Ethics November 14, 2011

Ethics of Justice and Care: Corporate Crisis Management

 Gerber:
o Justice/fairness
o Rational
o FDA - impartial, objective, scientific methods
o Very transparent, open
o Rights - Gerber rights vs. Public rights
 McDonald's:
o Focus on care and compassion for community
o Emotional
o Disregarded "rights" and legalities (don't worry about protecting themselves)
o Subjective experiences of people in the community

Ethics of Justice and Care:

 Justice: (fairness)
o Assume people are separate and autonomous
o Be objective (scales of justice - be fair and non-biased)
o Rational
o Arbitrating between conflicting rights
o Fairness - "win-lose" - zero-sum
 Care: (compassion/empathy)
o Assume people in relationship
o Subjective
o Emotions is important
o Creatively fulfilling conflicting responsibilities
o "win-win" - Non-zero sum

History of Justice Approach

1. Rawls:
 Pre-eminent justice theorist: "veil of ignorance" - metaphorical veil to ensure all have equal
opportunity and decisions are made impartially
2. Kohlberg:
 Developmental psychologist - justice theorist
 Longitudinal study of boys (from approx. 1984)
 Study boys over time
 Used Heinz dilemma
 Three levels of moral reasoning:
- pre-conventional (if you get punished)
- conventional (follow societal conventions or rules)
- post-conventional (principled stage - higher order abstract principles)
 how was his theory/its application problematic?
- He only included boys but people assumed his theory would be true for everyone
- Girls and eastern cultures never progressed through the same levels
History of Care Approaches
1. Gilligan - Kohlberg's student
 Repeat the study but only consider girls and women
 Girls were not deficient but rather they were simply different in how they tackled
problem solving
 Three level theory of reasoning:
o Focus on self
o Focus on others
o Focus on both self and others (fulfilling seemingly conflicting responsibilities)
 How has Gilligan's theory/its application been problematic?
o Essentially replicated Kohlberg's theory
o Focused only on middle, upper class white North American girls/women
o Research shows (thousands of studies) that there is no gender difference

Concepts of Care Relevant to Signal Detection and Uptake in Corporate Crisis Prevention
A. Resistance
 Conventional understanding:
o Bad, negative
o Impediment to progress
o Obscuring
 Alternate understanding:
o Positive in nature
o Way of being authentic
o Way of promoting health and resilience
B. Role of "voice" in resistance
 Resist: "giving voice"
 Telling the truth/advocating
Political risks of using voice:
 Negatively labelled
 Risks: socially, job security (getting fired)
Anger
 Dominant -> negative emotion
 Intra-individual dysfunction or disorder
 Dangerous
 Needs to be controlled and contained
 Anger is the essential political emotion (suppress anger and suppressing political action)
 Alternate view: anger is healthy and a health sustaining emotion (signal that something
is unwell in a relationship and we need to attend to it)
C. Silence as an alternative to "voice" (form of resistance)
 People have two choices when responding to injustice
o give voice - carries political risks
o silence - no political risks, but risk of psychological problems
Parallels Between Concepts of Care and Economic Theory of Decline
 Concepts of Care (Gilligan)
o SILENCE
o VOICE
o ATTACHMENT

 Economic Theory (Hirschman - 1973)

o EXIT - quiet, tidy, no political risks
o VOICE - messy, political risks
o LOYALTY - LOYAL give voice

General Framework for Crisis Prevention and Management

 What is a crisis?
o unanticipated event(s)
o often associated with distress
o threatens the viability of the company
o low probability/high impact
o need to act urgently
 What is crisis management?
o Preventing crises where possible
o Preparing for crises
o Managing crises if/when they occur

4 Ps of Crisis Management (Assessing so you know where to interfere)

1. Predisposing Factors
 Factors that make an organization vulnerable to a crisis
 They are just there in the background
2. Precipitating Factors
 Precipitant or the immediate trigger
3. Perpetuating Factors
 Factors that keep the crisis going or sometimes fuel it into a bigger crisis
 Media is the largest perpetuating factor, incompetence/mismanagement
 To prevent it, take responsibility early on (think ethics)
4. Protective Factors
 What buffers/protects you?
 What you can leverage?
 Opposite of predisposing (poor vs. Great financial backing, weak board members vs.
Strong board members)

Levels of Prevention
 Definition of "Levels of Prevention" Framework:
o the earlier you intervene the better
o cheaper and less reputational loss
 Why Intervene Early?

1. Organizational health promotion (level 1)

 Promote healthy & resilient organization
  Eg. Happy workforce, good relationships with your union, good financial management,
practising for crisis

2. Primary prevention (level 2)

 Averting crisis altogether where possible
 Skilled in recognizing early warning signs and fixing situations

3. Secondary prevention (level 3)

 The crisis occurred; how do you minimize damage?
 Early intervention

4. Tertiary prevention (level 4)

 Dealing with a chronic situation
 Crisis has become chronic - cannot cure it - need to manage it