Professionalism and Ethics in Public Administration

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Table of Contents

Abstract
Relevance of morals for public administration practice
Relevance of ethics for public administration practice
Relevance of integrity for the public administration practice
Synthesis
References

Abstract

Public administration is the implementation of a government policy and it is involved in the study of government policy. It also involved some people employed by the government to further the betterment of the public through the enhancement of social justice and civil society. It has been wrongfully been seen to be managed by the government alone, but other institutions such as non-governmental organizations also operate and manage public administration (Frankel, 1999).

People often make the mistake of likening the practice of public administration to the practice of business administration. Though the fields are closely related, they have a distinct and clear difference in that business administration is focused on making profits while public administration is concerned about promoting justice, efficiency security, and effectiveness to the public though at times the employees of public administration may do this for a profit. It is important to note that not always the practice of public administration focus on profits but the good of the public is always a mandatory interest of the practitioners of public administration (Thomas, 1996).

Public administration has a multidisciplinary outlook and this encompasses administrative duties. The people involved in public administration do their jobs in public agencies which are in all levels of government and they perform a wide range of duties. These duties include statistics, budgeting and accounting, and organization. They are also involved in the formulation of policies and they perform laid down government activities (Homan, 1991).

Relevance of morals for public administration practice

Morality can be defined as a set of codes of conduct that are authoritative in terms of the conduct is wrong or right. The morals of any field are defined and created by a society, religion, individual, or philosophy. Public administrators are also involved in morality in their field and it is important to keep the right morality when working as a public administrator. We have noted that public administration is involved in ensuring better welfare of the public and this means that public administrators have the task of serving people and in this field, there is a great need for morality (Abbott, 1983).

In terms of public administration morality, issues may arise in the conduct of a public administrator as directed to the public. Some things in the profession are considered bad because they may benefit a few people while hurting multitudes of others. In this respect, the public administrator must take great care when dealing with people’s needs as he must be accurate and very noble when performing this task. One of the reasons why morality is stressed is because many people have had their rights jeopardized by an immoral administrator. There are those kinds of administrators who do not have respect for people when they are needed to perform a task for the people. These are the kind of administrators who will ask for favors in return for the service they are to provide for the people (Addams, 2002).

These favors may range from financial to sex and this leaves the public confused on who they should turn to if they are to need the services of a public administrator. It is this kind of behavior that makes the people lose faith in the entire field of public administration. Corruption is very rampant in the field and the government should come up with policies that clearly define what the public should expect from the public administrators without having to do them a favor. This behavior is wrong and it gives a bad impression of the public administration field to the public. The demand for a favor to perform a job you are paid for is very inhuman (Frankel, 1999).

Another kind of morality is demonstrated when the public administrators perform the task in a mood that expresses the impression of laxity to the public. Some administrators for sheer lack of respect to the public may perform a duty in a manner that leaves a lot to be desired. Some of them take a lot of time to accomplish a simple task which would have only taken less time to perform. Others perform tasks that the public is not contented with and this creates problems when they are confronted as they threaten to subject the person to dire consequences if he persists in a high-quality job. Others are outright rude and they may subject a person to insults and embarrassing situations (Thomas, 1996).

The importance of morality in the public administration field is that the public feels contented with the services rendered to them and this leads to the institutes of public administration being given a lot of respect by the public. This respect makes the employees of the institutes proud to be serving the public. The public also has a lot of faith in the institutes and this leads to the glorification of the public service institutes and agencies. This in turn reflects on the performance of any institute and this ensures that the institute receives accolades from the government plus the benefit of the employees not facing the risk of being fired (Thomas, 1996).

Relevance of ethics for public administration practice

Ethics are the philosophical view of actions being good or bad and it also encompasses a person’s conduct in the light of a good or bad life. Ethics in public administration can be defined as the conduct of the public administrator in the philosophical view of whether it is right or wrong. The public administration has a responsibility of conducting its business and services to the public in a way that can be seen philosophically. However, at times, the public administrators do not perform their duties in the best way they can be provided to the public. This is because some public administrators have a habit that is not seen as justifiable to the public (Addams, 2002).

One of the unethical behaviors of public administrators is that they tend to be corrupt. There are some instances when for a person to have a service provided for him must part with some money. This is not ethical and is not right because it leaves the public unsure whether the service provided by public administration institutes requires them to pay for the services provided. This is also very inconsiderate when it is directed to people who may not afford the required bribe. This means that such uncouth public administrators’ behavior may deny some people the rights to access some services that are considered important in any civilization in the world (Homan, 1991).

Another unethical behavior is the institutions’ tendency to be involved in favoritism. Some people are favored by the public administrators and this is done at the expense of other people who are in dire need of a service. This means that the people who are favored get high-quality service provision while others are just treated like they do not matter. This makes the public feel discontented with the way the public administration institutes are performing their duties. This has also created a lot of problems because the people feel that the government is responsible for the way things are turning out to be in the public administration institutes. This has brought a lot of criticism from the public and has led to the firing of some senior people in the institutes (Abbott, 1983).

Some institutes also tend to be racist and hence they may discriminate against some races while it comes to service provision. The Blacks had had difficulties when trying to access some of the services that are provided by the public service field and this does not only apply to the blacks but also other races like Hispanics, Asian Americans, and Native Americans in the United States. This is because these people are considered minorities. The greatest culprit of this is the institutions that are related to justice where they find that some of the races are prone to be criminals. They also reason that the neighborhood in which these people live are prone to crime and hence they deny the residents some very important services thinking that they might use them to carry out a particular crime. This has left many minorities confused and disappointed by the provision of the services that they require from public administration institutes (Frankel, 1999).

The importance of ethics in public administration practice is that it leaves the people contented and also the people hold the institutes in very high esteem. This also means that with the increased respect accorded to the public administration institutes, many people may feel obliged to enroll in their services and this means that if it’s profit-oriented, the institute will gain a lot from this gesture of faith by the public. The people also cultivate a culture of respecting the institute and this means that the institute will have little problems in achieving its objectives of serving the public. Problems may arise from people demonstrating or complaining to the authorities about the misconduct of the institute and they may even force closure (Homan, 1991).

Relevance of integrity for the public administration practice

Integrity is the consistency of perceived principles, actions, methods, values, and measures. This is seen as the character of being truthful and honesty in whatever one does in any situation. In the field of public administration, there are some policies that the involved institutes may pass which require the people to adapt them for the better provision of the services to them. This means that the policies may introduce other implications which may affect the people’s accessibility to the services provided by an institute concerned with public administration (Frankel, 1999).

When the institute decides to make such a policy, it is important to note that the people may be adversely affected by such a move. This may include raising the price of accessing their services, which may hinder some people from accessing the services they provide. Integrity comes in to justify that the hitching of prices is not done to enrich the people who control the institute. There have been cases where the people have been taken advantage of by such institutions, especially the institutions which are profit-oriented and yet they offer very crucial services to the public (Addams, 2002).

The field of public administration needs to be operated in a manner that suggests that there is a high degree of integrity involved in the running of the institutions involved. All decisions must be made truthfully and honestly not just for the intention of the institutes to enrich themselves or have an undue advantage over the people because of the sheer fact that the public needs the services of the institutions. This will ensure that the public has faith in the institutions and they can trust in the integrity of the institution (Homan, 1991).

Synthesis

The paper has come to the conclusion that the field of public administration being a very integral part of any civilized society, needs to be accountable and perform its duties in a manner that is very satisfying to the public. This is the only way in which the institutes can be respected by the public. However, we have seen that some institutes are harboring a lot of vices in the provision of their services to the public (Abbott, 1983).

The institutes should for one be of the right morals in their provision of public service. This means that the institutes should not be immoral and in that respect way not treat the people in the right way. This implies that the people may lose faith in the institute which might bring a lot of complications to the institute. The institutes should also be ethical in their conduct of business. This means that things like corruption, favoritism, and racism should be issues that are not even remotely connected to such institutions. Failure to comply with this may lead to complications directed to the institute. The institutes should also have a high degree of integrity and this means that the institutes must have honesty and truth when conducting their business of public service provision (Thomas, 1996).

References

Abbott, Andrew. (1983). “Professional Ethics.” American Journal of Sociology 88, no. 5: 855-885.
Addams, Jane. (2002). Democracy and Social Ethics. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.
Frankel, Mark S., and Sanyin Siang. (1999). “Ethical and Legal Aspects of Human Subjects Research on the Internet.” A Report of a Workshop.
Homan, Roger. (1991). the Ethics of Social Research. New York: Longman, Inc.
Thomas, Jim. (1996). “Introduction: A Debate About the Ethics of Fair Practices for Collecting Social Science Data in Cyberspace.” Information Society 12: 107-117.

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