Download An Introduction to Development Ethics

An Introduction to Development Ethics
Formulation of USAID White Paper
on Development Ethics
October 2011
moral agency; thinking and acting ethically
CONCEPTS OF
DEVELOPMENT ETHICS
The Goal: Human Flourishing/Well-being
• Successful execution of a rational plan of life,
by which the person determines the good for
himself or herself.
• John Rawls
• “That human persons are flourishing means
that their lives are good, or worthwhile, in the
broadest sense.”
• Thomas Pogge
Moral Vocabulary?
• Myth of value-neutrality
• “Us” and “Them”
– North and South
– experts/managers and “beneficiaries”
• Ethics as rules vs. ethics as principled
motivation
• Ethical thinking, ethical discernment
– Ethical justification
• Development
“Development”
• More than “democracy”
• What it isn’t
– Goulet’s “triple curse” of underdevelopment
• Poverty
• Powerlessness
• Hopelessness
• The translation of economic opportunities into social
opportunities
• Stability and peace
• Democracy and participation
• Justice, human freedoms/human rights
Reality Check
ethics &
morality?
infrastructure
institutional
economic
development
health,
education
political
environmental
social &
cultural
Developing Country Context:
Widespread poverty
Resource scarcity
Weak institutions
Inadequate infrastructure
Shallow (if any) democracy
Corruption
Gender inequality, SGBV
Marginalized populations under threat
Environment under stress
Unmanaged land use
Poor or no planning
Significant health challenges
Inadequate education, brain-drain
Violent conflict, injustice
Why “Morality”?
• An important way of thinking about
development ~ moving beyond Codes of
Conduct or disclosure rules
• Qualitative focus to “development” ~ pursued
through discernment and moral intuition
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Development for what? For whom?
Development meaning what? Who defines this?
How much is enough? Who gets to decide?
Who is responsible for development? Why?
What about trade-offs? And the losers?
Moral content?
• In less developed countries, growing
extremes of wealth and poverty
– A pampered elite vs. those suffering the most
crushing human poverty
– Instability, violent conflict, impunity
• Stability and development depend on social
order ~ and social order comes from:
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social contract ~ an agreement to “behave”
power and coercion (and sometimes tyranny)
cooperation and caring
competition ~ with rules and tradeoffs
Human Dignity ?
• What to do in societies seemingly hostile to
the concept of human dignity?
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Severe and worsening poverty
Deprivation of opportunities
Loss of hope, limited options
Loss of “voice”, lack of power
Dehumanization, extreme violence, SGBV
• Is respecting universal human dignity an
important goal of development that ought to
be prioritized by USAID?
– Merely rhetoric?
Pursuit of the Common Good ~ 1
• Policies and actions that best serve to
promote the essential components of human
well-being or flourishing for each person
or
• Going for the best net score of individual
interests within and among the whole
community (utilitarian)
– i.e. sacrifices some people’s interests to further
that of many others
Pursuit of the Common Good ~ 2
• What is the “common good”?
– Subject to moral disagreements
– Identified, agreed upon, and “owned” only through
a participatory and deliberative democratic
process
• reasoning together ~ respectfully
• How does good governance facilitate the
articulation of a society’s sense of the
common good?
Pursuit of the Common Good ~ 3
• Unavoidable trade-offs
– “A moral justification must be provided to
justify this sacrifice of perceived selfinterest, and not simply the weight of
majority interests.”
• Richard Flathman
– Measuring the impact of trade-offs ~ a
decision-maker’s role
• “advocate” or “expert”?
• legitimacy?
Common Good Goals: Stability, Safety and Security
• Conditions of stability, order, predictability,
and freedom from bodily harm
• Healthy environment ~ to live within a country
without becoming ill, or dying early
• Economic security
– Access to employment and/or other forms of
welfare
• Rule of law and defense institutions that
ensure safety ~ police, judiciary, military
Participation & Voice ~ Who Governs? Why? How?
• Power, wealth, and “voice” concentrated at
the center ~ national governments & elites
– Weak or no accountability to non-elites, women,
marginalized groups
• Governments generally fail to:
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Offer and sustain vision-driven leadership
Demonstrate a public service ethos
Manage equitable distribution
Facilitate local participation
Listen to non-elite citizens
Participation and Inclusion ~ 1
• In conditions of scarcity, who ought to decide:
– What “good” development and “good” governance
mean
– What the obligations of good governance impose,
and when they must be met
– What should be done when “good governance”
values clash with other values
• Where’s the balance?
– Popular participation in governance vs.
representative democratic institutions of
government vs. elite control
– Hijacking or manipulating public participation
Participation and Inclusion ~ 2
• Is meaningful popular participation in
decision-making a realistic expectation?
– expensive, prolonged, subject to failure
– who identifies the “stakeholders”? on what basis?
who is excluded? why? with what mandate?
• Does donor-facilitated “stakeholder
participation” reflect accurate demographic
and power realities?
Participation and Inclusion ~ 3
• Deliberative Democracy is an ideal, not
wholly a practical objective
– What role for ideals and principles?
• “Careful structuring” of the participatory and
deliberative process:
– Differentiate and consider different views of
means and ends of development and good
governance
– Balance between expert opinion and public values
– Everyone has voice, everyone is listened to
Moral Visibility
• Illustrative moral and ethical dimensions:
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freedoms and opportunities ~ who enjoys?
land ownership & access rights ~ who controls?
environmental/ecological integrity ~ who profits?
inequitable distribution ~ “trickle down”
rights of vulnerable & marginalized minorities
democracy, deliberation, and participation
gender equality and women’s empowerment
reducing corruption and promoting integrity
mitigating/preventing violent conflict
caring about people and the environment
modeling public service
Ideals ~ 1
• Social justice
– Fair, even-handed treatment of all individuals and
groups within a society
– Prerequisite for the achievement of human
flourishing
• Rasmussen
• Care
– The “caring relationship” between self and others
• Gilligan
Ideals ~ 2
• Distributive justice
– On what basis should social institutions distribute
burdens and benefits? Enforced how?
• John Rawls
• Civic virtue, integrity, transformative
leadership, “followership”
• Aristotle
• Joanne Ciulla
• Human rights and freedoms
• Amartya Sen
Reality Check
• “Survival takes priority over dignity”
– Margalit
• Political leadership in the South is often topdown or even autocratic
– Neither accountable nor inclusive
– Seldom issues-driven
• Power prevails over principles
– Low public expectations of integrity
– Thin view of the “public good”, weak social capital
– Large segments of the population (women) lack
voice
moral demands and “good” governance
ETHICAL GOVERNANCE
Moral Demands
• Human rights claimants and duty bearers
– What happens when human rights cannot be met
right away?
• Basic human needs met first
– In scarcity, how distributed?
• Centralized planning, or the free market?
• Expecting and enforcing good governance
– Is democracy enough?
• Demanding tangible performance standards
from public servants
Challenge to Good Governance
• What ought decision-makers to do to respect
and respond to those moral demands that
recognition of basic human dignity entails?
• What about:
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social justice and equity?
human flourishing?
the common good?
participation and inclusion?
safety, stability and security?
a caring, compassionate society?
democratic values?
social capital?
Development … For What?
• Ideals of human and social well-being
• The “decent society” ~ honor in equal
measure = universal human dignity
– Margalit
• Respecting what is “truly human”
– Rousseau, Kant, Nussbaum, Sen
• Achieving freedom and human agency
– Sen, Crocker
core methodology of normative analysis
OBJECTIONS AND
RESPONSES
Five Objections
1) Moral issues are largely arbitrary and subjective in
nature, changing in scope and intensity
2) Seeking common ground on moral concerns risks
upsetting the status quo
3) The quality of a moral dialogue on substantive issues
depends upon uncommon tolerance, reflection,
mutual respect, and a deliberative ethos ~ rare in
governance processes
4) Moral values and systems are largely unreliable in
policy making ~ universalism vs. relativism
5) Moral values are extremely difficult to measure,
monitor and evaluate
Response to #1
moral issues are largely arbitrary and subjective
in nature, changing in scope and intensity
• Morality is not arbitrary
– persuasively justified and rational
– ethics is the systematic and critical study of moral
beliefs, values and concerns
• In ethics, our values and beliefs are
organized into various (and to some extent,
competing) systems, each of which exhibits
coherence and matches our considered
judgments and deeply felt beliefs
Response to #2
seeking common ground on moral concerns
risks upsetting the status quo
• Yes ~ attending to moral concerns risks
upsetting the status quo by thoughtfully
challenging the existing economic and power
relationships within any given society
• The existence of widespread poverty,
corruption, injustice, and the lack of universal
respect for human dignity demand such a
challenge
Response to #3
the quality of a moral dialogue on substantive
issues depends upon uncommon tolerance,
reflection, mutual respect, and a deliberative
ethos
• If this claim were accepted, it would be
difficult to imagine a society’s moral progress
over time
• Leadership of morally virtuous persons is not
a necessary condition to progress
• The application of an ethical framework to the
participatory process may facilitate a moral
dialogue of substance and quality
Response to #4
moral values and systems are largely unreliable
in policy making
• Certain values are universal and fundamental
to human nature
– e.g. Universal Declaration of Human Rights
• Local culture, tradition, and context ought to
significantly influence and shape the
implementation of development initiatives
– provided they are responsive to universal values
Response to #5
moral values are extremely difficult to measure,
monitor and evaluate
• Empirical data says much about progress in
achieving morally desirable goals
– birth weight of babies ~ a good proxy for
measuring shortcomings in quality of life and the
need for better nutrition and health care
• Qualitative factors are subject to meaningful
evaluation through a variety of techniques,
from focus groups to surveys
– the experience of poverty, the enjoyment of basic
freedoms and opportunities, and the prevalence of
respect for human dignity
measuring ethical progress in development
DATA DRIVEN ETHICAL
DEVELOPMENT
Measuring development ~ 1
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Poverty thresholds (Collier’s “Bottom Billion”)
8 Millennium Development Goals
Happiness and well-being; human suffering
Women’s empowerment; gender equity
Political freedom
– free, partly free, not free (Freedom House)
• Economic progress
– gross domestic product (GDP)
– gross national product (GNP)
– physical quality of life index (PQLI)
Measuring development ~ 2
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Human Development Index (HDI)
Capability Approach
Level and quality of democracy
USAID’s Strategic Framework for Africa
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Reduce corruption
Increase civil society’s effectiveness
Strengthen democratic governance and rule of law
Increase participation of marginalized groups
Improve fairness and inclusivity of political
processes
Standard Tools for Evaluating Development
• Through the Democracy & Good Governance
Lens
– Political economy analysis
• Power, rules of the competitive game
• Who is included, who is excluded?
– Economic analyses
• Market analysis
• Cost-benefit analysis
– Perceptions analysis
• “Customer” satisfaction
• Service delivery
Less Conventional (for USAID) Tools for Evaluating
Development
• Through the Democracy & Good Governance Lens
– Human development analysis (HDI)
– Other normative analyses
• Human rights, capability approach, Kantian duties
– Environmental analysis
– Gender analysis & gender audits
“It is one thing to design democratic
institutions, quite another to educate
or persuade citizens to live by
democratic precepts.”
~ Laurence Whitehead