Fact
Luke works for ABC and has come to know about a project to build an adult entertainment retail store in his brother’s neighborhood. Logically, this will diminish the value of his brother’s home. Nevertheless, he has a confidentiality agreement with the company, so he should not tell this information to his brother.
Furthermore, Owen, his brother, has been thinking about selling his home, and received an offer for an acceptable amount of money last week. Nevertheless, he has not taken the final decision, as he is considering postponing the sell to see if the real estate market gets better.
Issue
The issue in this case is whether Luke should share with his brother the information that he has or not. The reason this is an ethical issue is because he has a confidentiality agreement with the ABC company that does not allow him to disclose the company’s future plans.
Analysis
Obviously, this is somewhat of a conundrum. Luke is set on doing the right thing, yet he does not really know what this is. There are many ways that one can determine what the correct course of action is, and Utilitarianism and Universal Ethics are two of the most famous and employed methods. They both take different points of view on how one should lead one’s life, yet are both very valuable and should be considered.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory that attempts to follow the course of action that would cause the greatest benefit and the least harm for those involved. Nevertheless, this is problematic because these definitions are controversial. First, how there is no parameter with which to determine whether something is beneficial or harmful, and even the founders of the theory had discrepancies as to whether this meant good and bad, or pleasure and displeasure. Also, it is difficult and almost impractical to determine who the people involved are, as an action’s effects can have unlimited and very remote consequences.
In spite of this, one could argue that Utilitarianism would really not care too much about the course of action that Luke would take. This is due to the fact that the devalued price would affect the owner of the house, regardless if this is Owen or not. The only possible harm that could be avoided would be for Luke to be fired from the company because he did not comply with the confidentiality agreement. However, this is the reason why he is seeking help with the Ethics Department, so this would be irrelevant.
Kant’s categorical imperative (i.e., Universal ethics)
On the other hand, Kant’s categorical imperative attempts to disregard the effects that an action may have on others, and focuses on if the deed is universally good or not. It seeks to universalize the action and consider what would happen if everyone were to do the same thing. “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law” (Kant, 1993, p. 30). This has led many people to see it as a cold and often cruel theory, as it sometimes leads to very objective decisions that take the feelings that one may have for the other person out of the equation.
For example, it is arguable that this would mean that Luke should not tell Owen, as he has a duty to the company and it is something that should not be broken. Kant would have focused on how negative it would be for everybody to disclose the company’s proceeding, concluding from this that nobody should talk about what ABC is doing.
Obviously, this is very open to critique, as this is a case that has many other factors at play that one should take into account. The most important of these is that one is not talking about just anybody, but the worker’s brother, with whom he shares a special bond. This means that it would not be as bad for him to disclose it because he would probably not do it for anyone else that he did not love as much.
Conclusion
Based on my analysis above, Luke should consider telling his brother that he ought to sell his house if he is getting an acceptable offer without disclosing the company’s project. While one of these theories, Utilitarianism, does not particularly have a solution for this conundrum and Kant’s Universal Ethics says that he should not go through with it, there are criticisms to these theories that consider this to be against the virtue of friendship and brotherly love. In fact, neither of these discussed theories paints a clear, decisive picture of what Luke should do, while virtue ethics, such as Aristotle’s takes a clear, incisive position. Therefore, Luke should take these theories into account, yet realize that he could in fact ultimately tell his brother because there is a loving relationship involved and it would not cause more negative effects than not telling him would. While it is true that if everybody did this, it would greatly disrupt the real estate market, this is highly unlikely, as everybody’s brother would have to live in the same place.
Reference List
Kant, I. (1993). Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals. Trans. by Ellington, J. W. New York: Hackett.
