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- November 2003 See the University of Georgia website for this article:tp://www.uga.edu/columns/030217/news12.html ____________ Can ethics be taught? By Archie B. Carroll In his recent 2003 State of the University Address, President Michael F. Adams spoke of the importance of an ethical climate on the UGA campus. He called for a campus-wide expansion of an already successful ethics program. A few days later there appeared a letter to the editor in the Red & Black by a student asserting that students’ ethics are already pretty well determined by the time they reach college. This raises a vital question, one that has been asked many times before: “Can ethics be taught?” Today, after a year-long numbing experience of watching one business executive after another fall victim to corruption and fraud, everyone seems to be calling for colleges and universities to do something about the ethics of organizations and leaders. As a business ethics educator, I have been asked often if ethics can be taught. My short answer is “Yes, of course. I’ve been doing it for over 20 years.” In reflecting further on this question, however, perhaps a bit more has to be said. This is not a new issue. In my field of business ethics, it is an ongoing question and we address it frequently at professional meetings. Today, we spend more time on the “what?” and “how?” questions rather than the “whether?” question. History tells us that over 2,000 years ago, the philosopher Socrates debated this issue with his fellow Athenians. Socrates believed that ethics consists of “knowing what we ought to do,” and that this knowledge can be taught. Maybe the appropriate question is not whether ethics can be taught, but whether ethics can be learned. In considering my own personal experiences and the experiences of many others I know and have observed, it is clear that ethics can be learned. As an experiment, think about what you believed was right and acceptable back when you were a teenager and then think about how you believe today. Case closed. I doubt if there are any of us who believe we have not grown ethically over these ensuing years. Many psychologists today would agree with Socrates and with those of us who think ethics can be taught and learned. To be sure, all that is learned about ethics is not learned in the university classroom. But that is true of virtually all subjects we teach on campus. In the field of moral development, psychologist James Rest has asserted that dramatic changes occur in young adults in terms of the basic problem-solving strategies they use to deal with ethical issues. These changes are linked to basic changes in how a young person perceives society and his or her role in it. Further, the extent to which change occurs is associated with the number of years of formal education, along with other factors. And deliberate attempts to formally educate students in awareness of moral problems and to influence the ethical reasoning process have been successful. The research of the late Harvard psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg is often cited by Rest as support for the view that moral development does take place within all of us. Contrary to the belief of the student who wrote the letter in the Red & Black, a person’s ability to deal with moral issues is not developed all at once or exhausted by college age. Rather, moral development does take place within most of us, and formal education is one of the most important factors. Discussion continues as to the best way to teach ethics. Should it be done in a specialized course? Should it be infused into many relevant courses? I believe both should be done. Over the years I have monitored “what” students say they learn from my business ethics course. The top responses are “to be more aware of the ethical aspects of a decision situation,” “ethical concepts that will be helpful to me,” and “that there are a number of ethical principles that can help me make better decisions.” I strongly support elevating the teaching of ethics on campus, and I invite others to think about how this might be done in their programs. _______________________________________ Archie Carroll holds the Robert W. Scherer Chair of Management in UGA’s Terry College of Business. |
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