Corporate Social Responsibilities and Ethics
The concept of (CSRs) means that companies, organizations and/or societies have both societal and ethical responsibilities stretching beyond their existing economic responsibilities (Tuan, 2012). It requires these organizations to elaborate how they understand their responsibilities in efforts to including other stakeholders like customers, employees, local communities, customers, state governments, suppliers, international organizations among others. CSR stresses the need for organizations to behave like good corporate members of the society or citizens, by not only complying with laws and policies but also conducting their activities in ways protect the environment and other resources. Ethics may be seen as the fundamental component of both group and individual behaviors relating to organizations’ responsibilities. It takes into consideration the decisions and actions taken by both organizational business and individual in light of both moral values and principles that are based on beliefs of what is deemed right, fair and wrong (Tuan, 2012).
Enron case
Ethical issue
Enron’s code of ethics was pegged on respect, excellence, integrity and communication. Considering this high code of ethics, Enron Corp. was not expected to collapse dramatically, more so, going from the reported $101billion as revenues in 2000 with estimated $140billion, in the beginning, three quarters of the following year to being declared bankruptcy later in December 2001 (Riemer, 2013). An explanation for this seems rooted in the combination of several factors such as failure by the top management, unethical corporate culture, and may be the complicity manifested within the banking community for investments. From the aftermath of the court filing over Enron’s bankruptcy, several executives were charged with criminal offenses such as insider trading, money laundering, and fraud. For instance, the then treasurer, Mr. Ben Glisan, faced two-dozen counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. He pled guilty, though to only one account involving conspiracy to commit fraud. He received a jail term with post-prison supervision for extra three years and penalty regarding money worth $1million. Other top level officials have also been charged with various accounts of the crime. They include Andrew Fastow, Ken Lay, and Jeff Skilling among others (Riemer, 2013).
Tort claim
Contrary to the indictment of Ken Lay by the federal prosecutor, that describes Lay as being principal organizer and leader of criminal acts leading to the company’s bankruptcy Lay retains his innocence claiming that he had no knowledge about all that happened. He virtually blames Fastow for all those criminal acts. However, the chief Enron whistleblower, Sherron Watkins, maintains her proof of examples of questionable actions and decisions made by Lay-who has since passed away, leading to the case being thrown out (Riemer, 2013).
Committed crime
Indeed, crime was perpetrated in this case. In fact, most of those facing charges admitted being liable to some of the counts they faced. Many people suffered including pensioners and shareholders who lost all their investments.
The Boeing Tanker Scandal
Ethical issue
Boeing battled with strings of moral questions that tarnished its picture during the tanker scandal. The company fired its CFO, Michael Sears together with another senior official, Darleen Druyun for their engagement in what the company called unethical behavior. Druyun negotiated a deal with Boeing and later secured employment with Boeing. She was later criminally prosecuted after NLPC lodged a suit against him. She pled guilty and received jail term of nine months in connection to the unethical employment arrangements in 2004 (old.seattletimes.com).
Tort claim
Druyun initially violated her first plea bargain as she lied about some aspects concerning her relations with Boeing just after she had failed a polygraph test. But when she was faced with a heavier jail sentence, she spilled the beans involving the bewitching deals that she planned with the airline for Air Force projects (old.seattletimes.com).
Committed crime
Indeed this incident involved criminal offence especially as Druyun had illegally negotiated employment with the airline company while she was still at Pentagon. She also arranged continued employment for both her daughter and also her future son-in-law. The deal on the Air Force projects involved staggering hundreds of millions of dollars (old.seattletimes.com).
The subprime crisis
Ethical issue
The collapse of the moral behavior significantly contributed to the financial crisis which started in August 2007. Collapse in the moral behavior implies that the decision of many, if not all, of the big financial firms in America (and the foreign financial corporate that succumbed to that disease) would hit an ordinary citizen as unethical, scurrilous and repulsive (Sanders, 2010). The moment these financial firms became unmoored from their ethical point of concern, they had the freedom to behave in ways that only cared for their selfish interests.
Tort claim
The raised claims were that not all financial firms together with their executives could be collectively stupid in the manner outlined as unethical. They were trying to associate such crisis with massive leverage, and incompetent risk control systems.
Committed crime
The damage caused was that people could no longer obtain their mortgages directly from the branch bankers, for whom they were likely to have known personally. Mortgage brokers emerged to find borrowers who focused much on quality other than quantity.
Watergate
Ethical issue
John Dean, who was in the White House Council up to lately, confessed that he had made a list of the people whom he thought, would become the subject of justice obstruction at the time of Watergate cover-up in 1973 (Kaptein, 2013). He started offering seminars on the Watergate lessons to instill ethic to lawyers and attorneys.
Tort claim
Others have suggested that the bad behavior seen in some lawyers is due to the fact that lawyers are inherently ‘stupid ‘or ‘bad’ since they are more susceptible to much pressure emerging from their clients, as they seem under-regulated or over-regulated (Kaptein, 2013).
Committed crime
The damage for this is as a result of snatching justice away from innocent population. Obstruction of justice condemns innocent population to other mental, physical and even economical problems such stress, poverty and low esteem.
References
Tuan, L. T. (2012). Corporate social responsibility, ethics, and corporate governance. Social Responsibility Journal, 8(4), 547-560.
Riemer, J. B. (2013). Case Study 3: Enron Oil Trading (C): An Opening for Enron Audit? Resisting Corporate Corruption Cases in Practical Ethics from Enron through the Financial Crisis, 1-34
The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: Ex-Boeing CFO pleads guilty in tanker deal scandal. (n.d.). Retrieved February 11, 2016, from http://old.seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2002091816_webboeing16.html
Sanders, A. (2010). The subprime crisis and its role in the financial crisis. Journal of Housing Economics, 17(4), 254-261.
Kaptein, M. (2013). WWhy Smart Lawyers Sometimes Do Dumb Things. Behavioral Legal Ethics on Watergate, 12-36.
