Chapter 2: Ethics: The Bedrock of a Society
Defining Ethics
Michael Josephson, “Definitions in ethics.” [See separate file in this folder]
Michael Josephson, Becoming an Exemplary Police Officer (Los Angeles: Josephson Institute,
2007). Although this book was written for police officers, it offers Josephson’s thinking on ethics in
a general sense.
Louis A. Day, Ethics in Media Communications: Cases and Controversies, 5th Ed. (Belmont,
Calif.: Thomson Wadsworth, 2006), 5.
Stephen J.A. Ward, “Ethics in a nutshell,” Center for Journalism Ethics/University of
Wisconsin-Madison. An overview of the subject by the center’s director.
http://ethics.journalism.wisc.edu/resources/ethics-in-a-nutshell/
Origins of Ethical Theory
Elaine E. Englehardt and Ralph D. Barney, Media and Ethics: Principles for Moral Decisions
(Belmont, Calif.: Thomson Wadsworth, 2002). The authors’ discussion of the philosophers of
Athens is on 25-27.
Rushworth M. Kidder, How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of
Ethical Living (New York: HarperCollins, 1995). Kidder’s discussion of the Golden Rule is on 159160.
Peter Singer, Ed., A Companion to Ethics (Blackwell Publishers, Oxford), 32.
Lawrence M. Hinman, Contemporary Moral Issues, 2nd ed. (Prentice-Hall, 1999).
David Copp, The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2006).
Plato, The Republic, translated by R.E. Allen (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006).
Immanuel Kant. Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, translated by Arnulf Zweig
and edited by Thomas E. Hill, Jr. and Arnulf Zweig. (New York : Oxford University
Press, 2002).
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Aristotle’s Ethics.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/#StaPoiPraRea
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Ancient Ethical Theory.
http://www.science.uva.nl/~seop/entries/ethics-ancient/
Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, (Ed. H. Rackham). Aristotle’s work in English.
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0054&redir
ect=true
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Egoism. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/egoism/
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Thomas Aquinas’ Moral, Political, and Legal
Philosophy. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aquinas-moral-political/
Transmitting a Society’s Ethical Precepts
Day, Ethics in Media Communications, 15-16.
Observing People’s Ethical Choices
Francisco Gino, Don A. Moore, and Max H. Bazerman, “See no evil: When we overlook
others’ unethical behavior,” 2008. The authors, who are business-school professors, write
that while people ordinarily hold others to higher ethical standards than themselves, there
are “remarkable circumstances” in which people overlook others’ unethical behavior.
Among other findings, the authors report that people tend to “ignore unethical behavior
when ethicality erodes slowly over time” and “to assess unethical behaviors only after the
unethical behavior has resulted in a bad outcome, but not during the decision process.”
The paper mentions numerous actual cases as examples.
http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/08-045.pdf
The Ethical Dilemma: A Conflict in Ethical Values
Lawrence Kohlberg, Essays in Moral Development: Vol. I, The Philosophy of Moral Development:
Moral Stages and the Idea of Justice (New York: Harper and Row, 1981). The Heinz Dilemma is
on 12.
Michael Josephson, “The false ethical dilemma.” [See separate file in this folder.]
How the Ethical Person Makes Decisions
Deni Elliott and Paul Martin Lester, “Taking ethics seriously,” News Photographer, May 2004,
These ethics scholars write that the photojournalist of character is, first and foremost, someone
who takes ethics seriously. In addition to providing the full text of the column quoted in The
Ethical Journalist, this link lists the topics discussed by the authors in other columns for News
Photographer. http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu/lester/writings/finalcolumn.html
The Decisions of Virginia Gerst and John Cruickshank
Michael Miner, “Pioneer Press aims at foot, fires,” Chicago Reader, Sept. 5, 2003,
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/pioneer-press-aims-at-foot-firesnewsbites/Content?oid=913089
Michael Miner, “Yes, Virginia, some people still care about ethics,” Chicago Reader, May 7, 2004,
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/yes-virginia-some-people-still-care-about-ethics-wyclifflets-it-out-news-bites/Content?oid=915393
Eric Herman, “Paper sales inflated up to 50,000 a day,” Chicago Sun-Times, Oct. 6, 2004,
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1237287/posts
Jacques Steinberg, “Sun-Times managers said to defraud advertisers,” The New York Times,
Oct. 6, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/06/business/media/06paper.html