The Political Ethics Of Public Service

This book provides a defense of democratic politics in American public service and offers the political ethics of public service as a realistic and optimistic alternative to the cynical American view toward politics and public service. The author’s alternative helps career public servants regain public trust by exercising constitutionally centered moral and political leadership that balances the regime values of liberty and equality in governing American society while contributing to the ethical progress of the nation. She identifies three distinct leadership styles of political ethics, enabling career public servants to reconcile their personal loyalties, morality, and consciences with the public and private morality of American society and their constitutional obligations to secure the democratic freedoms of Americans. Recognizing career public servants’ moral and institutional struggles, the book proposes a rigorous leadership development program to acclimate individuals to workplace psychological, moral, and political challenges. The view offered here is that career public servants must be a part of, rather than isolated from, American politics to be effective on the job.

This title was first published in 2000: The focus of this analysis is that of moral standards in public service, with special attention to the role(s) of officials. It presents discussion of some of the issues that seem to the contributors to be of pressing importance and that seem to have relevance for public service in the new millennium. It concentrates in particular on public officials, and the constraints imposed on them by the political environment in liberal democracies.

This book, by a group of specially selected scholars, focuses on topics of current debate in the field of public service ethics. The subjects covered include codes of ethics, how ethics can be taught, the dilemma of tragic choices, administrative discretion and the protection of human rights, the interests of the state, secrecy and freedom of information, the democratic environment, and the relevance of the law and trade unions.

The book is a welcome contribution to the literature on ethics as it provides a broader horizon of investigation than most familiar works in recent years. Jamil E. Jreisat, International Journal of Public Administration This book provides critical, up-to-date reviews on the field of ethics and integrity of governance, along with fresh future perspectives. Focusing on Europe and the US, it addresses the key dimensions of public service values, the integrity and rationality of governance, ethics management, and the ethics of governance politics. In each of these four areas, leading international scholars tackle the main issues and controversies facing the world today. The final chapter synthesizes these views and provides an ambitious and critical outline for future work in the field of ethics and integrity of governance. Emanating from the much heralded transatlantic dialogue , this study integrates both the European and American perspectives into a common voice for action. Ethics and Integrity of Governance will appeal to academics, researchers and practitioners in the areas of leadership and organisation, public policy and public administration, and public values and ethics.

Questions of ethics in public administration are increasingly in the news, where commentators seem too often detached from the sources of those ethics and their application to current political conflicts. American Public Service: Constitutional and Ethical Foundations examines public administration ethics as contextualized by constitutional, legal, and political values within the United States. Through case studies, hypothetical examples, and an easy-to-read discussion format, the authors explore what these values mean for specific duties of government managers and for the resolution of many contemporary issues confronting public sector officials. Key Features: • Describes the philosophical underpinnings of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights • Identifies the values that anchor and define what government and public administrators should do. • Indicates where these values fit into a framework for moral decision-making in the public sector, and how they apply to discussions of current controversies in public administration. • Written by authors with rich experience as both lawyers and academics in public administration programs.

Ethics and accountability have become important themes for modern government, as in most of the countries there is a severe crisis of legitimacy. Increasingly there is a feeling that performance management alone will not solve this crisis. Citizens also expect from politicians and public servants ethical responsible conduct. As to the ethics, however, there is a problem. Governance and new public management have raised new problems which cannot be solved by referring to the traditional bureaucratic ethics. Devolution and decentralisation processes have enhanced the responsibility of public servants. The increase of transparency and openness and the service orientation of public organisations have challenged the traditional values of discretion and equality before the rule. The growing interaction between the public and the private sector have raised the question of integrity. In light of these developments, it is important to update the ethical system, or reversibly, the traditional values of the public service can question some actual evolutions in government.

The groundbreaking "Ethics in Public Administration" set the agenda for a decade's worth of research in the theory and practice of ethics in the public sector. This long-awaited follow-up volume represents the state of the art in research on administrative ethics. It features all new contributions by many of the leading figures in the field, and addresses both the managerial and individual/moral dimensions of ethical behavior as well as new challenges to administrative ethics posed by globalization. A detailed introduction, opening passage, and conclusion lend context to each of the book's four main sections. "Ethics in Public Management" is must reading for any graduate level course in public sector ethics.