Ethical Decision Making

Just as the ancient "Golden Rule" of treating others as you would like to be treated is familiar to people throughout the world, people have long heralded ideas of "social justice" and ethical decision making as basic elements of civilized society. In fact, in Babylonian law, the Code of Hammurabi-which dates back more than two thousand years-outlined a detailed set of rules to promote social justice and ethical decision making (Barusch, 2009, p.10; Darling, 2012).

Throughout this course, you examine both classic and contemporary models of ethical decision making with the goal of gaining deeper insights into complex moral dilemmas. Remembering these ethical decision-making models will help you as policy makers and public administrators, when confronted with similar conflicts, to seek best practice solutions to fulfill your professional responsibilities.

This week, you begin examining the process of ethical decision making. You apply the concept of ethical reflection and examine conflicts of authority, interest, and roles in ethical dilemmas. In addition, you will apply Cooper's ethical decision-making model to a case study.

Discussion: Administrative Responsibility, Conflict, and Ethical Reflection

When performing the functions of a public administrator, your realm of responsibility typically requires you to take standard, established actions to resolve challenges. This standard approach may involve objective responsibilities, whereas, other situations might compel you to take responsibility according to your personal ethical code and internal sense of accountability and imposed obligation. Situations may not present you with one clear solution to the challenges you face, however. Fulfilling these concepts of objective and subjective administrative responsibility can be a difficult, complex, and stressful task given the multiplicity of roles one plays in today's society. However, the struggle is not just an internal one. Conflicts of authority, interest, and roles, also confound the role of the public administrator.

For this week's Discussion, review the Menzel (2009) article located in this week's resources. Then, select a county administrator from the case study presented in the article and reflect on the ethical dilemma associated with his or her role in the scandal.

With these thoughts in mind:

Post a brief explanation of how ethical reflection might have helped the Pinellas County public administrators avoid the ethical scandal described in Menzel's case study. Then, identify the county public administrator you selected, and the ethical dilemma associated with his or her role in the scandal. Finally, explain whether the ethical dilemma you described represents conflict of authority, interest, or roles and explain why.

Assignment: Cooper''s Ethical Decision-Making Model

Often, public administrators' morals and identity as well as their capacity for decision making and innovation are entangled in their standard of ethics. These entanglements may cause challenges in determining ethical behavior. However, such entanglements are necessary. Public service is society's instrument for managing and resolving complex, interdependent issues affecting all individuals and organizations. Public expectations and formal standards demand that public administrators undertake sophisticated ethical reasoning and apply rigorous ethical standards to decisions and behavior.

As discussed in the text, Cooper's ethical decision-making model assists the responsible public administrator in assessing and addressing ethical dilemmas. Public administrators need to consider all underlying factors of a dilemma and the potential solutions in order to ensure the most proper outcome.

For this Assignment, review the following resources:

. Chapter 2 of The Responsible Administrator, focusing on the components of ethical decision making
. Dryburgh (2009), "Personal and Policy Implications of Whistle-Blowing: The Case of Corcoran State Prison"
The Assignment (3-4 pages in APA format): To demonstrate proper case analysis using Cooper's ethical decision-making model, your assignment should include the following:
. A description of the situation and the ethical issues involved in this case study (Dryburgh, 2009)
. A description of the possible courses of action that the guards could have taken
. An explanation of why they chose to be whistle blowers
. An explanation of the positive and negative consequences for each possible course of action the guards could have taken
. An explanation of how the ethical dilemma was resolved as well as its impact on the organization and individuals involved
Support your Assignment with specific references to all resources used in its preparation. Provide a reference list with all resources included in the paper.

Your Assignment must demonstrate both breadth and depth of knowledge and critical thinking appropriate to graduate-level scholarship. It must follow guidelines of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA Publication Manual) and be free of typographical, spelling, and grammatical errors. The Assignment should be 3-4 pages in length (double-spaced), not including the title page, abstract, and references.