Dubnick, Melvin J. And Jonathan Justice, “But Can You Count on Them to be Ethical?“. Prepared for presentation at the Paul Van Riper Symposium, 63rd annual conference of the American Society for Public Administration, Phoenix, AZ, March 23, 2002.
Abstract: The issue addressed in this paper is whether the linkage between accountability and ethics makes sense in light of what we know about social and psychological behavior. And if the connection between the two makes analytic sense, what are the implications of those linkages for our understanding of public administrative ethics? We will show that there is indeed (at the least) an analytic connection between accountability and ethics, and that the relationship is a complex one rooted in the fact that accountability is itself takes multiple and relatively distinct forms in the lives of public administrators. Furthermore, we contend that the ethics that emerge from these relationships pose a challenge to students of public administration ethics who presently focus on normative rather than empirical issues related to ethicality.
AI-Generated Summary:
This document explores the complex relationship between accountability and ethics in public administration, emphasizing empirical and normative considerations.
Linkage Between Accountability and Ethics
- There is an analytic connection between accountability and ethics, rooted in social and psychological behavior.
- Accountability manifests in multiple forms in public administrators’ lives, influencing ethical behavior.
Forms of Accountability in Public Administration
- Accountability appears as performance improvement, democratic responsiveness, and ethicality, each with distinct promises.
- It often relies on principal-agent models emphasizing responsibility, sanctions, and performance standards.
Limitations of Performance and Responsiveness Accountability
- Systematic models struggle with moral responsibility, moral expectations, and human emotional responses.
- Challenges include transaction costs, opportunism, information asymmetry, and the difficulty of enforcing moral obligations.
Ethical Shortcomings of Systematic Accountability
- Formal accountability often neglects moral reasoning, internalized ethics, and context-specific moral obligations.
- It can lead to perfunctory compliance and fail to address unanticipated circumstances or moral responsibility.
Normative Approaches to Public Ethics
- Ethical codes risk becoming superficial rules that do not ensure internalized moral commitment.
- They often overlook the complex, embedded accountability relationships that shape actual ethical behavior.
Sociological and Psychological Perspectives on Accountability
- Accountability is viewed as social mechanisms like answerability, blameworthiness, liability, and attributability.
- These mechanisms influence ethical strategies by creating pressures based on identity and situational expectations.
Types of Accountability and Ethical Strategies
- Answerability involves role-specific expectations and is linked to role-based ethical behavior.
- Blameworthiness relates to social status and group membership, affecting moral responsibility perceptions.
Ethical Responses to Accountability Pressures
- Ethical behaviors develop as social mechanisms responding to accountability pressures.
- These responses are pragmatic, focusing on social norms rather than universal moral standards.
Hierarchical and Formalized Accountability in Military Organizations
- In U.S. military, accountability is personal at the top, with commanders assuming blame for failures.
- This system emphasizes hierarchical responsibility, built on obedience and reliance, especially in crises.
Types of Accountability and Their Ethical Foundations
- Type A (Answerability): Based on intuitive political and rational agent standards, emphasizing rules and procedures.
- Type B (Blameworthiness): Involves social construction of blame, identity shifts, and higher moral standards, often used for scapegoating.
- Type C (Liability): Rooted in legalistic frameworks, focusing on causal responsibility, legal rules, and analogical reasoning.
- Type D (Attributability): Concerns personal conduct outside work, linking private life to public accountability through attribution and character judgments.
Accountability-as-Blameworthiness and Public Culture
- Blameworthiness in public agencies often extends beyond causal responsibility, involving social and moral judgments.
- Public officials are implicitly held responsible for all misfortunes, including natural disasters and security failures, regardless of direct causality.
Ethical Strategies for Managing Blame and Responsibility
- Instrumental approach: Use blame as a chance to strengthen organizational capacity.
- Deontological approach: Focus on moral standards like service, social equity, and constitutional values.
- Identity shift: Reframe professional identity to dissociate from blameworthy groups, emphasizing roles like city planner or law enforcement.
Legal and Social Foundations of Accountability
- Type C (Liability): Guided by law, emphasizing compliance with rules and standards backed by sanctions.
- Challenges include collective responsibility and the “many hands” problem, complicating attribution of blame.
- Judicial shifts have increased exposure of public administrators to legal liability, influencing administrative behavior.
Law-Like Ethics and Philosophical Foundations
- Two main legal philosophies: positivist (law as human artifact) and natural law (law as moral standard).
- Ethical reasoning in public administration involves rule adherence, higher standards, and analogical reasoning based on past cases.
- These approaches promote procedural fairness and legal competence over consequence-based ethics.
Accountability for Private and Nonwork Conduct
- Public employees face scrutiny of personal lives, with private behavior affecting employment and reputation.
- Legal constraints like the Hatch Act and conflict of interest laws regulate private conduct to prevent conflicts of interest.
- Private life accountability reflects societal expectations that public officials maintain higher personal standards.
Ethical Responses to Accountability Pressures
- Subordinate personal autonomy to organizational demands or adopt citizenship ethics emphasizing self-reflection.
- Virtue ethics encourages consistent personal conduct based on trustworthiness, honesty, and benevolence.
- These strategies aim to foster autonomous moral agency and integrity amid complex accountability environments.
Implications for Public Administration and Reform
- Understanding the social mechanisms of accountability can improve institutional design.
- Emphasizing ethical reasoning and reflective self-control can help administrators navigate tradeoffs and ethical dilemmas.
- Developing nuanced, context-sensitive approaches enhances both answerability and moral responsibility in governance.