Integrity is the quality of being honest and showing a consistent and uncompromising adherence to

strong moral and ethical principles and values.[1][2] In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty
and truthfulness or earnestness of one's actions. Integrity can stand in opposition to hypocrisy.[3] It
regards internal consistency as a virtue, and suggests that people who hold apparently conflicting
values should account for the discrepancy or alter those values.
The word integrity evolved from the Latin adjective integer, meaning whole or complete.[1] In this
context, integrity is the inner sense of "wholeness" deriving from qualities such as honesty and
consistency of character.[4]

In ethics[edit]
In ethics, a person is said to possess the virtue of integrity if the person's actions are based upon an
internally consistent framework of principles.[5] These principles should uniformly adhere to sound
logical axioms or postulates. A person has ethical integrity to the extent that the person's actions,
beliefs, methods, measures, and principles align with a well-integrated core group of values. A
person must, therefore, be flexible and willing to adjust these values to maintain consistency when
these values are challenged—such as when observed results are incongruous with expected
outcomes. Because such flexibility is a form of accountability, it is regarded as a moral
responsibility as well as a virtue.
A person's value system provides a framework within which the person acts in ways that are
consistent and expected. Integrity can be seen as the state of having such a framework and acting
congruently within it.

One essential aspect of a consistent framework is its avoidance of any unwarranted (arbitrary)
exceptions for a particular person or group—especially the person or group that holds the
framework. In law, this principle of universal application requires that even those in positions of
official power can be subjected to the same laws as pertain to their fellow citizens.

In personal ethics, this principle requires that one should not act according to any rule that one
would not wish to see universally followed. For example, one should not steal unless one would want
to live in a world in which everyone was a thief.

The philosopher Immanuel Kant formally described the principle of universality of application for
one's motives in his categorical imperative.

The concept of integrity implies a wholeness—a comprehensive corpus of beliefs often referred to as
a worldview. This concept of wholeness emphasizes honesty and authenticity, requiring that one act
at all times in accordance with one's worldview.
Ethical integrity is not synonymous with the good, as Zuckert and Zuckert show about Ted Bundy:
When caught, he defended his actions in terms of the fact-value distinction. He scoffed at those, like
the professors from whom he learned the fact-value distinction, who still lived their lives as if there
were truth-value to value claims. He thought they were fools and that he was one of the few who had
the courage and integrity to live a consistent life in light of the truth that value judgments, including
the command "Thou shalt not kill," are merely subjective assertions.