Discussing Ethics Part II - Keeping Politicians Clean

Yesterday I wrote about Talk of Alaska's discussion on ethics and the difficulty of talking about ethics in the middle of a public ethics dispute. It's natural to be biased by who, in the current controversy, you think is 'right.' So, I reasoned, we needed to step back and look at the underlying conditions that contribute to ethical communities.

In that post I argued that because conflict of interest is inherent in all jobs, the real focus needs to be on how to prevent conflicts of interest from leading to the two most common negative consequences of a conflict of interest: undue gain and improper influence.

Most of my views on this have evolved from teaching graduate public administration students and also doing ethics workshops with municipal employees for many years. Living and working in Asia have also contributed to my understanding of this topic. The ideas here have been written up in more detail as "Balancing Tensions between Personal and Public Obligations: A Context for Public Ethics and Corruption" in a chapter of a public administration book. The focus of that chapter and these ideas is NOT specifically Alaska, but the dynamics that affect the level of ethics and corruption anywhere in the world.

So let's move on.

In most countries or well defined communities there are official rules - government laws - but also other social norms that people follow. Modern states tend to be based on what we know as "the rule of law." Decisions are supposed to be based on rationalized rules and laws, and aren't made arbitrarily by some despot. But we also have the pull of loyalty to our family and friends that all of us recognize as legitimate as well. It's why we have laws against nepotism.

Ideally the rule of law and other norms support each other, but often they do not. Some common competing norms for government officials include religion, family loyalties, and alternatives to government. These alternatives include private options that come into being to fill gaps that aren't otherwise met by the government - from perfectly legal ones such as the legal market to highly illegal ones such as organized crime.

So with this very brief context, here are some basic cultural questions for testing the likelihood that public officials and administrators will be drawn into unethical behavior in any particular setting:

1. Can administrators meet their basic needs (live a life-style consistent to the societal expectations for a person in that position) from the compensation of their jobs?
   
   • In the US, public salaries for jobs that require the least amount of education tend to be highly competitive, and when you include benefits and pensions, are probably better than what many of the employees could get in the private sector. However, those in professional jobs - lawyers, engineers, accountants - often could make much higher salaries in the private sector than in government.
     
     
2. Are there conflicts between the social norms and the rule of law?
   
   • Do many public officials have personal obligations that are so strong that they may lead them to violate their professional obligations? Can religious or family responsibilities, or other personal ties interfere with their public job performance? In a number of countries family or school ties lead to severe conflicts for public officials. In the US business interests are often a challenge to politicians' duties to the public as a whole.
     
     
3. Are there options to meet one's needs through breaking the law?
   
   • In places where the rule of law is lax and corruption widespread, even basically honest officials are tempted. Where organized crime has strong power, politicians may be threatened if they don't cooperate with crime bosses. A terrible example of this in the news are the Mexican drug cartels that make it dangerous to be an honest public official in many places in Mexico. But the tales I hear from Juneau suggest that temptation lurks in much less overt ways - free dinners and drinks from lobbyists, poker parties where politicians hardly ever lose, and a bunch of people who are suddenly new legislators' best friends.
     
     
4. What is the likelihood of getting caught breaking the laws?
   
   • If corruption is commonplace and few are ever punished, falling to temptation is more likely. The Alaskan legislators who were convicted in the last few years were not doing things that hadn't been fairly common in Juneau. On the other hand, better education in ethics wouldn't hurt - education that is more than learning abstractly about laws. And also includes federal laws. The three convicted legislators didn't even know about the federal laws they were breaking at the time. But such training shouldn't simply be how to avoid getting caught.
     
     
5. Is the price of breaking the rules worth the risk?
   
   • If the potential gains are great and the potential punishment if caught low, some will take the chance, especially in places where legitimate means of improving one's position in life are limited.

While some Alaskans may think this is extreme, I would remind them the model here was not focused on Alaska, but nations around the world. But I would also point out that legislative salaries in Alaska are set with the expectation that legislators have other jobs when the legislature is not meeting. This does set up the opportunity for businesses affected by the legislature to hire legislators during the off season. While there may be situations where the legislator is completely free of obligations to his or her employer, there has to be a real tension for most. And the appearance of a wrong doing is ever present in the public's mind.

So, based on this scenario, what are the likeliest strategies for preventing unethical behaviors?

1. Employing organizations must provide enough compensation and free time for employees to meet their basic personal obligations.
2. Public officials should not be able to meet their needs through illegal channels.
3. Public officials pursuing illegal channels should have a high probability of being caught and punished.
   
4. Specific factors that make corruption less likely include:
   

• Transparency
  
  • As much as possible is out in the open to be seen and reviewed
• Independent watchdogs
  
  • Independent media, ombudsman offices, auditors, citizen activists, real protections for whistle blowers, are all important in this.
• Political structure with dispersed power
  
  • The more power is concentrated the less opportunity to challenge that power. But if it is too dispersed, it may be difficult to get anything done. (No one said any of this is easy.)
• Economic and political systems in which wealth and power are equitably distributed.
  
• The bigger the gap between the rich and poor, and the more difficult it is to bridge that gap legally, the more likely people will go to illegal options. If this assumption is accurate, then the more equitable a country's economy is, the less likely there will be corruption.
• Sufficiently educated population that understands the dynamics of economic, political, and social systems and thus is less susceptible to propaganda that supports corruption
  
  • To the extent people are susceptible to propaganda - economic or political or social - demagogues can take advantage of real or perceived problems to increase their own power and legitimize the illegitimate.

These are basic rules of thumb. Their application necessarily must vary from situation to situation. Some are relatively easy short term changes. Some are very difficult long-term changes. Some may react, "this is impossible in my country." While I have seen 'the impossible' happen several times in my lifetime, I don't dismiss that some things are real long shots. But it is also healthy to understand that sometimes we are facing extremely difficult tasks and that perhaps we should shift our efforts to areas that will yield more benefits for the costs. We tend to be better at understanding what is impossible physically ("Would you please jump over this house?") than we are at understanding things that might be impossible socially ("We will eliminate homelessness in two years.")

There's a lot of stuff there. Here's a simpler recap of the strategies:

Shorter term measures:

1. Reasonable compensation for officials so that they aren't tempted to make more money in ways that put them into compromising positions.
   
   
2. Tough, but enforceable laws that make it clear that undue gain and improper influence are not acceptable.
   
   
3. Incentive structures that protect independent watch dogs - media, auditing agencies, citizen activists, etc.
   
   
4. Transparency - there should be few areas where the public does not have access to what public officials are doing. Freedom of Information laws have already identified those areas that are legitimately confidential and when that confidentiality is no longer needed. Perhaps statute of limitations should be related to when the information becomes publicly available.

Longer term measures:

1. Work to have reasonably equitable distribution of education, wealth, and power. At the very least, legitimate ways to improve one's position in society should be more accessible and attractive than illegitimate ways.
   
   
2. Education, from primary school on, should focus on developing students' critical thinking abilities.

Improving the ethical climate of our state - or any political entity - is not something we can do quickly. It's based on a mix of factors that include personal values of officials, but also the social, economic, and legal structures that increase or decrease incentives to be good.