Ethics

In Normative Ethics there are three distinct schools of thought, and each differentiate through moral intentions. Consequentialism relies on the consequences of an action in order to distinguish whether or not something is morally acceptable. Deontology considers the morality of an action by one’s reason for doing a certain deed. Lastly, virtue ethics bases morality off of virtuous character, and how a virtuous person would act given a certain predicament. Ultimately, consequentialism provides the most practical explanation for morality due to the notion of providing the best possible result. Contrarily, deontology and virtue ethics do not always provide an individual with the most sensible course of action, and therefore prove to be

Every day people make decisions that may have profound effect on their personal and/or professional lives as well as the lives of others. The decision people make have a foundation on their personal, cultural, and perhaps organizational values. When these values are in disagreement, an ethical dilemma occurs.

Organizational climate is essential in developing a culture of incorruptible individuals and this climate is set by the organizations leaders. Within the SCORE unit of the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department (KCKPD) at the time of the indictment, it was not clear if leaders set a tone of ethical conduct, nor did it appear that principled conduct was the cornerstone of the command leadership philosophy. Specifically, all ethical standards for Kansas City Police Department are derived from Wyandotte County Unified Government code of ethics and the police department lacks police specific philosophies toward ethical conduct (Unified Government Ordinance, 2009). Although, the International Chiefs of Police have established a code of honor adopted by many police departments, it is unclear bases on empirical information what KCKPD leadership expected of their Police officers. For instance, it is vital for executive to formulate as stated by Martin (2011), “an agenda that explains the moral purposes of the department” (para. 6). Therefore, not making an ethics based agenda and delivering a repetitive and deliberate focus on such an agenda to all levels is one failure by leadership to have contributed to creating a perceived environment of unethical conduct. On the other hand, senior managers cannot root out corruption without captains, lieutenants, sergeants and senior officers. Middle and first-line leader are essential to the command structure ensuring high standards are

What exactly does the term “ethics” mean? When asking this question among several different groups of people, I’m sure all of their answers would be different in many ways, but would all draw the general theme that ethics is somewhat of a study of what is right and what is wrong. This is a mostly correct conclusion, except for the fact that it encompasses not only determining what is right and wrong, but attempting to systemize and defend those ethical positions which one holds. Almost all of the controversial headlines you see in the media today involve some sort of question of ethics. Abortion. Healthcare. (“Should we take money from the rich and give to the poor to pay for medical expenses?”) Gun laws. Euthanasia, etc. The topic I want

Police corruption comes in many types, including accepting bribes in exchange for not reporting a crime and flouting where police falsify

An abundance of problems and issues arise for professionals in law enforcement. These problems and issues include how to exercise authority and how to deal with conflicts on and off duty. There are ethical dilemmas in the use of an officers’ authority. An officer must not use their authority to promote personal values, avoid accountability for wrongdoing or accept gratuities. Using professional status to promote personal interests, engaging in or promoting professional activities that are contrary to personal values and participating in public or private activity that is contrary to professional values, like the use of illegal substances, drinking and driving are ethical problems in the relationship between personal and professional interests.

Bribery is a problem for many different reasons, also. Justice cannot be served if the police are willing to be “bought” by the criminals. An investigator is supposed to protect the community and do what he has to in order to make sure that justice is being served. This cannot be done if he is on the criminals’ pay roll. It can lower community moral, believing that if someone has enough money, they can just buy their way out of anything. The community may also lose faith in the justice system all together, believing that whoever harmed them, or whatever be the case, will go free because the police are working both sides of the fence. There is no case if the investigator is letting the guilty go free.

Training of criminal justice professionals in the principles of ethics and putting these practices into work is a very challenging process. The challenge comes in where it appears too non-practical to be put into practice in the real world. However, the important point to begin in this training is to develop a program that shows the importance of ethics to an individual in an organization and in this case, the criminal justice profession. I feel that it is important for ethics training in this field because of variety of beneficial reasons (Prenzler, 2009). To begin with police officers, most agencies in law enforcement and correction centers spend huge amounts of money in funding officers in defensive tactics and use of force by using weapons for their survival in their line of duty.

Among the other challenges mentioned is the absence of a strong leader whom police enforcement officers can emulate and look up to for inspiration. This is confirmed by Edward J. Tulley who said that a person must do the right thing always even if nobody is looking. The sad thing however is that there is nobody now who is willing to set a positive example.The lack of training or formal education is also a reason why law enforcement officers commit misconduct. I believe that no person would intentionally do something that is wrong. The problem however is that when people are faced with an ethical dilemma their lack of understanding of better ways to deal with the situation sometimes impels them to make a wrong decision. The task now is to make ethics a part of the training for law enforcement officers so that compliance with the code of ethics becomes a matter of instinct. The absence of a stringent hiring and selection process is also a barrier for compliance with high ethical standards. The conduct of interviews and psychological testing are important because there are people whose psychological profiles do not match with the profile of that of a police officer. While it is true that there are some people who can be educated and trained to become ethical police officers there are some whose personalities do not match that of a police officer

In this country we are seeing an increase in ethical violations in the field of law enforcement. I will go into detail about some of the main ethical issues we are seeing today and what can be done to prevent such acts from happening. When one officer is being unethical it has a huge effect on how the public views law enforcement as a whole. Many officers go undetected for a long time before getting caught, but an officer committing ethical violations will have their day it’s just a matter of time. In order to improve this growing problem we must first understand why there is such a problem in the field of law enforcement.

In spite of Burns belief, it was not only his two police friends and the Association that were responsible for his election. It took votes from “ALL” of the citizens. Unfortunately, many of his decisions and actions were consistently based on this unspoken loyalty he felt towards his two friends and the Association. Instead of Mayor Burns being concerned with his overall duty, role and responsibility as mayor to all Sealy citizens, who were responsible for his election, his loyalty was misdirected. This obligation could be viewed as a conflict of interest, because his commitment to the officers overshadowed his commitment to the public. It also affected his decisions and how he carried out some of his duties in his official capacity as mayor. It appears he made some of these choices in order to encourage his friends and Association members to support him in attempts to secure his re-election.

I must admit by way of virtue that after reading the dilemma of Dr. Sagatius, pg 186, I was dumbfounded as to the mind numbing choice I would have to make where the doctor in this dilemma. Furthermore, I believe that this dilemma is often encountered not only in the health sector, but widely common in the policing community. It is realistic that though policemen and department managers are selected and trained in a professional code of ethics, cops may inevitably succumb to an entirely different set of ethics in where loyalty is to their fellow officers rather than social justice. It is this camaraderie, the nature of the job, this danger they face that forges a knit tight gang of loyalty to each other. Label it whistle-blowing if you will

Many details have been examined in this paper that is extremely concerning to society. The corruptions that exist within the police departments are harming to the communities they lack to serve. There are numerous reasons why police reform is needed across all departments of the United States. The system we currently have in place has fallen so deep that respect the public one had for police has vanished. The information gathered concludes there is a lot of corruption that has gone unresolved. This corruption has come to light due to current technology making it easier to record in the moment. Corruption that has been accepted by authoritative organizations and has made this behavior seem norm within the code of silence.

“Brad is a production engineer at a bicycle company and part of his job includes inspecting broken bikes and drafting the design repairs for their repair” (Bartlett). Brad is considering replacing a broken brake cable with a more durable material, even though the customer did not request it in their order and specifically requested that “No aesthetic changes be made to the bike” (Bartlett). Brad’s manager suggests that his considered actions would go against the company’s policy of “The customer is always right.” Should Brad disobey the manager and the customer to possibly lose his job or go along with

It is one thing to establish a code of ethical conduct for an organization in the public sector, but it is quite another to really impress upon all employees the importance of living up to that code of conduct. What makes a code of conduct and how can management be assured that all employees understand the code and follow it's values and guidelines? How do not-for-profit professions stack up against for-profit professionals when it comes to ethics? This paper delves into codes of conduct in the public and sector and provides a review of several scholarly articles that present specific instances where codes of conduct are part of the workplace culture.