sevenhelz

This is a piece written by a friend of mine known as @abeneplacito84 on twitter. It was written in response to conversations I'd been having on twitter (linked here and here) and originally posted on facebook. Shared here so that it's accessible to all. Again, not my work.


To sum up my opinion; organisations cannot have ethics, only individuals can have ethics. For all the guidelines in the world, organisations do not have ethics in and of themselves. Only the people within that organisation can have ethics. Equally one cannot say that "because you are a member of organisation X, you must also possess the ethical inclinations of all other members of organisation X."

Conflation of this idea of organisational morality in that a group can collectively be "good" or "bad" ultimately falls foul of generalisation and presumption. It happened to the rioters and regularly happens to whatever scapegoat the media picks for it's latest moral crusade.

Each decision of the Army was taken by a wo/man, be that a squaddie to a Field Marshal, King/Queen to Prime Minister. Anyone who followed an unethical order is being equally unethical; "I was ordered to" is not an ethical defence, even if it is (sometimes) a criminal one.

Now this is not to say that the Army has no duty of care in such environments and there have been times when the organisation has failed to provide adequate guidance, support or even something as ephemeral as "culture." But in each of these failings, these are generated by wo/men, individuals who decide for whatever reason that they can behave as such. Ethically speaking, the burden falls on the individuals who make those decisions and I would dearly love to see a political and social culture that pursued individuals more thoroughly for their decisions in such respects. Those who contribue to unethical behaviour through ignorance or inaction are equally to blame. The natural argument is that if "reductio ad absurdum" you come out with, "we are all guilty." The obvious answer to that is there must be a control; the limit of what can be known by an individual by reasonable foresight and due diligence. These are all difficult to actually measure; they are not the basis of useful guidelines or law but they are ethically rigorous.

Hence, my saying that organisations have no ethics. Only individuals have ethics. Only a single wo/man can decide in any given moment if s/he is acting ethically. Even if "the Army" put a gun to a man's head and ordered him to torture someone or he would die, that would still be individuals enacting that behaviour, and it is ultimately they who bear the ethical burden. If others encouraged or allowed it, then they are too ethically responsible.

Ethics can only exist in action, and organisations do not take action; individuals do. If they do so in concert then it might be deemed that the "organisation" acted, but in truth that is an illusion. Many individuals acted at once toward the same goal. Equally, the ethics of their action cannot be attributed to any group of which they are a member; they fall purely upon the individuals who take part in any given action.

Thought experiment: "Club A" forms purely with the sole purpose to commit unethical acts, lets say mass rape, all for different reasons. They rape men and women until they are finally caught up with, separated and the club "disbanded." Totally separately, another group form called "Club A" that exists to support rape victims.

What is "Club A" and what are it's ethics?

IMHO "Club A" is simply a smokescreen for the actions of individuals, a convient monicker at best and at worst a shield from personal responsibility. Nonetheless, "Club A," in the vaccuum, has no ethics.

This is clearly a grossly oversimplified view when it comes to the Army; the Army has history, lots and lots of it, nor has it ever ceased to exist in some form since it's creation. However, you are separated from the actions of those in the past as much as the second "Club A" is separated from the first.

The question becomes, I suppose, what do you do if faced with something you consider unethical, especially if you are ordered to do something which is against your personal conscience? Do you allow yourself to become and agent of unethical behaviour by complying because of the risk of Court Marshal or do you resist and face a lengthy prison sentance for your conscience. It's this question that kept me personally out the Army, albeit far more poorly articulated when I was just starting out as a philosophy A level student.

I have tried to be rigorous in my reasoning here, but I don't know if others would find it convincing. This is purely philosophy; it is not one jot practical. Nonetheless, it provides the vital points that demonstrate that one cannot and should not allow the actions of any one individual, or group of individuals, to imply the ethical standing of another because of some shared affiliation, be that socio-political, pragmatic or elsewise.

If you can actually convince anyone that isn't a philosophy fan of a word of it, I'll give you a cookie. Most people take what you might call the "common sense" approach, which usually means "everything I like = good" and "everything I don't like = bad."

My personal inclination towards the Army, since it is of interest, is ambivilance. I believe that citizens in a democracy should be eternally ambivilant towards anyone with power; thank them for their service but always question everything they do for rigour. The means politicians, police, the Army, the Civil Service, QUANGOS, etc.. Question actions, and pursue responsible individuals if they are found to be wanting.