similar principles are included, but the reasoning on procedures limited.

C. Types of Professional Ethics: There are various types of professional ethics some of which are presented here:

1. Meta ethics: this deals with the origin of ethical principles that “govern the specification of right and wrong behavior.” The major issue is whether these principles are eternal truths that derive from a spiritual world or simply created by humans.

2. Descriptive ethics: this refers to the study of moral beliefs of the people. It is a field of empirical research into what people or societies consider right or wrong.

3. Normative ethics: this is concerned with arriving at a set of moral conduct rules against which behavior is judged.

4. Applied ethics: ethical principles are designed for implementation in a specific situation. Some of these are: bio ethics, medical ethics, computer ethics, engineering ethics, business ethics, legal ethics, etc.

D. Work Ethics: Industry and society are the systems which interact with each other and are independent. Society requires the industrial system which provides with goods and services it needs. The production of goods and services demands investment. Investors have to employ capital, labor, land and technology for producing what society demands. The output of industry, in turn, requires market infrastructure for distribution of goods. In the market transactions take place between traders and consumers. These transactions are needed for the welfare of society. In this process work ethics plays a crucial role.

Work ethics is defined as attitudes concerned with the value and motivation of work. The work ethics is designed to ensure employment, productivity, income, safety, and privacy. Employees also need security, pension, cultural and moral development and welfare. These opportunities are created for all citizens according to their abilities, without any discrimination.

E. Morals: Based on their experience and wisdom, the wise people of a society articulate and pronounce moral principles. These evolved, changed, modified, and edited to suit a given community, district or region. This is related to the development of knowledge, science and technology through time. Morality is focused on principles and practices such as: (1) what ought or ought not to be done in a given circumstance; (2) what is right or wrong in dealing with a certain situation; and (3) what is good or bad about policies, intentions, and ideals involved.

F. Values: “Humans have the unique ability to define their identity, choose their values and establish their beliefs.” These elements have influence on a person‘s character. People have tried to validate their beliefs, principles and dogmas. On the other hand, they may invalidate the beliefs of others that are contrary to their own. People normally act in line with their personal values. “A value is defined as a principle that promotes well-being or prevents harm.” It is also defined as a guideline for success, a paradigm about what is acceptable. Personal values are also defined as emotional beliefs in principles that are favorable for the person. Values associate emotions to experiences and guide choices, decisions, and actions. There are five Core Values and these are: (a) Right Conduct, (b) Peace, (c) Truth, (d) Love, and (e) Non-violence.

(a) Values related to Right Conduct are self-help skills, social skills, and ethical skills. “Self-help skills” are related to care of professions, modesty, self-reliance, and tidy appearance. One is required to pay attention to his profession by providing services to clients, society and country. A professional is responsible for the upkeep of skills and deliver them modestly to those who need it. A professional is expected to be self-reliant and win the confidence of his clients. “Social skills” relate to behavior, good manners, good relationships, helpfulness, and good environment. A professional should reflect good manners while performing duties. Good manners entice good relationships. Professional helpfulness is crucial for smooth functioning of Servant” is of primary importance if the Ethiopian people and taxpayers are to be entitled to free and fair services. The first step in this direction is to institute a civil service professional ethics code across the board. All ministries, commissions, authorities, etc. should develop an ethics code pertaining to their sectors. They should instruct the various public and private enterprises that fall within their jurisdiction on the preparation and observation of ethical codes. This activity should not take more than three months. Approval need not take more than one month.

Morality is different from ethics in different ways as indicated below:

N Morality Ethics
1 More general and prescriptive Specific and descriptive
2 More concerned with results of wrong action; More concerned with results of right action;
3 Thrust on judgment and punishment Thrust on influence, education, training through codes
4 Bylaws Guidelines
5 Character flaw Beliefs, manners, tastes, customs

final code of ethics has to be made public to the Ethiopian people. Here the roles of the Ombudsman and the Anti-Corruption Commission need no explanation. With respect to Trade Unions, Employers’ Federation and Professional Associations, I think the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs and other concerned Ministries and Authorities, the Attorney General and Auditor General and others have a role to play in giving the required instructions to professional groups in their respective sectors.

We all have to be determined to root out professional corruption that causes incalculable damage to the socio-economic development of Ethiopia.

We should realize that corruption is one of the factors that build up into inflation, through raising the cost of service delivery. Thus, consumers are forced to finance corruption that diminishes “Value for money.” Consumers’ Societies are formed at the lowest administrative level or Kebele to defend consumers from exploitation. But, some of these are infested with party apparatchiks and cadres who literally owned them. They are only nominal institutions.

Last but not least, the whole endeavor of having professional ethics is to deliver clean and proper services to citizens. This effort will be rendered ineffectual if the means of execution of the laws, regulations and guidelines governing it are not observed. Observance implies encouragement of stakeholder and consumers to be capable enough to expose with impunity corrupt officials, professionals and employees irrespective of their status. Particularly, a professional who devotes himself to the whims and wishes of his corrupt boss should be accountable for his irresponsible acts. He should be able to defy such a boss.

Finally, separation of party and government may be ensured in Ethiopia by identifying party functionaries from regular party members; the latter could run for election at all levels, Federal, Zone and Woreda levels. Once elected, they should restrict themselves and refer only to party programs with which they won election. Post-election re-writing of hidden party programs, bylaws and guidelines should be forbidden by law.

Thank you!

The Ethiopian Herald July 14, 2019

 BY GETACHEW MINAS

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