Ethical Obligations Confronting Public Administrators
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Ethical Obligations Confronting Public Administrators
Ethical Obligations Confronting Public Administrators
There are many assets of Public administration that should be taken into consideration when considering ethical obligations of those said administrators. We shall look at the areas of Public Interest, Administrative Responsibility, recent Ethical Obligations and the Dilemma of Privatizing Government Functions.
Public Interest:
There are those that argue while many secretly follow the teachings and philosophy of Machiavelli in their hearts, the majority do not (Douglas). Paul Douglas, a former Senator from Illinois states that “Instead, most men want a life of integrity and goodwill in which public officials are stewards rather than masters and treat their jobs as a means of helping people rather than dominating them” (Wikipedia). He also states that since our government is now so huge, plus the fact that our lives are directly affected, we as a people, cannot be contented with the idea of our public officials merely behaving with moderately decent levels of behavior. It would seem that even small percentages of misbehavior on the behalf of public officials can induce great amounts of harm. While both Machiavelli and Douglas are distant players in the past, their ideas are still relevant today.
When a person enters into the public realm, several aspects of their lives that would normally be private are made available for public record. These aspects are health, finances, sexual misconduct and any appearances of impropriety.
Health- Public officials need to be, in the eye of the public, fit for the job. An example of this would be the assassination attempt on President Reagan. Afterword, he kept putting out reports on the good condition of his health, but due to the mandate of transference of powers, it became necessary for his overall medical condition to become public knowledge (Wikipedia). I feel that the most recent issue with...
Ethical Obligations Confronting Public Administrators
There are many assets of Public administration that should be taken into consideration when considering ethical obligations of those said administrators. We shall look at the areas of Public Interest, Administrative Responsibility, recent Ethical Obligations and the Dilemma of Privatizing Government Functions.
Public Interest:
There are those that argue while many secretly follow the teachings and philosophy of Machiavelli in their hearts, the majority do not (Douglas). Paul Douglas, a former Senator from Illinois states that “Instead, most men want a life of integrity and goodwill in which public officials are stewards rather than masters and treat their jobs as a means of helping people rather than dominating them” (Wikipedia). He also states that since our government is now so huge, plus the fact that our lives are directly affected, we as a people, cannot be contented with the idea of our public officials merely behaving with moderately decent levels of behavior. It would seem that even small percentages of misbehavior on the behalf of public officials can induce great amounts of harm. While both Machiavelli and Douglas are distant players in the past, their ideas are still relevant today.
When a person enters into the public realm, several aspects of their lives that would normally be private are made available for public record. These aspects are health, finances, sexual misconduct and any appearances of impropriety.
Health- Public officials need to be, in the eye of the public, fit for the job. An example of this would be the assassination attempt on President Reagan. Afterword, he kept putting out reports on the good condition of his health, but due to the mandate of transference of powers, it became necessary for his overall medical condition to become public knowledge (Wikipedia). I feel that the most recent issue with...