Essay on Whistle-blowing & the Environment
Often times companies will do things that they are not supposed to knowing that they can get away with it. One problem with this is that if someone finds out and does something about it, it can be extremely detrimental for the company. This was the case with Avco Environmental Services who have a contract with a local hospital. Avco is a company that deals with toxic-waste disposal and it was discovered by one of their employees (named Chantale Leroux) that they were disposing of some of this medical waste in a local municipal landfill. This is not only an illegal action, but it could be very harmful to the health of the workers and the public in general.
Chantale Leroux is faced with a very loaded decision. She could either say something about it and risk falling out of favor in the company or allow this activity to continue in hopes of maintaining good standing in the company. Chantale takes the following course of action. Initially she goes to her immediate superior and is told to drop it because it is neither the concern of her or her superior. Not being satisfied with this, Chantale takes her issue to a higher ranking employee the very next day. When Chantale brings up the issue, her superior is clearly irritated and tells Chantale things like “this isn’t your concern”, “everyone knows that the regulations in this area are overly cautious”, and that there is no real danger and that the matter should be considered closed.
After Chantale had taken the previously mentioned, she was unsure of what to do. Her supervisors had both been extremely clear that they thought she should just drop her concerns, but she was hesitant to drop it. One the one hand, she knew that it was a completely illegal act and that it could be potentially harmful to the unsuspecting public. On the other hand though, if she were to take this fact public, she fears that she could jeopardize her job. She is especially fearful of this because she is new and has a promising future with the company. Chantale thinks that the management of the company is honest and trustworthy and generally has faith in them. She is, however, unsure of what to do. She looks up the phone number of an old friend who worked for the local newspaper in case she wants to tell the story, but has still yet to decide.
Corporations have moral obligations in a multitude of ways including obligations to people and obligations to the environment. Corporations are not to harm the people or environment around them especially if it is not of a significant cost. In this sense, cost can mean many things including the obvious money, but also includes things like lives, the well-being of people, and surrounding areas. What is being questioned is whether Chantale has a moral obligation to do as much as she can to prevent her company from harming others even if it may cost her job.
Whistle-blowing is essentially just a name used to describe the act of somebody making information public that was secret and intended to be kept secret. There are multiple kinds of whistle-blowing, but for this specific case, we will focus on what is called internal whistle-blowing. “[T]he term refers to disclosures made by employees to executives in a firm, perhaps concerning improper conduct of fellow employees or superiors who are cheating on expense accounts, or are engaging in petty or grand theft.” (DeGeorge 300) It is referred to as internal whistle-blowing because it is done by somebody inside of the company which is the exact situation that Chantale finds herself in. “Generally (when one whistle-blows), one believes an investigation will follow and a sanction will be imposed.” (DeGeorge 300) This would be the case for Chantale as well because she would only whistle-blow in order to potentially reduce harm to her surroundings.
Whistle-blowing can be viewed three different ways: prohibited, permitted, and mandatory.
- Prohibited – This is the most widely held view of the three. DeGeorge states that “[t]here is a strong tradition within American mores against ”ratting” or telling on others.” (303) Due to this common viewpoint, it is typical for a whistle-blower to be seen as someone who went against the firm and therefore the people in the firm.
- Permitted – Permitted whistle-blowing “involves an employee somehow going public, revealing information or concerns about his or her firm in the hope that the firm will change the product, action, policy, or whatever it is that the whistle-blower feels will harm, or has harmed, and needs to be rectified.” (DeGeorge 306) Whistle-blowing is typically not seen as something done with the permission or consent of the company and will often do the company harm. For this reason, for whistle-blowing to be permitted, good must come of it and enough to where it outweighs the bad.
- Mandatory – This is the case when a person has a moral obligation to whistle-blow because of certain conditions including, but not limited to, the concern for the health of others and the concern for the environment.
As long as there are activities going on, goods being made, or really anything else where companies are acting immorally, there will be some sort of whistle=blowing that not only will happen, but really in some cases, should happen. “The need for moral heroes shows a defective society and defective corporations. It is more important to change the legal and corporate structures that make whistle-blowing necessary than to convince people to be moral heroes.” (DeGeorge 316) When speaking about whistle-blowing one must understand that it can on the one hand lead to troubling times for a company, but on the other, it can make companies work toward a higher standard. DeGeorge states, “[w]histle-blowing should also alert corporations to what can and should be done if they wish to be both moral and excellent.” (317) Overall, whistle-blowing should be see looked at in a case-by-case basis because it can be both wrong and right.
Chantale finds herself in a situation that is far from enviable, but she is trying to decide whether or not to blow the whistle on her company. There are positives and negatives to both sides, but armed with the previous information, she should be able to make a decision. What should Chantale do?
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