Ethical Dilemmas Associated With Corporate Bribery
ABSTRACT
In today’s business world, bribery has become an everyday problem. Some people consider it to be a fair business tactic, others consider it to be an unethical act. This paper focuses on a particular bribery case and uses three different ethical theories, Utilitarianism, Kant, and virtue ethics to determine whether or not bribery is an ethical or unethical act.
The Case
A former partner of a prominent New Jersey law firm has been indicted on bribery charges in exchange for legislation and other favors intended to benefit the attorney’s land-developer clients. Eric Wisler is charged with making regular payments to Democratic, New Jersey Senator Wayne Bryant totaling $192,000 from
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However, when it is studied after the scandal is revealed, it is hard to find any hedons in the case. The harm done as a direct result of the bribery, provides many dolors and very few, if any, hedons. In addition, the dolors in this case are greatly affected. Wisler faces jail time, Senator Bryant is currently serving a jail sentence due to accepting bribes, and the land-developers who were not clients of Wisler had lost business as a result of the bribery. An alternative to the situation would have been for Wisler to never offer bribes to Senator Bryant. When utilitarian calculus is performed on this situation, many more hedons emerge. Wisler would not be facing criminal charges, Senator Bryant would not be serving jail time for the bribes accepted from Wisler, and the land-developers who were not clients of Wisler would not be put at a disadvantage and would not lose business. The land-developer clients of Wisler are the only group of people who may be considered dolors if the bribery had never taken place. As a direct result of the bribery, they had legislation passed in their favor and gained business over the competition. After looking at both situations, Wisler should have chosen not to offer Senator Bryant bribes. When the utilitarian calculus was done on the current situation, where bribes were offered and they were caught, the amount of dolors far outweigh the number of hedons. However, when looking at the available
As said in every economics class, the reason every business goes into business is to make money. The same can be said in criminal cases involving businesses. In the majority of cases, executives and people highly ranked in the company tend to bend the numbers in the financial/accounting areas of the business or corporation. They do not do this for fun, but rather to make money. Something needs to be done before corporations really get out of hand.
The problem to be investigated is the conflict that can arise within companies between doing what is right (or moral) and doing what is often viewed as more important the attainment of corporate goals. This conflict is highlighted in the case study involving Fannie Mae (FM). (Jennings, 2009) In this case, corporate executives choose to focus on corporate goals and meeting the market expectations, ignoring any moral issued witch conflicted with the attainment of their goal. (Jennings, 2009) To understand the reasons for the executives actions and learn from their mistakes and misjudgments the following topics are reviewed: 1) ethics and social responsibility, 2) the importance of devolution, 3) the power and value of incentive plans, 4)
spoke openly about the affair, claims he did not do justice, and explains why he confessed in court to the bribery charges.
As with much of Enron, their outward appearance did not match what was really going on inside the company. Enron ended up cultivating their own demise for bankruptcy by how they ran their company. This corrupt corporate culture was a place whose employees threw ethical responsibility to the wind if it meant financial gain. At Enron, the employees were motivated by a very “cut-throat” culture. If an employee didn’t perform well enough, they would simply be replaced by someone who could. “The company’s culture had profound effects on the ethics of its employees” (Sims, pg.243). Like a parent to their children, when the executives of a company pursue unethical financial means, it sets a certain tone for their employees and even the market of the company. As mentioned before, Enron had a very “cut-throat” attitude in regards to their employees. This also became one Enron’s main ethical falling points. According to the class text, “employees were rated every six months, with those ranked in the bottom 20 percent forced to leave” (Ferrell, 2017, pg. 287). This system which pits employees against each other rather than having them work together will create a workplace of dishonesty and a recipe of disaster for the company. This coupled with the objective of financial growth, creates a very dim opportunity for any ethical culture. “The entire cultural framework of Enron not only allowed unethical behavior to flourish,
In our world today, the more money and power have a direct relationship. What this means is that the more money one has, the more power that person has – whether it be the power to influence, inspire, or even rationalize with others. In the United States, we have the privilege of being governed by a democracy, which, in turn, allows power to be vested in the people and also exercised by them as well. That power and voice that we have the ability to exercise is being drowned out by large corporations and labor unions who donate extremely large amounts to political parties and campaigns. For example, research done by the Center for Responsive Politics, a non profit organization that tracks the effects of money and lobbying on elections and public policy, shows that donations made by corporations in the years 2013-2014 were as high as $222 million (Open Secrets). These donations made by corporations and labor unions lead to decisions made by some, but not all, politicians and political parties that favor the views of their top contributors. With that being said, it is morally wrong for these corporations to have the ability to donate capital to politicians and political parties because these donations induce corruption within our society and government while additionally completely defeating the purpose of a democracy. Because of these reasons, corporate political funding must be put to an end or regulated stricter before it is too late.
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