Being Unethical: Is it a gradual process ?

Picture Credits: Wikipedia

Ethics is often referred to as a grey area, especially when we talk about it in correlation with business. However those who are adamant that ethics should be integral part of business opine that ethics though is an abstract concept, should be put forth as Blank and White area. Most of the time people are aware about what is ethical and what is not. However what is that very thing which drive people away from being ethical? Let’s analyses.

Reference Cases:

1) After I enter into my MBA class, it is implied that cell phones should be kept silent or switched off. This was strictly followed during some of the earlier classes. However, after some days, we started using cellphones within class for messaging, using email and internet etc. Since this act wasn't being interrupted by faculty members, there was more lax. And finally some of us started even receiving calls in classes.

2) Our hostel mess serves single banana per meal. But as I am fond of it, I am keen to get some extra bananas. But this is not possible in ethical way. So I started to take one right in the beginning(and have it) and another right after lunch saying that I didn't take it previously. And what next, I even tried getting more when the mess servers are busy.

What generalization we can develop from these two simple real life cases is that "being unethical is a gradual process and if unethical behavior is not checked/interrupted, we tend to become more unethical".

Why is it so? 

A person who commits small unethical act will be motivated when he/she performs that task. This will bring on him/her a sense of achievement or accomplishment because of being able to disobey the law. It will also enhance on you a feeling that you won't get caught and it's easier for you to master such unethical practices.  It will make the doer comfortable about that, and before you know, it snowballs into something vehemently large. This tendency of committing one unethical task after another will lead to a vicious cycle of being unethical and we become a total corrupt.

Though I assume that whether you commit a small degree of unethical activity or a huge degree of unethical activity, the jurisdiction is the same: you end up doing something unethical. However, it is the society that defines whether an activity is ethical is or not, based on the perception of the larger size of the population. So sometimes society may forgive small degree of unethical practices as being a normal act. But we should be conscious of whether or not that lax has been promoting our society to be more unethical.

Many of the business scandal that were followed in recent history follow the same trend. They being from something small and finally end up with something really uncontrollable unethical practices. While they manage to cheat something small in one round, they might be willing to cheat a bit more in another round and most likely a really a big in the upcoming rounds. And this is because of the organization's behavior of  not paying attention to the small issues signaling that it is willing to tolerate a level of questionable behavior. For reference:

•  Modoff Ponzi scheme started when he covered relatively small financial losses. Later on, over the period of 15 years, the scam grew in manifold time and finally reaching a galloping figure of $65 billion. 
• The same is in case for World Phone hacking scandal. 
• Collapse of Enron etc

The beginning of most corrupt practices is a lower one. Most of the time we begin with small practices like taking away of office equipment, hiking of transportation expenses, labeling of personal meeting as official visit and son on. And this trend can be identified as a serious problem for the future of the business world. The case is more serious (and interesting) as a recent survey conducted by ethics.org reveals the following findings: 

• About 73 % of surveyed Americans employed full time reported ethical lapses on the    job, 36% said they were distracted by such an incident.
• Young workers, from 18-34, reported substantially higher levels of witnessing ethical lapses and being distracted than middle-aged and older workers.

As such we can observe it vividly that if we do not take proper corrective actions/measures instantly, the future of business world and the society in which we will be jeopardized and our ethical and moral standards will degenerate. 

References:

Ethics.org

Hbr.org

World Forum For Ethics in Business

(for reference about systematic procedure to address unethical practices in an organization, refer to another BlogSpot on ethics) 

Early Phase of Globalization : Phase II

The second phase of globalization covers the period between 1850 AD to 1914 AD. It is marked by the period of extensive internalization of science, commerce, transportation and communication in the middle of the nineteenth century. As such, this phase is also known as "The Age of Transnational Integration".

We can make a study of second phase of globalization based on following four topics:

1. Marvellous Inventions: 
During the second half of the 19th century, world saw the advent of advancement major technological findings that would largely shape the future of the world. Invention of Train system, Postal system and Steam Engines. All these inventions facilitated the integration of the world in an speedy way. These inventions shaped people expectation regarding the future of the integrated world.

2. Flow of Capital and Goods:
We can also identify this phase as one in which there was a cross-national flow of investment capital. This phase of history was marked by an enhanced colonized system that also aided the globalization of business and economic development of colonies. Great Britain investment in its colonies: America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand would later-on facilitate economic development. Also there was extensive flow of goods in this period: the international voyage of goods from India (Asia) to Great Britain (Europe), Canada to Britain, Australia to Britain, etc.  Similarly other colonies based in Europe exploited the vast resources of Africa, to their benefit. However this vast integration of world economies was changed after first world war, which to some extent disrupted the chains of globalization.

3. Establishment of Global facilitating Institutions: 
The proliferation of social organization in this phase: The Scout(1901), Rotary, The Red Cross(1863), The Salvation Army (1865), Olympic games, Nobel prize etc would later prove as a facilitating mechanism for the integration of the whole world.  Also it was visualised that the world would need a global language for regulating and enhancing future global trade. Developed in Poland by Zamenhof', the language was called Esperanto(1887) , which though did not develop enormously, was overtaken by English as language of globalization.  

4. Promotion of notion of Free Competition and Global Integration:
Organizations like Olympic games(1896), FIFA (1904)  developed a common platform to bring together global population together,  and compete for the better international relations among nations. This helped to promote the feeling of competition while also favoring co-operation and harmony among the global population. As such, the basic lifeline of Globalization, i.e free competition, was popularised in second phase. Also they promoted humanitarian ideals and belief in the value of knowledge.

Hence we can conclude that second phase laid down those rudimentary framework which paved way for rapid and massive form of globalization in the third phase.

Sources:
Wikipedia
University of Texas @ Austin
The World is Flat 

Early Phase of Globalization : Phase I

Globalization has tied people of the world living together, no matter what part of the world and what walks of life. No country, regardless of its size, structure and business can ignore the globalization of business. In the present world, advancement in science and technology has completely transformed the concept of globalization. Forces like: modern and sophisticated means of communication, transportation, establishment of global trade facilitation bodies like World Bank, IMF etc, establishment of regional/bilateral/multilateral economic treaties etc has completed added new spheres to the discussion of globalization. 

At the present time, when the concepts of globalization is dragging more attention than ever and is ever evolving, we need to understand the historical development of concepts and practice of globalization. 

First Phase of Globalization:

First phases of globalization began in 1492 AD. with the voyage of Christopher Columbus to the new world and the voyages of european exploration that made possible for proliferation of European colonies throughout the world. 

The explorers like: Christopher Columbus, sponsored by Spanish crown, completed four voyages across the Atlantic ocean. Columbus introduced American lands to the world. Similarly Portuguese explorer Vasco Degama made India know to the world in 1498. Similarly, Ferninand McGellan made the first circumnavigation across the world in the service of King Charles -I of Spain, between 1519-1522. Francis Drave made second circumnavigation across the world from 1577-1580, to the service of Elizabeth -I. Drave implemented the concept of tax and executed the confiscation of foreign treasures across the world. 

Basically there were many other overseas expedition prior to these. But these particular event are referred to as beginner of globalization. We can accredit following reasons for this:

1) All of these events were state sponsored acquisition of strategically valuable knowledge and skills that enabled nations like Spain, United Kingdom and Portugal to establish vast colonial empires across the world.

2) These expedition carried out state sponsored expedition to confiscate lust treasures of colonial states that could later on become wealth of the state. This later on paved possibilities of collaboration between state and private companies. eg: Great Britain and East India Company.

3) State sponsorship of global trading monopolies was a foreshadowing of state sponsored national champions global corporations of the model era.

References:
Age of Globalization course, Coursera
Wikipedia
Google

North Korea : Why is it Failing ?

While we talk about reasons of countries failing, we may infer different reasons for the failure of the nations. Even developmental experts may differ in opinion regarding this. (By failure, here I mean, the inability of the state mechanism to address the basic issues like: control over its territory, political stability, basic human rights, strong international relations, etc.)  People may attribute the reason of failure of nation to religion factor, meaning that religion practices forbids or hinders development. While some experts may opine that the cause for such phenomena of poor performance is Climatic factor. Experts are also found identifying geographical factors as forces that brings poorness to a nation. But digging more into this topic, we can ascertain without difficulty that none of the aforementioned factors prove hinderance for a nation to develop.

A more illustration to this would be:

1) Religion factors:
Any particular religion does not favor peopperity. Protestant countries like : England, Netherland etc are developed. So are Catholic countries like France. While inspite of following Christianity, the status of  Congo is still pathetic.

2) Climate factors:
 Prosperity has flourished even in tropical country like South Africa.

3) Geographical factors:
The geographical factor cannot justify the differences between North Korea and South Korea.

4) Cultural factors:
Generally held belief that "islamic values are inconsistent with economic successes" does contrast with the development of countries like Qatar,UAE etc.

Well lets us dump all these reason and look forward to see case of North Korea and South Korea in details.



Case of North Korea

The landmass on the both side of 38 parallel share almost the same religion, climate, geography, culture, history, ancestors, common diseases, language, cuisine, and ethnic identity.  However the period after the separation of Korean peninsula in the early 1950s, the two countries have evolved differently. After the separation, like the American troops residing in the South, the USSR troops remained in N. Korea to rebuild the country.  This incident would turn out to affect the status of the two country in longer period of time.


After the division, the political institutions and economics institutions that proliferated in these countries were of different nature. Under the influence of United states, S Korea developed inclusive institutions that favored growth via entrepreneurship and innovation, basic human rights, right to property, etc. While in contrast, N Korea influenced by Soviet Union created a single party system, favoring Totalitarianism (family dictatorship). The economic system in isolated Korea is wrecked and over the period of around 64 years of separation, the Per Capita of South Korea has reached to             $ 32,020(2012), while that of N. Korea is $ 1,800(as of 2010). Until mid 1970s, both the countries had almost same GDP per capita.

To add more to the clarity, let's make the use of this light picture of the Korean peninsula, taken at night. S Korea is seen lit brightly at night with crowded population, living sound life in prosperous city. In contrast, the other Korea seems like an abandoned nation. North Korea with a dim picture, akin to what the reality is there; in terms of development status, happiness of people, and prosperity of the nation.

View of Korean Peninsula at Night: NASA Earth observator

Will days come for North Korea to propel away the darkness from the nation and to lit up the country with kind of infrastructures and fuels that would blaze it in the world map ? Will such political juncture appear in North Korea, that will  force its totalitarian ruler to adopt to the political system in favor of the people? Only Kim Jong-un or future can answer this...