One can ask whether a politician can be trusted to honor his oath of office if he betrays his marital vow. It is a valid question that has to be answered individually and specifically. Both President Roosevelt and President Kennedy were known philanderers yet few would claim today that there were not excellent presidents.

Adultery is defined as voluntary and consensual sexual relations between a married individual and someone other than his or her spouse. It has always been considered reprehensible throughout history. The 7th Commandment says: “Thou shall not commit adultery.” In some countries today, it is punishable by death. The common expression of “not casting the first stone” comes from a story in the Gospel when a woman is found in adultery and is about to be stoned. Her accusers, representing the legal authority of the time, asked Jesus whether she should be stoned according to the Law. He replied “Let him who has not sinned cast the first stone.”He then wrote something in the sand. We are not told what was written but somehow, all the accusers, discretely disappeared.

According to most studies on the topic, more than 90% of Americans consider it morally wrong. Yet, according to the National Opinion Research Center of the University of Chicago, more than 25% of men and 17% women commit at least one extramarital affair in their lifetime. This should not surprise us. Most of the time, when we are doing something wrong, we know it is wrong, yet we do it anyway.

Why then is infidelity such a major problem?

I believe it is because it is a violation of trust, a betrayal, the breaking of a promise. Trust is at the basis of any human relationship. We should all be very careful never to betray the trust people have in us.

As Isaac Bashevis Singer once said:

“When you betray somebody else, you also betray yourself.”

The concept of oaths is not new. In the Jewish tradition we find that God Himself swears that He will “never again curse the ground because of man.” (Gen: 8:21) In the Greco-Roman tradition, the Athenian statesman and orator Lycurgus in 324 B.C.E said: “It is the oath which holds democracy together.”

Taking an oath is positive because it indicates a determination “to do the right thing” but unless it is adhered to, has no real meaning.

An oath can also have a negative purpose. The SS did take an oath to Adolf Hitler and abided by it, but to do evil.

Today public servants, attorneys and physicians take a public oath. To become a U.S. citizen by naturalization, one has to take an oath of allegiance to the United States. In marriage, couples make a vow of fidelity to each other and that is the cornerstone of their relationship.

Why do oaths play such an important role in society and why are public promises necessary?

We could assume that if one decides to become a physician, it would be to best serve the patients? The same assumption can be made in the legal profession. Someone who decides to become an attorney would want to serve the best interest of his clients at all times.

However we know by experience that such assumptions are not realistic. Dr. Hebert J. Schlesinger, in his book Promises, Oaths and Vow: On the Psychology of Promising believes that “promising can be viewed as additional reinforcement to overcome a wish to undermine the promise.” We are somehow aware when we make a promise that we will be tempted at one time or another in the future to forget our idealism and high principles and fall into the attraction of personal benefit. A public promise can help us stay on the “narrow path.” It helps us remember our commitment, sets standards and makes us accountable to ourselves and to others.

Making and keeping promises is considered one of the highest moral achievements.

As Hannah Arendt once said:
“Every organization of men, be it social or political, ultimately relies on man’s capacity for making promises and keeping them.”

Hundreds if not thousands of people were involved in making the flight possible. Manufacturers of the equipment, software developers, Air Traffic controllers and many others each had a role, however minute in the organization of the flight. In the analyses of catastrophes we very often discover that there are multiple players in the chain of events that ultimately led to the disaster and that any one of the players could have avoided the disaster by his or her intervention or action.

The same is true in the corporate world, which has had its share of disasters lately. What may appear to us as a minor mistake can, in a succession of related events, have dire consequences.

We may think of ourselves as minor players in a big game and that our mistakes or errors are insignificant and will not have any major impact. This is not a wise way to think. We do not and can not always see the connection between our actions and the overall success or failure of an enterprise.

As Jim Rohn, author and public speaker once said:

“Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don’t fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgment, repeated every day.”

Yet errors are inevitable and are part of life. We even learn from them by “trial and error.”

How can we reduce the numbers of errors we commit?

1. We should first of all admit our errors without giving ourselves excuses.

2. We should then try to understand how and why we made them. There is a difference between an explanation and an excuse. By analyzing our errors thoroughly we will have a better chance to learn from them and not to repeat them.

3. We should also learn as much as we can from other people’s mistakes.

We say that we should not do something we do not want to be on the front page of tomorrow’s paper or posted on YouTube.

But what about the past?

We have all done things that we are not proud of and would rather not see them made public. How do we deal with them?

We sometimes try to forget them but that obviously does not work if we are thinking about them as I write this blog and as you are reading it!

We should first make a fundamental distinction between the misdeeds that caused damaged or hurt to others and those that did not.

In situations where our actions cause damage to ourselves only (and they are rare), the best thing we can do is make a commitment not to repeat them. It is surely the best way to learn from our mistakes. We might even consider sharing those mistakes with others, people we trust. The psychological impact of having “told someone” can be very positive and liberating.

In situations where our misdeeds caused damage to others, the best option is to apologize and offer reparation if possible. I will never forget when David Finn, the Co-founder and Chairman of the company, apologized to me for having raised his voice and expressed slight anger in a moment of hectic preparations for Ruder Finn’s 50th anniversary. My respect and admiration for him and the company took an immense leap. It takes leadership and great self-confidence for someone in high position to apologize to someone in a lesser position.

We should aim at living our lives so that we can sustain any scrutiny and be “above suspicion” because Mark Twain was right when he said:

“When one’s character begins to fall under suspicion and disfavor, how swift, then, is the work of disintegration and destruction”

Expense reports serve a useful purpose mainly for practical reasons. It is easier for an individual and its employer that charges related to business be paid by the individual and then reimbursed by the employer.

Unfortunately many abuse that privilege. According the Wisconsin Law Journal, cheating on expenses is one of the most common thefts perpetrated by employees.

It is not always easy to determine what is right and what is wrong when submitting an expense report. Let’s look at two scenarios.

1. You are out -of- town on business and spending the night in a hotel. You had a busy day and feel you need to relax and decide to watch a movie. Should you include the cost of the movie on your expense report?
2. You are traveling for business to meet a client in Europe for two days. You arrive a day early and use the extra day for a vacation. Should you include the extra hotel night on your expense report?

Some people will argue that these charges are acceptable others, (I among them) think they are not.

One may argue that if the amounts involved are small it is okay to charge them. It is not a good argument. Taking what is not yours is stealing whether it is one dollar or $10,000.  The amount does not matter as much as the principle. There is a difference between a misdemeanor and a felony. However the difference is in the penalty for breaking the law not the moral principle that prohibits stealing. Furthermore, a minor offence in ethical conduct often leads to a larger offence.

Here are some guidelines that might be helpful.

A. Find out what is the policy of the company that employs you and stick strictly to it. If the policy is not clear to you, ask for clarification.

B. Do not include a charge on your expense report that you would be embarrassed to justify to your boss or…… your mother!

C. Never include a questionable charge because “everybody does it” for the reason that:

• It is never “everybody”

• The fact that there are a number of people doing something wrong does not make that thing right.

D. Apply the popular adage that says: “when in doubt, abstain.” It may keep you from serious negative consequences such as embarrassment, loss of reputation, loss of a job or even jail time.

As Mother Theresa once said:

“Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.”

When John Kennedy ran for president, his opponents argued that because he was Catholic his allegiance to Rome would compromise his loyalty to the United States! No one would dare question his loyalty to the U.S. today.

We all have multiply loyalties. Most of us are (or want to be) loyal to our family, friends, colleagues, employer, business partners, clients, religion and so on. Children of divorced parents often have to deal with a conflict of loyalties. There are situations when these loyalties could have the potential of entering into conflicts. It is up to us to best navigate them guided by our own conscience and the values at stake.

Loyalty is a much-revered value in most, if not all, cultures but remaining loyal to more than one entity is not easy. Ethics often deals with potential conflicting loyalties.

How do you manage a conflict of loyalty situation?

Here are a few tips that might be helpful.

1. Identify or recognized the conflicting loyalties

2. List your values, those that define you. Decide who you are or want to be.

3. Determine the boundaries, what your loyalties will allow and prohibit. What you are ready to do and what you will refuse to do. You may decide, for instance, that you will not lie to either party or that you will not report information from one party to the other.

4. Seek counsel before making a decision or taking action.

As the Israeli novelist Amos Oz once said:

A conflict begins and ends in the hearts and minds of people, not in the hilltops.

A real ethical dilemma, should we have a pandemic, will be making the decision of who is going to get help, assuming that our supply of vaccines would not be sufficient for all the population. How do you allocate vital limited resources?

The ultimate goal in a situation that has no perfect solution is to do the utmost to reduce for the greatest number of people the negative impact of the flu.

When facing an ethical dilemma it is always helpful to think of the values that are involved. I would think that the predominant value is fairness in a situation that by definition is unfair.

What should be the criteria to make that determination? Those criteria would apply for any situation where vital resources are limited.

Let us first eliminate some of the criteria that should not be taken into consideration.

1. Gender
2. Social standing
3. Religion
4. Citizenship

There are at least two criteria I think we should we should consider.

1. Vulnerability: People the most vulnerable that might have a greater probability of dying from the flu should be helped first such as children and the elderly.
2. Profession: People that are in essential social services and public safety such as healthcare providers, firemen, sanitation workers and the police.

Some have suggested implementing a system of random selection to determine who gets the vaccine. I think it would be morally questionable to do so because it is shifting the moral burden of the decision to chance. Issues of life and death should not be decided by a lottery.

As Edward W. Howe, the naturalist and author once wrote: “A boy doesn’t have to go to war to be a hero; he can say he doesn’t like pie when he sees there isn’t enough to go around.”

There are many questions to be answered and the trial will determine whether he is guilty or innocent, at least according to U.S. law.

The question whether they are pirates or extortionists is legitimate. Historically, pirates capture the ships and cargo. These young men capture the ships and take the crew hostage for a ransom and then return the ship, cargo and crew.

What the trial may not address are the circumstances in which these teenagers are recruited to perform these unjustifiable and unacceptable acts.

Some might argue that it is irrelevant, that a crime has been committed and that someone has to pay.

There is however a difference between an excuse and an explanation. There are no excuses for such acts but sometimes explanations can lead to prevention.

Below are some undisputed facts.

• Somali is one of the world’s poorest countries.
• The average wage in Somalia is $2 a day.
• According to the UN, waste, including nuclear waste is being dumped illegally and regularly within the territorial waters of the country thus dramatically reducing fishing in those waters and depriving Somali of one of its source of income.

There has not been so, far any fatalities among the hostages taken by the pirates. They have all been freed once the ransom was paid.
People that are desperate and have “nothing to lose” do desperate things. It is true that there are millions of people that are desperate and yet they don’t resort to violence and terrorism. However, we should not ignore the correlation between despair and violence.

It is the responsibility of the rich to alleviate the harsh living conditions of the poor, whether on an individual level or on a global level. Rich nations have a responsibility towards the less fortunate.

We should give people hope and “something to lose.”

Professor Armand Abecassis, French Jewish philosopher and author once said that at the Judgment Day we will not be able to give, as the excuse, for not helping the poor, that we did not have enough because the answer will be: “Yes, but you ate.”

Terrorism and crime has to be opposed with full determination but addressing some of the causes of despair in the world could greatly reduce its occurrence.

The official position of the U.S. government as well as the government of Israel is never to pay ransom in exchange for hostages, nor to grant other demands of terrorists. The government of Israel as agreed in the past to exchanges of prisoners.

Whether one should pay ransom to save a life is a particularly difficult ethical dilemma.

Paying a ransom will encourage more kidnapping but refusing to pay may cause the death of the hostage.

If one takes the principle approach (or Kantian) approach that one should only do what would be acceptable if universally practiced, then payment is not an option. Universal kidnappings and the payment of ransoms would lead to total chaos.

If on the other hand one takes the value-based approach and one believes that saving a life is the most important value, than of course one has to pay.

Tracey Kidder, the founder of Institute for Global Ethics says that this case is a typically case of a individual versus community dilemma not one of right versus wrong.

A third approach would be to try to apply the Golden Rule (or Biblical) approach of not doing unto others what we do not want done to us. This approach is even more problematic because the decision maker is rarely the hostage!

Negotiations are often helpful. In the case of Captain Phillips the negotiators were offering to let the pirates go free in exchange for the life of the captain. That could have been an acceptable solution. However when the life of the captain was threatened, force was the only remaining option. Three pirates were shot and killed and the captain rescued. The remaining pirate, who was on board of the ship and negotiating was taken into custody.

Often, in ethics there are no perfect solutions and one has to choose the lesser of two evils, the one least harmful. However we should remember as Max Lerner, the American politician and columnist once said, that:

“When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil.”

There were more than 60 participants from Fortune 500 and other global corporations. Each had an interesting story to tell.

Ruder Finn is a signatory of the initiative and is a member of the Task Force. Ruder Finn is (or rather always has been) committed to a “Zero-tolerance policy towards bribery” and will develop a practical and effective implementation program for the Agency.

Corruption and bribery costs an estimated 5% of Global GDP or $2.6 trillion a year.

It is a major, if not the major cause of the disastrous state of the economy of most developing countries. If the funds lost in corruption were used as intended, world hunger could be drastically reduced and many diseases cured.

Although realistically corruption will never be completely eradicated, its practice can be dramatically reduced if anti-corruption measures are implemented and world governments are enlisted to give their active support to these measures.

It is a monumental task but there is hope. Since the implementation of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practice Act (FCPA), corruption has been dramatically reduced worldwide. (FCPA imposes severe penalties and jail time for U.S. companies involved in bribery whether the crime is committed in the US or abroad.)

Cobus de Swardt, the managing Director of Transparency International (a global anti-corporation organization and founding partner of PACI) told us that there was reason for optimism. He said that if someone had told him, some 15 years ago, while he was in jail in South Africa because of his opposition to Apartheid that the SA regime would fall and/or that the U.S would have an African-American President, he would not have believed it. The world is changing. Some governments have fallen because of corruption. Corruption is more and more viewed not as just “the cost of doing business” but is increasingly perceived as simply “no longer acceptable.”

Corruption violates ethical values such as fairness, justice, honesty and transparency. We each can play a role in fighting corruption because it happens ever day and at many different levels.

I have heard the following inspiring quote from Edmund Burke more than once at the conference and it well represents the attitude of those present.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”