Describe the Various Levels Where the Crisis is Felt in Contemporary Indian Society. Discuss the Concept of “Code of Ethics” for professionals.
News about India's booming economy is hard
to miss these days. This is especially true because all sectors of economy – from IT to agriculture - have
grown. Yet, the profits from this growth-have not been shared equally - and
many people feel marginalized. As Sundeep Waslekar writes, the country is
facing a profound value crisis.
India is actually divided sharply into
three economies.
1) India's Three Economic Tiers :
The Business Class economy – consisting
of the people who from the market for consumer durable, cars, mobile phones
and credit cards - comprises only 10 million households, or 2% of the country's
one billion population
The Bike economy - comprising another 20%
of the population - consists of people on periphery of the market, with the
purchasing power of its constituents limited to television sets, telephones and
housing with basic amenities.
2) The Periphery :
The 2% elite cannot sustain
themselves forever, surrounded by 98% periphery. It is not a question of
inequity. Almost every Western country has 2% or 5% or 10% of wealthy citizens.
But there, they constitute the periphery, whereas the heartland is made up of a
large middle class.
To have 2% elites is normal. To have them
at the core — rather than the periphery of the nation — is not sustainable.
3) The Implications of Growth... :
The issue of sustainability has
not found a place in the Indian public debate. Globally, too, sustainability is
still defined mainly in ecological terms. Until the 1960s, Growth was never questioned.
In the last 40 years, the West has
understood the limits to growth. It has initiated a project to balance
relations between human beings and the environment. It is yet to realize the
need to balance relations among human beings.
4)
...and the Forces of Greed :
There is no doubt that the fabric of
humanity is being torn apart by forces of greed. Terrorist groups and their
state sponsors — personalize this force. But there is another side of the story
- grievances.
For economists in planning commissions and
corporate headquarters, economics is business. For India's poor masses,
economics is life.
5) Omnipresent Poverty :
Poverty, for the poor, is measured not in
terms of statistical indicators, which may provide evidence of improvement.
Poverty is measured in terms of their
ability to meet socially defined expenditure. Poor people feel poor not only
when they consume less than 2,500 calories a day.
6) Rigid Class Divisions :
They also do so when they see a minister's
daughter hosting a lavish wedding — not because of her own accomplishments, but
because of her father's control over the public treasury.
Poverty is then seen as a result of absence
of power. Those who are born in power-endowed families tend to be rich.
Those with less power-endowment tend to be
poor, however competent they may be.
Investment reforms are introduced so that
colas and perfumes can be availed of easily by the endowed segments of the
society.
7) A Demand for Violence :
Land reforms are aborted half
way, so that those who are really competent may not eventually overtake those
who are merely born in the right families.
India's conflicts are still limited to a
few parts of the country. There is a lesson to be learnt from neighboring
Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nepal.
8) Extremism Along India's Borders
:
Monopolists' control of agriculture, the
creation of classes of a privileged few in cities — through expansion of the
state sector and the capture of political institutions by a few — has generated
a demand for violence.
In Afghanistan, warlords of today and
Taliban of yesterday woo the dejected youth, as all Qaeda will do again
tomorrow. In Pakistan, clerics use latent frustration to create battalions of
religious extremists.
In Nepal, the Maoists produce ideological
extremists. Different names. Different forms — but the same underlying
dynamics. India need not look too far to understand the implications of the
neglect of the periphery for the sustainability of the core.
9) Disintegrating Value and Ethic
Codes :
But there are plenty of borne-grown factors
limiting the development of India's full potential. Corruption per exists
everywhere.
There are two issues: Profits and
acceptance. Violation of ethics and justice proves to be profitable, at least
in the short run.
A hard-working farmer barely earns 1,000 rupees ($20) per month. A usurer of food items in Mumbai or New Delhi
makes at least 100 times as much.
If the farmer does not sell his produce
through government monopolies, he is punished. If a usurer is arrested by the
police, the higher authority releases him. In theory, values are a matter of
philosophy.
10) Corruption Equals Economic Gains
:
In practice, values are a matter of
economics. The character of a nation is judged by the values that are
profitable in it.
As human beings by nature try to gain, they
prefer values which enable them to earn profits. India has run into ethical
deficit because it is not profitable in today's India to follow ethics and
justice.
11)The Spiral Wheel of Extortion :
A breach of ethics destroys the level
playing field. It works against honest people, since their competitors can win
by unfair means. Moreover, those who amass wealth by crooked means tend to
display it.
As they host bigger and bigger parties - in more and more expensive designer clothes,
at larger and larger houses, with smaller and smaller mobile phones in their
pockets - the teenager from the slum next door feels restless.
Since he cannot inherit an industry, he
sets up an extortion racket. He discovers that he can command even greater
fame, inspiring many others to follow. In this culture, every boy wants to be a
don and every girl a beauty queen.
1 12) Only a Recent Trend :
Forty years ago, ethics still
mattered. As a child, the most popular story I heard was that of a poor
schoolboy who stole a neighbor's gold chain. His mother patted him affectionately,
as she could now buy him good clothes and food.
The boy went on to steal bigger things. As
he graduated from one level of crime to another, he finally attained skill in
big time robberies.
13)
Uniting the Ideal and the Practical
:
Every today, those who behave
without integrity are few in our large nation of more than a billion.
Unfortunately, those who tolerate them and applaud them are many more. That is
why India In a crisis of values. And as
for childhood stories, they are replaced by heroic tales of underworld dons.
The supporters of an unethical way of life
defend it on the grounds of pragmatism, even though they may believe in India's
core values.
The Indian mind is seized with a conflict
between the ideal and the practical. What is ideal is not considered practical
— and vice versa. India's future depends upon its ability to establish a unity
of the ideal and the practical.
Excerpted from Frank-Jorgen Richter and
Pamela C.M. Mar's (editors) "Asia's New Crisis: Renewal Through Total
Ethical Management" Copyright 2004 John Wiley & Sons (Asia) Pvt Ltd.
Used by permission of the publisher.
An ethical code is adopted by an
organization in an attempt to assist those in the organization called upon to
make a decision (usually most, if not all) understand the difference between
'right' and 'wrong' and to apply this understanding to their decision.
The ethical
code therefore generally implies documents at three levels: codes of business ethics, codes of conduct
for employees and codes of professional practice.
A code of business ethics often focuses on
social issues. It may set out general principles about an organization's
beliefs on matters such as mission, quality, privacy or the environment. It may
delineate proper procedures to determine whether a violation of the code of ethics has occurred and, if so, what
remedies should be imposed. The effectiveness of such codes of ethics depends
on the extent to which management supports them with sanctions and rewards.
Violations of a private organization's code of ethics usually can subject the
violator to the organization's remedies (such as restraint of trade based on
moral principles). The code of ethics links to and gives rise to a code of
conduct for employees.
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