Ethical Quandaries During Disaster

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Joseph G. Jarret
April 29, 2020

Over the last three decades, I have been afforded the opportunity to serve three different public entities in two different states as a managing attorney/chief legal counsel. All three positions required me to impart advice to long-standing ethics committees. Needless to say, once you get past, “Don’t lie, cheat or steal,” ethics becomes a complex area as we focus on what our mission is, as well as how we decide what we ought or ought not to do. This doesn’t change in the face of disaster.

The Ethical Challenge

If there is one thing that Covid-19 has taught us is that disasters pose unique and unusual problems for public entities by placing government workers in unfamiliar, unstable informational and logistical environments. As such, ethical issues abound during the diverse and rapidly changing situations that are the hallmark of crises and disasters. Public employees are being called upon to identify and refine emergency preparedness protocols for disaster response, and in so doing, include ethical guidance, alongside legal and performance frameworks. Such ethical guidelines are increasingly becoming common components of disaster response plans. Because disasters require a coordinated, multidisciplinary response by government to ensure that essential government functions and services continue in spite of the crisis, your employees are often faced with ethical choices, dilemmas and grey areas that are not explicitly set out in the ethics manual. In fact, many ethics manuals or policies are apt to provide less explicit directives while making strong moral claims on employees, elected and appointed officials. We’ve all heard stories about the gut-wrenching moral and ethical decisions with which healthcare professionals face during a pandemic, but what about the less dramatic, day-to-day duties and responsibilities of government? What about the actions of governors across the United States that serve to “relax the rules” when it comes to public sector procurement/purchasing, the reliance upon volunteers, the hiring of temporary personnel and the empowerment of local governments to declare local states of emergency? These actions often test the ethical fiber of an organization.

Maintaining an Ethical Organization

The ethical management of disaster and emergencies is a complex business that involves communication, education and training, awareness building, resource acquisition and planning and allocation as part of the disaster management cycle of mitigation, planning, response and recovery. The aforementioned often need to be accomplished quickly, with little time to analyze, debate or scrutinize. Such a scenario can come at a price if the government’s employees’ ethical behavior fails to conform to the accepted standards of public service. As such, leadership must ensure that employees, the public and the media appreciate the difference between a relaxing of the rules, and a suspension of the rules. While the former can encourage people to improvise, overcome and adjust, the latter can encourage some people to lose sight of the mission at hand. Consequently, it is crucial that everyone is assured that the rules of ethics, professionalism, etc. continue to be in full force and effect, and that the government’s fiscal resources will continue to be protected regardless of the challenges posed by the disaster. Leadership must take the time to identify the ethical process for planning and response, including considerations of transparency, public engagement and communicating information to the public. Failing to do so can tarnish an entity’s reputation as well as diminish the public’s faith, trust and confidence in their public servants.

For ethical guidance to be useful to the public employee, they must be practical and implementable. Although high-level, abstract frameworks were once prevalent in disaster planning—especially in the early days of pandemic planning—today’s ethical norms, rules and regulations must be clearly stated and justifiable. Their implementation must be practical, and contain easy-to-follow guidelines. Along with maintaining high ethical standards, leaders must also be on the lookout for moral distress. Moral distress is most commonly defined as a psychological state born of an individual’s uncertainty about his or her ability to fulfill relevant moral obligations. It often manifests itself when your employees experience a conflict between what they feel is ethically appropriate and what they are being requested or required to do. Leaders can reduce or eliminate moral distress by ensuring employees are made fully aware that they may be asked to do things during a disaster (e.g. setting the employee or procedures manual aside) that they wouldn’t otherwise be called upon to do, but for the disaster at hand. Again, instructions must be clear, concise, commonsensical and legal.

Conclusion

Public sector leaders have a duty and an obligation to plan for catastrophes as well as their response thereto. By investing in training and resources needed to minimize adverse events while having a plan in place to allocate scarce resources, leaders can go a long way in maintaining the highest ethical standards and the integrity of the organization.

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Author: Joseph G. Jarret is a public sector manager, attorney, and mediator who has served several state and local governmental entities in Florida and Tennessee. A former United States Army Armored Cavalry Office with service overseas, he lectures on behalf of the Master of Public Policy and Administration program in the Department of Political Science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He holds the B.S. in Criminal Justice, a Masters in Public Administration, a Juris Doctorate, and is a candidate for the Ph.D. in Educational Leadership from the University of Tennessee.

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