Tim Grace 3702098
BUSINESS ETHICS – 71203
ASSIGNMENT 1
Part A
Ethical theories are the philosophical attempt to classify human actions into the categories
of either, right and wrong or good and bad. It is the study of how morality is defined.
Socrates gave us his definition in the broadest sense of how to approach morality and
ethical theory when he stated, “(it’s) how we ought to live and why.” – Plato, The Republic.
Book. 1. Page 28. Ethical theories serve to guide a person’s conduct where decisions need to
be made on how to proceed whereby that decision can have a direct effect, good or bad, on
the individual, another individual and a larger group of people. Ethical theories attempt to
outline a universal set of guidelines that can be applied in each uniquely different situation.
Ethical theory provides the framework that seeks to identify the underlying rationale of an
argument and provides an attempt to defend conclusions about what is right and wrong.
Within the scope of this essay is the application of normative ethical theories which are
prescriptive in their approach and promote a unity of human moral sentiment; in the
colloquial sense, the norm in society. Normative statements are the foundation of the
ethical theories. They “affirm how things ought to be done, how to value them, which things
are good or bad, which actions are right or wrong.” – Wikipedia- Normative. Normative
ethical theories can generally be separated into three categories: deontological (rule based),
consequentialist (concerned with outcomes)) and virtue ethics (virtuous development of
character). The difference between these approaches to morality tends to lie more in the
way moral dilemmas are approached than in the moral conclusions reached.
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The application of an ethical approach to “how we ought to live” has produced varied
schools of thought each “expounding a different concept of what it is to live morally” –
Rachels, The Elements of Moral Philosophy, McGraw-Hill Intl. Chap.1 P.1.
The underlying value each theory places on what is right or wrong determines how,
according to the theory, one should act to uphold the beliefs of what is ethically the best
thing to do. As a result, ethical theories have been formulated that promote contrasting
views at how to arrive at an ethical position and what exactly is an ethical way for a person
to conduct one’s self.
Ranging from Aristotle in 384-322BC to Immanuel Kant amidst the 18th century
Enlightenment and into the Industrial revolution with John Stuart Mill (Bentham’s student),
ethical theory has challenged the philosophical mind to define how the issues of morality
are best approached. The ethical theories presented by each contrast markedly on many
issues producing differing views on what exactly is the definition of morality. Moral
goodness for Kant is based on the principle of an action; for Mill and Utilitarians it is
determined by the likely consequences of the action while Aristotle’s virtue ethics confers
moral goodness by reference to a concept of the virtuous character. Here we see the reason
why the theories are not compatible.
In his lifetime (384-322BC) Aristotle considered that ethics was the practice where a person
aimed to become good and do good. He formulated virtue ethics which advocates that
knowing what the right thing to do is based on learning excellent traits through teachings
and experience. These traits are virtues or qualities of character. When he considered how
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we should live and why, Aristotle placed importance on well-being (eudaimonia) as the
highest operative state for the human soul (psuche). He suggested that moral guidance is
best given by developing a model of a good person and the character traits that make a
good person. Aristotle was advocating the development of a person’s character. Therefore,
in any given situation, virtue ethics asks of us, how should we act so as to live a flourishing
life? In practice, a person would apply the model of the virtuous person to guide their
decisions and habitually doing so leads to the conscious choice to do the best things;
practice (with reflection) makes perfect.
The development and expression of virtue in character is the basis for morality under virtue
ethics. Virtue is developed by understanding the extremities of disposition. For this to occur,
one should acknowledge but avoid vices or weaknesses by learning the properties of virtue.
Human inclination involves a degree of emotion and desire. Vices are established when a
person becomes excessively or insufficiently affected by them. Being rash or overly
impulsive in a situation can lead one into the path of danger. While being fearful, leads to
cowardice. The median of these two extremes is where the virtue courage is based. Virtue
ethics would define courage as having the right amount of confidence for the situation. Vice
is described as the immoral action and therefore gives the guidance towards moral acts.
Virtue becomes part of our character when our reason properly shapes our desires and
emotions to respond correctly in any situation. With experience, practical wisdom can be
achieved whereby one controls their emotions to habitually express virtue. The
understanding of what is important in life by using virtues and avoiding vices in situations to
assess the options for acting leads to ethically acceptable actions.
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The virtue ethics notion of assessing a one’s character to find moral worth is appealing
because it gives an account for the motives of a person and the reason for their actions.
Actions are not generated by duty or obligation. Consider an example where a friend visits
you in hospital. If they stated that they were obliged to come and see you out of a sense of
duty, we would feel that their motives are lacking in care and are self-interested. The friend
that visits out of compassion and care is motivated in ways that we have a sense of affinity
with and identify positively with. This person is expressing virtue.
Virtue ethics offers options for action by giving a reasoned account for the moral worth of
virtue over vice. With the self-control to temper one’s emotions and desires adequately
along with reason, virtue becomes the norm for action and cultivates a virtuous person.
Emmanuel Kant (1724-1804) formulated a deontological ethical theory which focuses
exclusively on the morality of an action which a person performs in accordance to a set of
rules. Kant asserts that in order for a person to act in a morally right way, a person must act
from duty. This duty or “good will” is derived from an intrinsic good that is the highest good
in its self and gives humans special status because we are capable of making rational,
independent judgements regarding how to live.
Being concerned with action, Kant’s ethical theory asks of a person, what should I do? To
answer this and to define the good will without qualification because it’s good in its self,
Kant formulated the categorical imperative. This is a list that outlines the absolute rules for
how to act, without condition. The moral rightness or wrongness is determined by the
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principle of the action. The formula for the categorical imperative presents two normative
statements the first being:
“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it
should become a universal law” – Kant, Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals
Kant’s universal law concerns the conditions of rational choice. In any given instance where
a maxim is applied and that maxim cannot be held to be logically and universally accepted,
then the maxim fails as it would be forbidden for everyone to act on. For Kant, rationality is
achieved by this maxim if it holds up to be applied universally as an obligatory rule.
The second formulation for the categorical imperative states:
“Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the
Person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means”
The intrinsic value of a person deems them important and we are not to use people
instrumentally to achieve some purpose. Kant insists we must respect the fact that other
people have ends and they are capable of reasoning about these ends. We are reminded to
do to others as we would have them do to us. The stability of the theory lies in the
categorical imperatives ability to be unaffected by outside stipulations; we have rules by
which to act based on the “good-will” grounded in all of us that sits independently of desire
and emotion.
Kant separates categorical imperatives from what he terms hypothetical imperatives.
Hypothetical imperatives are defined by Kant as:
“A moral command that is conditional on personal motive or desire.”
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Kant says that these desire based commands are not questions of morality. Furthermore he
states that morality does not serve an interest or purpose, morality is not about getting
what we want or realising a goal. Morality, for Kant, is about exercising our capacity to
choose freely with the categorical imperatives as the unconditional representation of the
good will concept. This is disrupted if we allow our wants to overwhelm our reasoning. It is
in this formulation that Kant removes human behaviour and the resulting inclinations from
any question of morality.
Kant’s theory is at odds with Aristotle’s virtue ethics. In the earlier example of a friend that
comes to visit us in hospital, if we follow what Kant suggests, the morality of that action is
based purely on a duty to fulfil. He is not concerned with the moral qualification of the
desire to be seen as being caring and compassionate. These virtues and the resulting actions
have no moral worth to Kant. This exposes the deepest flaw in Kant’s theory.
Kant believes human character and our inclinations from character interfere with our free
will. His idea of autonomy is based on assuming a rule by which to live thus achieving
morality. Kant’s idea of autonomy is hard to defend as we tend to place importance on our
desires, goals and emotions when living a moral existence. Kant expects us to live
autonomously without some reference to desires, goals and purposes. This does not
adequately conceptualize freedom and autonomy. Reason and our affective states, such as
desire and emotion, are mutually dependant. Our capacity to reason is dependent on these
states that form our inclinations and in turn, our desires must be based on our rational
beliefs. Self control enables moral responsibility of a person and is the necessary tempering
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of our emotions and desires. Freedom and autonomy is about having and expressing selfcontrol of emotions.
Aristotle suggests the path to morality is the development of character by virtue.
Understanding virtue requires that we understand vice. The application of virtue ethics has
us arrive at the morally best thing to do by understanding the worth of a moral action
compared to the worth of an immoral action. Kant argues that there is no morality in acting
out of avoiding the immoral act. He removes the freedom to understand why an act is
immoral and only applies that it is on the basis that it does not support a categorical
imperative. With Kantian theory in practice, our emotions and desires do not even feature
when we make moral decisions.
Kant argues that our ability to reason and infer it upon things is unique to humans and
therefore creates the intrinsic worth of our reason and leads us to the good will concept.
Our inclinations based on our feelings are also unique to humans. It separates us from
animals and expands upon our primal reasons for living. It must be acknowledged that we
have this capacity to understand how we are situated in the world and that our desires have
an impact on how we understand living.
In conclusion, Kant presents some very plausible notions of morality. Insisting that people
not be used as a means to an end is an aspect of the theory that while at odds with other
theories presents a convincing approach to ethical actions. It is Kant’s definition of
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autonomy and it’s exclusion of human character that seems hard to apply as it suppresses
the value of our actions, beliefs and sense of dignity.
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Part B – Applying ethical theory to a real life business scenario: The Tea Tape scandal
On Friday, November 11, 2011, New Zealand Prime Minister John Key and ACT party
candidate John Banks met publically in an Auckland cafe for a cup of tea. The meeting, set
two weeks before general national elections, was seen as a symbolic endorsement of John
Banks as the National Party’s favoured candidate for the Epsom electorate. It was in the
National party’s interest that ACT won the Epsom seat so as to form a coalition in
government positioning National in a more powerful position if John Key was to become the
preferred leader of government. The intentionally public forum in which they held the
meeting, fostered media and in-turn public interest in what was being symbolically stated
and verbally discussed. As a result, the meeting was subject to intense media interest and
was heavily publicised in mainstream media.
Within the media pack at the meeting was a freelance cameraman, Bradley Ambrose. After
National party officials asked the media to leave the politicians to talk in private, Ambrose
“inadvertently” left a hidden-from-view recording device on the table and did not retrieve it
when media were asked to leave. Consequently, the discussion between Key and Banks was
recorded with the device and created the Tea-tape scandal as we know it.
Ambrose gave the recording to the New Zealand Herald newspaper company. The
acknowledgement of the recording was clearly stated by media representatives in
mainstream media. Although the tapes were not released to the public, media coverage
alluded to information obtained from listening to the recording, giving the public some idea
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of what was discussed. NZ police ordered media outlets by search warrant that any
unpublished information was to be handed over after Key laid a complaint about the
incident on the grounds that his privacy had been breached.
There was considerable debate and deliberation about whether any privacy breach had
occurred. No conclusive point was reached by the Police or within the courts of law as to
whether that was the case or not. After 4 months of Police investigation the charges were
dropped by Key and NZ Police after an out of court settlement that involved Ambrose
writing a letter of apology to John Key. NZ Police and John Key dropped the case after the
general elections were held in which National won and ACT candidate John Banks secured
the Epsom seat.
The incident quickly escalated and created the belief that Ambrose had not taken all
reasonable steps to avoid the conversation from being recorded and garnered the public
perception that he had intentionally left the device on the table to record the conversation.
This is the approach this assessment of his ethical actions and choices for action will take
while considering the claim by Ambrose that he acted unintentionally. Some focus will be
put onto the actions not taken in this situation but were at some point available to Ambrose
for consideration before he acted.
Bradley Ambrose was the subject of much scrutiny by politicians, fellow journalists and the
New Zealand public. There was support for his act of recording the conversation; some
stated it as “good journalism” - Mark Lewis – Lawyer. University of Canterbury journalism
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lecturer Jim Tully stated he believed that the contents of the conversation should be
released in the public’s interest. His actions were also condemned and seen as
professionally unethical by some in the media industry. Whether Ambrose’s actions can be
defined as good journalism or not, it is necessary to assess his options with the guidance of
an ethical theory, namely, Aristotle’s virtue ethics.
Discussed earlier, virtue ethics focuses on the agent not just what they do. Virtue ethics
determines an action is morally good if it is the action a person of ideally good character having all the virtues of character and practical wisdom - would do. Applying this ethical
theory to Ambrose’s situation raises questions over which virtues come into play and why,
thereby guiding us ethically through his dilemma.
Suppose Ambrose knowingly did commit the act of placing the recording device on the table
in close proximity to Key and Banks to record their conversation. Here Ambrose is
confronted with his first ethical dilemma: place the device to record or don’t? What would a
person of excellent virtue do? Virtue ethics would have him consider virtues such as civility,
fairness, honesty, justice, prudence and tactfulness.
The second ethical dilemma in the situation is what to do with the recording. Ambrose ‘s
claim that his actions were unintentional, “I left the microphone on the table”...”this was
not intentional” casts light on his decision to pass the recording on to the Herald newspaper
and his reasons for doing so. Whether the device was left on the table by mistake or
intentionally and resulted in possessing a recording of the conversation, Ambrose has the
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choice to listen to the recording or not. This is an ethical dilemma in itself. If he decides to
do so he the ethical dilemma extends as he will have to consider his next course of action.
The virtue ethics theory would have him consider virtues such as reasonableness, justice,
courage and conscientiousness.
Having compiled a list of the virtues that come into play in this situation, we can prioritize
them and identify which issues are most important for an accurate ethical analysis. While
some virtues may seem to compete with each other, in order to decide what to do in this
situation it is necessary to identify the strongest virtue by reasoning.
To be prudent is the ability to approach situations thoughtfully by considering the
possibilities and risks at play. Appropriately placed within virtue ethics, it encompasses the
practical approach of putting things into context prior to acting. Prudence allows one to
check their own assumptions and measure them against historical or similar accounts.
Ambrose may have made a premeditated decision to place the concealed device on the
table well in advance of the moment that action was required. A prudent person would
assess the situation for the appropriateness of that act within the setting it was done. The
media were asked to leave the politicians in private. While previous accounts of a similar
action may have revealed immoral intentions of the group afflicted by the recording and
seemingly promoted some good, the actions have still been subject to criticism for the
dishonest manner in which the individuals were treated.
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Honesty brings into question, the means by which Ambrose is obtaining information about
someone else. The recording of a conversation unbeknown to the participants of that
conversation means one is obtaining information covertly. The information, if used to
benefit oneself or a group at the expense of others, is not an action that would be
supported by the virtues of fairness and honesty. A virtuous person would therefore decide
to not record the conversation because honesty requires that we guard against self-serving
biases.
Civility ties closely to the professional responsibilities of the media. Civility is the cultivation
of habits that are important to the success of the community. The media are expected to
report accurate, informative information that raises awareness of important issues in the
community ideally contributing toward a healthy collective. Civility is also concerned with
the etiquette of social interaction. It promotes politeness and courtesy. It could be argued
that acquiring and releasing information that contributes positively to society is civility in
action. Concerning courtesy within the setting of the situation, perhaps that gives another
perspective of how to conduct oneself where commonalities exist. Out of prudence comes
civility whereby prudence requires that we put things into context. A virtuous person would
likely decide that given the context, civility requires that I act courteously and thereby in a
way that conforms to the expectations of the setting by not recording the conversation.
Courage requires that we express the right amount of confidence in a situation. The
required level of confidence that we express would be based on our assessment of the
situation. When Ambrose placed the device on the table and had the decision in front of
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him to give his recording to the Herald Newspaper, he may have viewed that it would take
courage to do so. Honesty and tact may have been considerations he had to not pass it on
and simply discard the recording. The virtue courage is attained by reaching the median
between fool-hardiness and cowardice. A comparison to a person of excellent virtue would
likely result in defining the action of recording the conversation and passing on the
recording as excessive courage giving us fool-hardy actions. This is a vice to be avoided.
Courage therefore, cannot be considered the decisive virtue to use in this situation.
In conclusion, virtue ethics would see us uphold the virtue honesty in this situation above all
other virtues. While a motive can give a compelling account of why actions are right, it is an
ethical theory that we can test those motives against and gain insight into how to navigate
through an ethical dilemma. The virtuous person, displaying all characters of virtue and
practical wisdom, would not have left the device on the table. If this was done
inadvertently, the same person would have discarded the recording based on the dishonest
nature under which it was obtained.
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Bibliography (References)

The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand, 2012, Module 1. Justification and ethical
theories. Business Ethics. Lower Hutt; New Zealand

Furrow, Dwight. (2005) Ethics – Key concepts in philosophy. Continuum, London

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue_ethics

Radio New Zealand (16 November 2011). "Tea tape comparison wrong, says UK
lawyer". Radio New Zealand (New Zealand).
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/election-2011/91190/tea-tape-comparison-wrong,says-uk-lawyer. Retrieved 18 November 2011.

"Teapot tape ruling inappropriate: judge". Sydney Morning Herald. 23 November
2011. http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/teapot-tape-rulinginappropriate-judge-20111123-1ntxx.html. Retrieved 15 February 2012.
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