Part 2 Ethics terminology for UPSC IAS MAINS EXAM
8) Selflessness
Holder of the public office should act solely in terms of public interest. He should not act in order to gain financial or other benefits for himself, his family or friends
9) Objectivity
In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit.
10) Openness/Transparency
Definition: Holder of the public office should be as open as possible about his decisions and actions. He should give reasons for his decisions and restrict only in special cases
“Transparency is the biggest disinfectant which can curb corruption in the system Transparency is the tool which can expose the gap between political rhetoric and actual development”
11) Integrity
Definition: Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to outside individuals or organisations that might seek to influence them in the performance of their official duties.
An individual is said to possess the virtue of integrity if the individual’s actions are based upon an internally consistent framework of principles. One can describe a person as having ethical integrity to the extent that the individual’s actions, beliefs, methods, measures and principles all derive from a single core group of values Civil servants shall not only be honest in fact, but beyond the reach of suspicion of dishonesty
Examples:
Friend’s forcing to smoke. They said they’ll sponsor. They started teasing me saying I’m a child. Yet I didn’t smoke.
A – Head of the Ragging Squad. A got a complaint on B who is A’s closest friend. B starts influencing A.
Integrity and Civil Service: Monetary power,
threat and political pressure
Quote: Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.
12) Accountability
Holder of the public office is accountable to their decisions and actions to the public and they must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny is appropriate to their office
Caesar’s wife should be above all suspicion
13) Leadership
Holder of the public office should promote and support these principles by their exemplary actions.
2nd ARC
14) Honesty and its relationship with integrity
“Man of integrity is not only uncorrupt but also uncorruptible”
Integrity is consistently following moral values in all situations
Integrity is about having consistency in what one think, what one speaks and what one do. It is walking the talk.
Moral integrity
Intellectual integrity
Intellectual integrity is defined as recognition of the need to be true to one’s own thinking and to hold oneself to the same standards one expects others to meet.
Organizational integrity
15) Impartiality
Civil servant while taking a decision should base the decision on merit/objective criteria and he must not place the decision based upon parochial criteria such as race/religion etc
Maintaining political neutrality & non-partisanship while performing his duty of public service by serving the political ideology of the elected govt., without letting his own ideology or liking for a group affecting his duty. Insular from politicization of services
16) Dedication to public service Unflinching service to the public Ex: During natural disasters
17) Accountability
It is the act of making the civil servants
answerable for his acts of omissions/commissions.
Answerability must be backed up by enforcement
mechanism
18) Sympathy
Sense of pity and feeling bad for others conditions
19) Empathy
Putting one in others position and trying to
understand what the other person is going
through
20) Compassion
Empathy + action
Mother Teresa
2004 Tsunami disaster relief – PM Relief Fund
21) Tolerance
Attitude of fairness towards someone who’s
viewpoints or opinions, caste, religion, race,
gender etc. is different than yours
Sir, I may not agree with what you say, but I’ll
defend to my death your right to say so – Voltaire
22) Leadership
Sathish Dawan and APJ Abdul Kalam Story
MSD
23) Selflessness
Holders of public office should act solely in terms of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other benefits for themselves, their family or their friends
24) Altruism
The principle or practice of unselfish concern for or devotion to the welfare of others.
It is the opposite of egoism.
Altruism is an ethical doctrine that holds that the moral value of an individual’s actions depend solely on the impact on other individuals, regardless of the consequences on the individual itself.
Ethical Altruism:
An action is morally right if the consequence of that action is more favorable than unfavorable “to everyone except the agent”.
MSD Stepping out of the captaincy to nurture
Kohli to train and take up the team and challenges
further.
25) Conscience
Definition: Conscience is the part of your mind
that tells you whether what you are doing is
morally right or wrong.
In short, conscience is a term which we use to denote the inner mind.
Quote: “The human voice can never reach the
distance that is covered by the still small voice of conscience.” – Gandhi
There is a higher court than courts of justice and that is the court of conscience. It supercedes all other courts.
Conscience is to law as a brush is to paint.
