Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question

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Ethical Reasoning: Striking the Balance Between Virtue, Policy and the Greater Good Activity Instructions/ Details In this and several of the next modules, you will reflect on what you’ve learned and assess how it fits with your professional experiences and prior knowledge. In this activity, you will simply assess how what you have learned this first two weeks compares to what you knew previously, and how it might benefit you in your academic and career aspirations. Please answer the following: • • What did you learn that was new to you, or brought new ideas on familiar topics to you . Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. (e.g., about your own ethical type; your current or past organizations’ ethical codes; events, instances etc.)? Drawing on your own personal and/or professional experiences, what value do you see in organizational ethical codes of conduct? Do they work in the national security domain, as you have experienced it or studied it? You may draw on any examples you see fit here, particularly if you prefer impersonal ones. Learning Reflections Criteria This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeReflections Ratings 100 pts Exemplary Assignment addresses the question with specific examples and thoughtful insight. 85 pts Satisfactory Assignment addresses the question with some examples and insight. 55 pts Minimally Responsive Assignment addresses the question but does not provide examples and offers little insight. Pts 0 pts Unacceptable The assignment is not submitted. Total Points: 100 Submission Your assignment should be approximately 150 words in length and should substantively integrate any relevant assigned content of the module and draw on what you have learned by going through the course. Be sure to check your work and correct any spelling or grammatical errors before you submit. 100 pts Topic Proposal Rubric Please note that the grade on this assignment and feedback are intended to help improve your proposal for the final paper.Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Criteria Thesis/Problem Statement and significance of issue Summary of key information related to issue Exemplary 60 The thesis/problem statement is succinct and clearly defined. Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Significance of the topic and need for research in this area is clearly and succinctly noted. 40 points Includes background information that clearly summarizes the key components related to the topic. Topic Proposal Rubric Proficient Progressing 51 points 45 points The thesis/problem The thesis/problem statement is defined statement is missing and the significance information or has and need for research too many in this area is noted. components. The Minor points need significance and need further development. for research in this area is implied; however, more explicit information is needed. 34 points 30 points Includes background Identifies some key information that components related summarizes the most to the topic. key components related to the topic. However, information is vague and some Minor points need components are further development missing. to clarify for the reader. Incomplete 39 points The thesis/problem statement is not clear to the reader. The significance and need for research in this area is missing. Unacceptable 33 points The thesis/problem statement is cannot be determined from the information provided. 0 0 points Did not submit assignment 26 points There is little information provided on key components related to the topic 22 points Information provided demonstrates misconceptions with the content, is incomplete, and is unclear to the reader. 0 points Did not submit assignment. OR the information provided demonstrates some misconceptions with the content. BNS301:Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Ethical Reasoning Processes Module 2 Introduction Virtue Among National Security Decision-Makers Types of National Security Ethical Dilemmas, Relationships, Issues Ethical Reasoning and Your Ethical Standards The Reasoning Process: Ethical Con icts The Ethical Battlespace Core Values, Institutional Value and Codes of Ethics Your Ethical Type Lesson 1 of 8 Introduction U.S. Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson watching a helicopter ﬂight exercise “ In the military, ordinary moral issues take on a special seriousness because decisions and actions so frequently have life and death implications. Leaders entrusted with immense power over other human beings and with the employment of immensely powerful weapons cannot take ethics lightly. TPurdue University Ethics and Morality Question. he stakes are too high.” – (Stromberg et al., 1982, p.30) As you reviewed in Module 1, the U.S. national security arena is vast and includes not only all branches of the military, but also the many aspects of civilian political authority wherein violent means might be employed for policy purposes which may end with violent outcomes, whether at home or abroad. Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Because of the high stakes involved, a great deal of scrutiny is applied to the individuals and organizations working in the national security arena. Their individual and collective ethical compasses and conduct matter. U.S. Marine oﬃcer meets with Japanese refugees in a school being used as a shelter (March 2011). This scrutiny occurs everywhere across the national security arena and in the public domain, sometimes simultaneously as with scandals or successes like Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, My Lai in Vietnam, disaster relief with Japan in 2011, or democratic restoration successes as in Haiti in 1994, etc. Beyond the military service branches and organizations (i.e., Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Regional Combatant Commands, Joint Special Operations Command, etc.), the US national government bureaucracies related to national security are vast.Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. They include, among others, these organizations within the Executive branch of the federal government: National Security Council Department of Defense Oﬃce of the Director of National Intelligence Central Intelligence Agency National Security Agency Department of Homeland Security Department of State Federal Bureau of Investigation Each one of these actors has the capacity to use coercive and/or violent means at home or abroad. The U.S. Congress and the federal judicial system also matter to ethical conduct in national security matters, as they often intervene (or fail to) in important national security instances. These federal entities often shed unwelcome light on important national security events, particularly when the “free” press exercises its “right” to publish unvarnished accounts of ethically-laden events. But, we are still left with the diﬃcult questions of who is (and ought be) empowered to make decisions about using violent means, and what is their ideal ethical compass? Lesson 2 of 8 Virtue Among National Security Decision-Makers “The great burden of military ethics lies in this: if those who control the power to kill and maim are evil or morally unﬁt, we unleash a torrent of sinister power.” – (Toner, 1995, p.134). In the U.S., many unelected leaders accompany elected authorities in making crucial national security decisions, and the constitutional structure of American democracy was established to try and control the worst impulses of humanity in these situations. There is simply, however, no sure way to make all people virtuous. Or, can virtue and ethically correct behavior be learned, and if so, who is to teach it to those who need it most in the national security community? James Madison once observed: “The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, ﬁrst to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold the public trust.” (Madison, 1788, Federalist No. 57). The founders of the American republic did not place their trust in the virtuous leader, the philosopher King of Platonic ideal; instead, they created many checks and balances in the U.S. systems of governance and invited everyone to struggle for power within this divided federal system. Even Alexander Hamilton, who is used currently to justify an expansive unitary theory of executive power, was particularly distrustful of the oﬃce of the President. He held the President will succumb to “temptations to sacriﬁce his duty to his interest.” A President may be: “An avaricious man [who] might be tempted to betray the interests of the state to the acquisition of wealth…mak(ing) his own aggrandizement, by the aid of a foreign power, the price of his treachery to his constituents.” (Hamilton, Federalist No. 75). While to the American founders, policy or personal virtue did not reside in the President necessarily, no less a general than Carl von Clausewitz did not ﬁnd it in army generals either. Clausewitz held that war was not something that should be left to generals alone to plan or execute. As a former general, it is important to note his statement that the “military point of view must be subordinate to the political” (Clausewitz, 1831, p.607). To Clausewitz, there was no such thing as purely military planning, and that if the military were allowed to plan and operate in the absence of political direction, then “damaging” results could be expected. Clausewitz’s most important insights concern this supremacy of policy in the planning and conduct of war. To Clausewitz, “policy ” should have a continuous inﬂuence on the military means chosen and used in war, it should “permeate all military operations” (ibid., p.87). Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. To him, “policy uniﬁes and reconciles all aspects of internal administration,” and “represents all interests of the community ” (ibid., p.606). Policy and its makers should do so because at any moment the state’s leaders have to balance the means available and the ends desired in the war, which undergo continuous change during the war. More importantly, policy leaders have to calculate the effects of using some means in one theater of a war on the whole of the war, where one battle and use of questionable means (e.g., torture, civilian bombing, excessive force etc.), could affect relations with allies and neutrals in other theaters and, of course, domestic unity and mobilization, which is necessary for the war’s successful prosecution. What may appear militarily expedient, or necessary, may not be politically acceptable in light of these larger factors, which have to be considered at all times during war. Most importantly, policy was not a pristine and uncorrupted sphere to Clausewitz, as he recognized that it can “err,” and serve “the ambitions, private interests and vanity of those in power” (Clausewitz, 1831, pp.606-607). Vanity in leaders is as timeless as is the hope that virtue can be taught and ethical regard for others might rule decision-makers. Each of the U.S. service academies and branches of the U.S. military has ethical codes of conduct precisely because they understand the necessity of this instruction and the mastering of the “evil principle” within as Kant noted in our last module. But to what end are we to master our ethical behavior? To whom do we have a duty, and what is this duty? Lesson 3 of 8 Types of National Security Ethical Dilemmas, Relationships, Issues In 1994, the Rwandan civil war descended into genocide, with the majority Hutu population slaughtering upward of 800,000 minority Tutsis. The United Nations Security Council had acted, sending forces under Canadian Major General Romeo Dallaire to stabilize the situation, but the U.S. did not support the effort in the crunch, when it counted most. At that time, General Wesley Clark asked dismissively: “Is it Hutu and Tutsi, or Tutu and Hutsi?” (Power, 2001, p.88), while President William Clinton said simply: “our interests are not suﬃciently at stake in so many of them (ethnic conﬂicts like Rwanda) to justify a commitment of our folks” (ibid., p.104). The somewhat preventable atrocities during the genocide in Rwanda caused General Dallaire to take his own life in its aftermath. In 1994, there was no “Responsibility to Protect” U.N. Security Council resolution normatively obligating powerful nations to act in defense of aggrieved citizens elsewhere in the world, but we are still left to contemplate the ethical responsibility to act in these types of situations. Must the U.S. intervene everywhere where a civil conﬂict descends into humanitarian catastrophe? Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Is there a moral duty to intervene, and does this exist only abroad for a great power like the U.S.? What of the domestic or smaller group environments? When President Dwight Eisenhower sent the U.S. Army ’s 101st Airborne division to Little Rock, Arkansas to enforce school desegregation in September 1957, it would seem an ethical, even noble and virtuous action, based on fundamental principles of equality and justice. But things look differently when you consider the Cold War and the battle within the anti-colonialist developing countries around the world where the Soviet model loomed as a potent rival, with its pretense of peaceful existence among its many diverse “republics.” Eisenhower acted morally and ethically in this instance, but the ethical assessment becomes strained as Eisenhower was more motivated by his desire to win the struggle for hearts and minds in the Third World contest against the Soviet Union, and the conditions in the U.S. deep south were hurting his ability to do so. Ike and Trump: Using Federal Troops in Relation to AfricanAmerican Rights U.S. Troops Escort African American Students into Little Rock Central High School. President Donald Trump leaving White House, June 1, 2020, with General Milley in fatigues. Eisenhower’s Choice: Trump’s Choice: It is September 1957 in Little Rock, Arkansas. It is June 1, 2020 in Washington, DC. Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus has moved Demonstrators are gathered in the streets and national guard troops under his control to parks around the White House to protest recent enforce Jim Crow segregation in the public incidents of killings of African-Americans by local schools, acting forcibly against the 1954 police. President Trump uses federal forces to Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of clear demonstrators from Lafayette Square, and Education of Topeka, Kansas. President General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Eisenhower intervenes, using the U.S. Army ’s of Staff, the highest ranking U.S. military oﬃcial, 101st Airborne division, enforcing order on the joins President Trump to walk through the cleared streets and inclusion of African-American streets for a photo at the St. John’s Episcopal students in the school. Church. In Your View, Were These Uses of Federal Forces in Times of Domestic Civil Unrest Equally Valid — Morally, Ethically? If they were equally valid or motivated similarly, what was the compelling strategic interest in tear-gassing and attacking Yes demonstrators for a photo op? What was the Justice, Common Good, or Rights ethical standard about treating people equally in everyone’s interest? Despite the powerful co-determining factor of Cold War rivalry with the Soviets, Eisenhower did use U.S. forces to promote domestic American values of equality and justice. Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Nearly a decade after integration of the U.S. military, armed enforcement of segregation by local forces was intolerable to both domestic and strategic policy arenas. As columnist Walter Lippman noted: “The caste system in this country, particularly when as in Little Rock it is maintained by troops, is an enormous, indeed an almost insuperable, obstacle to our leadership in the cause of freedom and human equality.” What was the ethical standard involved here for President Trump and Chairman Milley? Restoring good order and discipline, where there was no disorder among demonstrators who were legally allowed to congregate in these public spaces? U.S. Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, had said previously that the Pentagon would support efforts to “dominate the battle space” on American streets in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. No Injustice against some Americans due to their race is always unethical and immoral; injustice to many Americans gathering peacefully is equally unethical and immoral. If it was ethically valid, why did General Mark Milley apologize? Watch this video and ask yourself if there was any ethical value in this state action. Ethical evaluation of Presidential actions (and similarly situated strategic oﬃcials) is complicated due to the simultaneity of the domestic and foreign realms in their decisions. But, decisions by lesser public oﬃcials and even the lowest ranking individual are also ethically complex. When confronted with ethical decisions, particularly within groups, individuals face diﬃcult options, including: follow orders (blindly, or with unspoken personal reservations); conform to suboptimal leader/group pressures (i.e., groupthink); resist (passively, actively); dissent or resign; whistle-blow against the group and/or leader; etc.Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Do you have a duty to tell the truth, even unwelcome truths, and resist someone else’s conception of the necessity of following their own “noble lie,” for example? Your own moral and ethical compass informs here, as does the likely contentious understanding of what is lawful, constitutional, and/or professionally responsible (recall Atkinson, 2015, pp.39-40 from Module 1). Code Pink Protesters. Win McNamee, Getty Images News In one reading, this was the case with Edward Snowden and his release of classiﬁed operational details of transnational spying by the NSA. Snowden saw a higher duty to the individual liberties of Americans enshrined in the Constitution (e.g., the 4th amendment “right” to privacy), while nearly all national governmental actors saw this as an act of treason, not whistle-blowing (except perhaps for large segments in the U.S. Congress). To the generals and admirals who have run the NSA over the years, the possible infringement on individual citizens’ rights may be superseded by the state’s need to defend itself against all enemies, foreign and domestic (again, at the state level, ethical decisions simply mean choosing the least worst option as all have negative costs associated with them). To them, it was legitimate to eavesdrop on allied leaders in Germany and Brazil as well as any actors operating in potentially hostile states like China or Russia. Much like your view on whether there exists a duty to intervene abroad in humanitarian tragedies, how you come down on the ethical question of Constitutional rights infringement says more about your own ethical reasoning processes and standards. Lesson 4 of 8 Ethical Reasoning and Your Ethical Standards As you will discover in the Engage discussion forum, your personal ethical reasoning characteristics and standards often go unexamined. Yet, they matter supremely, as you navigate your personal and professional lives’ many challenges. Can you identify and defend the ethical principles that you draw upon for decision-making? As a reading from Module 1 put it simply, do you believe you evaluate ethically-laden choices by reasoning from: principle; or, consequence; or, duty; or virtue? These different sounding ethical standards are not abstract, as each of us seeks to make the right ethical choice, but each may be drawing on different wells of inﬂuence in how we reason and decide. The choice you make is often a function of your moral character and courage, your personal values of integrity and honor, and your internal sense of what is right and wrong. You develop these standards over time, through several often-competing inﬂuences: family, peers, friends, education, religious/spiritual beliefs, cultural inﬂuences, worldly experiences, etc. Personal …
Purchase answer to see full attachmentEthical Reasoning: Striking the Balance Between Virtue, Policy and the Greater Good Activity Instructions/ Details In this and several of the next modules, you will reflect on what you’ve learned and assess how it fits with your professional experiences and prior knowledge. In this activity, you will simply assess how what you have learned this first two weeks compares to what you knew previously, and how it might benefit you in your academic and career aspirations. Please answer the following: • • What did you learn that was new to you, or brought new ideas on familiar topics to you (e.g., about your own ethical type; your current or past organizations’ ethical codes; events, instances etc.)? Drawing on your own personal and/or professional experiences, what value do you see in organizational ethical codes of conduct? Do they work in the national security domain, as you have experienced it or studied it? You may draw on any examples you see fit here, particularly if you prefer impersonal ones. Learning Reflections Criteria This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeReflections Ratings 100 pts Exemplary Assignment addresses the question with specific examples and thoughtful insight. 85 pts Satisfactory Assignment addresses the question with some examples and insight. 55 pts Minimally Responsive Assignment addresses the question but does not provide examples and offers little insight. Pts 0 pts Unacceptable The assignment is not submitted. Total Points: 100 Submission Your assignment should be approximately 150 words in length and should substantively integrate any relevant assigned content of the module and draw on what you have learned by going through the course. Be sure to check your work and correct any spelling or grammatical errors before you submit. 100 pts Topic Proposal Rubric Please note that the grade on this assignment and feedback are intended to help improve your proposal for the final paper. Criteria Thesis/Problem Statement and significance of issue Summary of key information related to issue Exemplary 60 The thesis/problem statement is succinct and clearly defined. Significance of the topic and need for research in this area is clearly and succinctly noted. 40 points Includes background information that clearly summarizes the key components related to the topic. Topic Proposal Rubric Proficient Progressing 51 points 45 points The thesis/problem The thesis/problem statement is defined statement is missing and the significance information or has and need for research too many in this area is noted. components. The Minor points need significance and need further development. for research in this area is implied; however, more explicit information is needed. 34 points 30 points Includes background Identifies some key information that components related summarizes the most to the topic. key components related to the topic. However, information is vague and some Minor points need components are further development missing. to clarify for the reader. Incomplete 39 points The thesis/problem statement is not clear to the reader. The significance and need for research in this area is missing. Unacceptable 33 points The thesis/problem statement is cannot be determined from the information provided. 0 0 points Did not submit assignment 26 points There is little information provided on key components related to the topic 22 points Information provided demonstrates misconceptions with the content, is incomplete, and is unclear to the reader. 0 points Did not submit assignment. OR the information provided demonstrates some misconceptions with the content. BNS301: Ethical Reasoning Processes Module 2 Introduction Virtue Among National Security Decision-Makers Types of National Security Ethical Dilemmas, Relationships, Issues Ethical Reasoning and Your Ethical Standards The Reasoning Process: Ethical Con icts The Ethical Battlespace Core Values, Institutional Value and Codes of Ethics Your Ethical Type Lesson 1 of 8 Introduction U.S. Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson watching a helicopter ﬂight exercise “ In the military, ordinary moral issues take on a special seriousness because decisions and actions so frequently have life and death implications. Leaders entrusted with immense power over other human beings and with the employment of immensely powerful weapons cannot take ethics lightly. The stakes are too high.” – (Stromberg et al., 1982, p.30) As you reviewed in Module 1, the U.S. national security arena is vast and includes not only all branches of the military, but also the many aspects of civilian political authority wherein violent means might be employed for policy purposes which may end with violent outcomes, whether at home or abroad. Because of the high stakes involved, a great deal of scrutiny is applied to the individuals and organizations working in the national security arena. Their individual and collective ethical compasses and conduct matter. U.S. Marine oﬃcer meets with Japanese refugees in a school being used as a shelter (March 2011). This scrutiny occurs everywhere across the national security arena and in the public domain, sometimes simultaneously as with scandals or successes like Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, My Lai in Vietnam, disaster relief with Japan in 2011, or democratic restoration successes as in Haiti in 1994, etc. Beyond the military service branches and organizations (i.e., Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Regional Combatant Commands, Joint Special Operations Command, etc.), the US national government bureaucracies related to national security are vast. They include, among others, these organizations within the Executive branch of the federal government: National Security Council Department of Defense Oﬃce of the Director of National Intelligence Central Intelligence Agency National Security Agency Department of Homeland Security Department of State Federal Bureau of Investigation Each one of these actors has the capacity to use coercive and/or violent means at home or abroad. The U.S. Congress and the federal judicial system also matter to ethical conduct in national security matters, as they often intervene (or fail to) in important national security instances. These federal entities often shed unwelcome light on important national security events, particularly when the “free” press exercises its “right” to publish unvarnished accounts of ethically-laden events. But, we are still left with the diﬃcult questions of who is (and ought be) empowered to make decisions about using violent means, and what is their ideal ethical compass? Lesson 2 of 8 Virtue Among National Security Decision-Makers “The great burden of military ethics lies in this: if those who control the power to kill and maim are evil or morally unﬁt, we unleash a torrent of sinister power.” – (Toner, 1995, p.134). In the U.S., many unelected leaders accompany elected authorities in making crucial national security decisions, and the constitutional structure of American democracy was established to try and control the worst impulses of humanity in these situations. There is simply, however, no sure way to make all people virtuous. Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Or, can virtue and ethically correct behavior be learned, and if so, who is to teach it to those who need it most in the national security community? James Madison once observed: “The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, ﬁrst to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold the public trust.” (Madison, 1788, Federalist No. 57). The founders of the American republic did not place their trust in the virtuous leader, the philosopher King of Platonic ideal; instead, they created many checks and balances in the U.S. systems of governance and invited everyone to struggle for power within this divided federal system. Purdue University Ethics and Morality Question. Even Alexander Hamilton, who is used currently to justify an expansive unitary theory of executive power, was particularly distrustful of the oﬃce of the President. He held the President will succumb to “temptations to sacriﬁce his duty to his interest.” A President may be: “An avaricious man [who] might be tempted to betray the interests of the state to the acquisition of wealth…mak(ing) his own aggrandizement, by the aid of a foreign power, the price of his treachery to his constituents.” (Hamilton, Federalist No. 75). While to the American founders, policy or personal virtue did not reside in the President necessarily, no less a general than Carl von Clausewitz did not ﬁnd it in army generals either. Clausewitz held that war was not something that should be left to generals alone to plan or execute. As a former general, it is important to note his statement that the “military point of view must be subordinate to the political” (Clausewitz, 1831, p.607). To Clausewitz, there was no such thing as purely military planning, and that if the military were allowed to plan and operate in the absence of political direction, then “damaging” results could be expected. Clausewitz’s most important insights concern this supremacy of policy in the planning and conduct of war. To Clausewitz, “policy ” should have a continuous inﬂuence on the military means chosen and used in war, it should “permeate all military operations” (ibid., p.87). To him, “policy uniﬁes and reconciles all aspects of internal administration,” and “represents all interests of the community ” (ibid., p.606). Policy and its makers should do so because at any moment the state’s leaders have to balance the means available and the ends desired in the war, which undergo continuous change during the war. More importantly, policy leaders have to calculate the effects of using some means in one theater of a war on the whole of the war, where one battle and use of questionable means (e.g., torture, civilian bombing, excessive force etc.), could affect relations with allies and neutrals in other theaters and, of course, domestic unity and mobilization, which is necessary for the war’s successful prosecution. What may appear militarily expedient, or necessary, may not be politically acceptable in light of these larger factors, which have to be considered at all times during war. Most importantly, policy was not a pristine and uncorrupted sphere to Clausewitz, as he recognized that it can “err,” and serve “the ambitions, private interests and vanity of those in power” (Clausewitz, 1831, pp.606-607). Vanity in leaders is as timeless as is the hope that virtue can be taught and ethical regard for others might rule decision-makers. Each of the U.S. service academies and branches of the U.S. military has ethical codes of conduct precisely because they understand the necessity of this instruction and the mastering of the “evil principle” within as Kant noted in our last module. But to what end are we to master our ethical behavior? To whom do we have a duty, and what is this duty? Lesson 3 of 8 Types of National Security Ethical Dilemmas, Relationships, Issues In 1994, the Rwandan civil war descended into genocide, with the majority Hutu population slaughtering upward of 800,000 minority Tutsis. The United Nations Security Council had acted, sending forces under Canadian Major General Romeo Dallaire to stabilize the situation, but the U.S. did not support the effort in the crunch, when it counted most. At that time, General Wesley Clark asked dismissively: “Is it Hutu and Tutsi, or Tutu and Hutsi?” (Power, 2001, p.88), while President William Clinton said simply: “our interests are not suﬃciently at stake in so many of them (ethnic conﬂicts like Rwanda) to justify a commitment of our folks” (ibid., p.104). The somewhat preventable atrocities during the genocide in Rwanda caused General Dallaire to take his own life in its aftermath. In 1994, there was no “Responsibility to Protect” U.N. Security Council resolution normatively obligating powerful nations to act in defense of aggrieved citizens elsewhere in the world, but we are still left to contemplate the ethical responsibility to act in these types of situations. Must the U.S. intervene everywhere where a civil conﬂict descends into humanitarian catastrophe? Is there a moral duty to intervene, and does this exist only abroad for a great power like the U.S.? What of the domestic or smaller group environments? When President Dwight Eisenhower sent the U.S. Army ’s 101st Airborne division to Little Rock, Arkansas to enforce school desegregation in September 1957, it would seem an ethical, even noble and virtuous action, based on fundamental principles of equality and justice. But things look differently when you consider the Cold War and the battle within the anti-colonialist developing countries around the world where the Soviet model loomed as a potent rival, with its pretense of peaceful existence among its many diverse “republics.” Eisenhower acted morally and ethically in this instance, but the ethical assessment becomes strained as Eisenhower was more motivated by his desire to win the struggle for hearts and minds in the Third World contest against the Soviet Union, and the conditions in the U.S. deep south were hurting his ability to do so. Ike and Trump: Using Federal Troops in Relation to AfricanAmerican Rights U.S. Troops Escort African American Students into Little Rock Central High School. President Donald Trump leaving White House, June 1, 2020, with General Milley in fatigues. Eisenhower’s Choice: Trump’s Choice: It is September 1957 in Little Rock, Arkansas. It is June 1, 2020 in Washington, DC. Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus has moved Demonstrators are gathered in the streets and national guard troops under his control to parks around the White House to protest recent enforce Jim Crow segregation in the public incidents of killings of African-Americans by local schools, acting forcibly against the 1954 police. President Trump uses federal forces to Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of clear demonstrators from Lafayette Square, and Education of Topeka, Kansas. President General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Eisenhower intervenes, using the U.S. Army ’s of Staff, the highest ranking U.S. military oﬃcial, 101st Airborne division, enforcing order on the joins President Trump to walk through the cleared streets and inclusion of African-American streets for a photo at the St. John’s Episcopal students in the school. Church. In Your View, Were These Uses of Federal Forces in Times of Domestic Civil Unrest Equally Valid — Morally, Ethically? If they were equally valid or motivated similarly, what was the compelling strategic interest in tear-gassing and attacking Yes demonstrators for a photo op? What was the Justice, Common Good, or Rights ethical standard about treating people equally in everyone’s interest? Despite the powerful co-determining factor of Cold War rivalry with the Soviets, Eisenhower did use U.S. forces to promote domestic American values of equality and justice. Nearly a decade after integration of the U.S. military, armed enforcement of segregation by local forces was intolerable to both domestic and strategic policy arenas. As columnist Walter Lippman noted: “The caste system in this country, particularly when as in Little Rock it is maintained by troops, is an enormous, indeed an almost insuperable, obstacle to our leadership in the cause of freedom and human equality.” What was the ethical standard involved here for President Trump and Chairman Milley? Restoring good order and discipline, where there was no disorder among demonstrators who were legally allowed to congregate in these public spaces? U.S. Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, had said previously that the Pentagon would support efforts to “dominate the battle space” on American streets in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. No Injustice against some Americans due to their race is always unethical and immoral; injustice to many Americans gathering peacefully is equally unethical and immoral. If it was ethically valid, why did General Mark Milley apologize? Watch this video and ask yourself if there was any ethical value in this state action. Ethical evaluation of Presidential actions (and similarly situated strategic oﬃcials) is complicated due to the simultaneity of the domestic and foreign realms in their decisions. But, decisions by lesser public oﬃcials and even the lowest ranking individual are also ethically complex. When confronted with ethical decisions, particularly within groups, individuals face diﬃcult options, including: follow orders (blindly, or with unspoken personal reservations); conform to suboptimal leader/group pressures (i.e., groupthink); resist (passively, actively); dissent or resign; whistle-blow against the group and/or leader; etc. Do you have a duty to tell the truth, even unwelcome truths, and resist someone else’s conception of the necessity of following their own “noble lie,” for example? Your own moral and ethical compass informs here, as does the likely contentious understanding of what is lawful, constitutional, and/or professionally responsible (recall Atkinson, 2015, pp.39-40 from Module 1). Code Pink Protesters. Win McNamee, Getty Images News In one reading, this was the case with Edward Snowden and his release of classiﬁed operational details of transnational spying by the NSA. Snowden saw a higher duty to the individual liberties of Americans enshrined in the Constitution (e.g., the 4th amendment “right” to privacy), while nearly all national governmental actors saw this as an act of treason, not whistle-blowing (except perhaps for large segments in the U.S. Congress). To the generals and admirals who have run the NSA over the years, the possible infringement on individual citizens’ rights may be superseded by the state’s need to defend itself against all enemies, foreign and domestic (again, at the state level, ethical decisions simply mean choosing the least worst option as all have negative costs associated with them). To them, it was legitimate to eavesdrop on allied leaders in Germany and Brazil as well as any actors operating in potentially hostile states like China or Russia. Much like your view on whether there exists a duty to intervene abroad in humanitarian tragedies, how you come down on the ethical question of Constitutional rights infringement says more about your own ethical reasoning processes and standards. Lesson 4 of 8 Ethical Reasoning and Your Ethical Standards As you will discover in the Engage discussion forum, your personal ethical reasoning characteristics and standards often go unexamined. Yet, they matter supremely, as you navigate your personal and professional lives’ many challenges. Can you identify and defend the ethical principles that you draw upon for decision-making? As a reading from Module 1 put it simply, do you believe you evaluate ethically-laden choices by reasoning from: principle; or, consequence; or, duty; or virtue? These different sounding ethical standards are not abstract, as each of us seeks to make the right ethical choice, but each may be drawing on different wells of inﬂuence in how we reason and decide. The choice you make is often a function of your moral character and courage, your personal values of integrity and honor, and your internal sense of what is right and wrong. You develop these standards over time, through several often-competing inﬂuences: family, peers, friends, education, religious/spiritual beliefs, cultural inﬂuences, worldly experiences, etc. Personal …
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