Developing a workable system of public service ethics is difficult owing, to a fundamental tension between law (public duties) and ethics (private duties). This article surveys the literature on legal ethics to observe how a well-defined public service profession has reconciled this tension, to some extent, through the adoption of a "legalized" code of ethics that also allows professionals to step from behind the prescribed system of rules and engage his or her individual ethical sense in appropriate instances. The article then surveys the literature on administrative ethics and concludes that contrary to current trends aimed at deprofessionalizing the field, public administration would benefit from creating a new profession of public administrators that could adopt a code of ethics similar to the legal profession's code of ethics, thus allowing for a fusion of legalized rules (public duties) and individual ethical precepts (private duties).
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Abel, R. (1981). Why does the ABA promulgate ethical rules?Texas Law Review, 59, 639-688.
2.
Adams, B. (1984). The frustrations of government service. Public Administration Review, 44, 5-13.
3.
American Bar Association (ABA) . (1983). Model rules of professional conduct and code of judicial conduct. Chicago: Author.
4.
Appleby, P. H. (1952). Morality and administration in democratic government. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.
5.
Arendt, H. (1972). Crises of the republic. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
6.
Bailey, S. K. (1965). Ethics and the public service. In R. C. Martin (Ed.), Public Administration and Democracy (pp. 283-298). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press.
7.
Black, H. C. (1979). Black's law dictionary (5th ed.). St Paul, MN: West
8.
Blackstone, W. (1818). Commentaries on the laws of England. (Vols. 1-4). Boston: T. B. Wait & Sons.
9.
Bok, D. C. (1983). A flawed system of law practice and training. Journal of Legal Education, 33, 570-585.
10.
Catron, B. L, & Denhardt, K. G. (1994). Ethics education in public administration. In T. L. Cooper (Ed.), Handbook of Administrative Ethics (pp. 49-61). New York: Marcel Dekker.
11.
Chandler, R. C. (1983). The problem of moral reasoning in American public administration: The case for a code of ethics. Public Administration Review, 43, 32-39.
12.
Chitwood, S. R. (1974). Social equity and social service productivity. Public Administration Review, 34, 29-35.
13.
Cody, W.J.M. , & Lynn, R. R. (1992). Honest government: An ethics guide for public service. Westport, C: Praeger.
14.
Cooper, T. L. (1987). Hierarchy, virtue, and the practice of public administration: A perspective for normative ethics. Public Administration Review, 47, 320-328.
15.
Cooper, T. L. (1990). The responsible administrator: An approach to ethics for the administrative role (3rd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
16.
Corwin, E. S. (1969). The "higher law" background of American constitutional law. In P. Woll (Ed.), American government: Readings and cases (3rd ed., pp. 37-54). Boston: Little, Brown.
17.
Davis, K. C. (1969). Discretionary justice. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.
18.
Denhardt, K. G. (1988). 7he ethics of public service: Resolving moral dilemmas in public organizations. Westport, CT: Greenwood.
19.
Dershowitz, A. M. (Ed.). (1990). The world's most famous court trial: Tennessee evolution case. Birmingham, AL: Notable Trials Library.
20.
Devine, D. J. (1972). The political culture of the United States. Boston: Little, Brown.
21.
Dewey, J. (1927). The public and its problems. New York: Holt.
22.
Diamond, M. (1992). Ethics and politics: The American way. In L. G. Rubin & C. T. Rubin (Eds.), The quest for justice: Readings in political ethics (3rd ed., pp. 295-315). Needham Heights, MA: Ginn.
23.
Dworkin, R. (1978). Taking rights seriously. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
24.
Finer, H. (1990). Administrative responsibility in democratic government. In W. L. Richter, F. Burke, & J. W. Doig (Eds.), Combating corruption/encouraging ethics: A sourcebook for public service ethics (p. 44). Washington, DC: The American Society for Public Administration.
25.
Fiss, O. M. (1981). The varieties of positivism. Yale Law Journal, 90, 1007-1016.
26.
Fletcher, G. P. (1981). Two modes of legal thought. Yale Law Journal, 90, 970-1006.
27.
Foster, G. D. (1981). Law, morality, and the public servant. Public Administration Review, 41, 29-34.
28.
Frankena, W. K. (1963). Ethics. New York: Prentice Hall.
29.
Frederickson, H. G. (1980). New public administration. University: University of Alabama Press.
30.
Fried, C. (1976). The lawyer as friend: The moral foundations of the lawyer-client relation. Yale Law Journal, 85, 1060-1089.
31.
Friedrich, C. J. (1972). The pathology of politics. New York: Harper & Row.
32.
Friedrich, C. J. (1990). Public policy and the nature of administrative responsibility. In W. L. Richter, F. Burke, & J. W. Doig (Eds.), Combating corruption/encouraging ethics: A sourcebook for public service ethics(pp. 43-44). Washington, DC: The American Society for Public Administration.
33.
Gawthrop, L. (1984). Public management systems and ethics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
34.
Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963).
35.
Golembiewski, R. T. (1965). Men, management, and morality: Toward a new organizational ethic. New York: McGraw-Hill.
36.
Goodsell, C. T. (1983). The case for bureaucracy: A public administration polemic. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House.
37.
Gore, A. (1993). Report of the National Performance Review: Creating a government that works better and costs less. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
38.
Gortner, H. F. (1991). Ethics for public managers. Westport. CT: Praeger.
39.
Gulick, L. (1937). Science, values, and public administration. In L. Gulick & L. Urwick (Eds.), Papers on the science of administration (pp. 191-195). New York: Augustus M. Kelley.
40.
Hamilton, A. , Madison, J., & Jay, J. (1961). The federalist papers. New York: New American Library.
41.
Harmon, M. M. (1974). Social equity and organizational man: Motivation and organizational democracy. Public Administration Review, 34, 11-18.
42.
Hart, D. K. (1974). Social equity, justice, and the equitable administrator. Public Administration Review, 34, 3-11.
43.
Hart, H.L.A. (1961). Law, liberty, and morality. New York: Vintage.
44.
Hart, H.L.A. (1963). The concept of law. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
45.
Hayek, F. A. (1944). The road to serfdom. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
46.
Hazard, G. C. Jr. (1991). The future of legal ethics. Yale Law Journal, 100, 1239-1280.
47.
Hejka-Ekins, A. (1988). Teaching ethics in public administration. Public Administration Review, 48, 885-891.
48.
Heywood, A. (1994). Political ideas and concepts: An introduction. New York: St. Martin's.
49.
Hobbes, T. (1958). Leviathan. Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill.
50.
Holmes, S. A. (1996, September 8). Dick Mornis's behavior and why it's tolerated. The New York Times, p. E5.
51.
Jones, W. T. (1970). The classical mind: A history of western philosophy (2nd ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
52.
Kavathatzopoulos, I. (1994). Training professional managers in decision-making about real life business ethics problems: The acquisition of the autonomous problem-solving skill. Journal of Business Ethics, 13, 379-386.
53.
Lee, H. (1960). To kill a mockingbird. New York: Warner.
54.
Lewis, A. (1991). Gideon's trumpet. New York: Random House.
Lilla, M. T. (1981). Ethos, "ethics," and public service. Public Interest, 63, 3-17.
57.
Locke, J. (1947). Two treatises of government. New York: Hafner.
58.
Lowi, T. (1969). The end of liberalism. New York: Norton.
59.
Luban, D. (1988). Lawyers and justice: An ethical study. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
60.
Lumbard, T. (1981). Setting standards: The courts, the bar, and the lawyers' code of conduct. Catholic University Law Review, 30, 249-271.
61.
MacIver, R. M. (1947). The web of government. New York: Macmillan.
62.
Marini, F. (Ed.). (1971). Toward a new public administration. Scranton, PA: Chandler.
63.
Marini, F. (1992). The uses of literature in the exploration of public administration ethics: The example of Antigone. Public Administration Review, 52, 420-426.
64.
Marx, F. M. (1940). Public management in the new democracy. New York: Harper & Row.
65.
McDonald, F. (1985). Novus ordo seclorum: The intellectual origins of the constitution. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
66.
McGregor, E. B. (1974). Social equity and the public service. Public Administration Review, 34, 18-29.
67.
Morgan, T. D. (1977). The evolving concept of professional responsibility. Harvard Law Review, 90, 702-743.
68.
Mosher, F. C. (1982). Democracy and the public service. New York: Oxford University Press.
69.
Nozick, R. (1974). Anarchy, state, and utopia. New York: Basic Books.
70.
Okun, A. M. (1975). Equality and efficiency: The big tradeoff. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.
71.
Osborne, D. , & Gaebler, T. (1992). Reinventing government: How the entrepreneurial spirit is transforming the public sector from schoolhouse to statehouse, City Hall to Pentagon. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
72.
Ostrom, V. (1974). The intellectual crisis in American public administration. University: University of Alabama Press.
73.
O'Toole, L. J. Jr. (1984). American public administration and the idea of reform. Administration & Society, 16, 141-166.
74.
Pangle, L. S. , & Pangle, T. L. (1993). The learning of liberty: The educational ideas of the American founders. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
75.
Patterson, L. R. (1984). Legal ethics: The law of professional responsibility (2nd ed.). New York: Matthew Bender.
76.
Porter, D. O. , & Porter, T. W. (1974). Social equity and fiscal federalism. Public Administration Review, 34, 36-43.
77.
Postema, G. J. (1980). Moral responsibility in professional ethics. New York University Law Review, 55, 63-89.
78.
Powell v. Alabama, 287 U.S. 45 (1932).
79.
Pratt, C. B. (1993). Critique of the classical theory of situational ethics in U.S. public relations. Public Relations Review, 19, 219-234.
80.
Rawls, J. (1971). A theory of justice. Cambridge, MA: Belknap.
81.
Redford, E. S. (1958). Ideal and practice in public administration. University: University of Alabama Press.
82.
Richardson, W. D. (1997). Democracy, bureaucracy, and character: Founding thought. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
83.
Richardson, W. D. , & Nigro, L. G. (1987). Administrative ethics and founding thought: Constitutional correctives, honor, and education. Public Administration Review, 47, 367-376.
84.
Rohr, J. A. (1986). To run a constitution: The legitimacy of the administrative state. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
85.
Rohr, J. A. (1989). Ethics for bureaucrats: An essay on law and values (2nd ed.). New York: Marcel Dekker.
86.
Rosenbloom, D. H. (1989). Public administration: Understanding management, politics, and law in the public sector (2nd ed.). New York: Random House.
87.
Schneyer, T. (1989). Professionalism as bar politics: The making of the model rules of professional conduct. Law and Social Inquiry, 14, 677-737.
88.
Schubert, G. A. (1960). The public interest. New York: Free Press.
89.
Shaffer, T. L. , & Shaffer, M. (1991). American lawyers and their communities. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.
90.
Shakespeare, W. (1904). King Henry VI, part 2, act 4, scene 2. In The works of William Shakespeare (pp. 31-64). New York: Oxford University Press.
91.
Sheeran, P. J. (1993). Ethics in public administration: A philosophical approach. Westport, CT: Praeger.
92.
Shuchman, P. (1968). Ethics and legal ethics: The propriety of the canons as a group moral code. George Washington Law Review, 37, 244-269.
93.
Simon, W. (1978). The ideology of advocacy: Procedural justice and professional ethics. Wisconsin Law Review, 1, 29-143.
94.
Streib, G. (1992). Ethics and expertise in the public service: Maintaining democracy in an era of professionalism. Southeastern Political Review, 20, 122-143.
95.
Taylor, H. (1992). The statesman. Westport, CT: Praeger.
96.
Thayer, F. C. (1973). An end to hierarchy! An end to competition!New York: New Viewpoints.
97.
Tocqueville, A. de (1969). Democracy in America. Garden City, MI: Anchor.
98.
Torp, K. H. (1994). Ethics for public administrators. National Civic Review, 83, 70-73.
99.
Tusa, A. , & Tusa, J. (1986). The Nuremberg trial. New York: Atheneum.
100.
Wakefield, S. (1976). Ethics and the public service: A case for individual responsibility. Public Administration Review, 36, 661-666.
101.
Waldo, D. (1948). The administrative state. New York: Ronald Press.
102.
Wasserstrorn, R. (1975). Lawyers as professionals: Some moral issues. Human Rights, 5, 1-24.
103.
Weber, M. (1992). Selections from politics as avocation. In L. G. Rubin & C. T. Rubin (Eds.). The quest for justice: Readings in political ethics (3rd ed., pp. 273-283). Needham Heights, MA: Ginn.
104.
Weisband, E. , & Franck, T. M. (1975). Resignation in protest. New York: Grossman.
105.
White, O. , & Gates, B. L. (1974). Statistical theory and equity in the delivery of social services. Public Administration Review, 34, 43-52.
106.
Wildavsky, A. (1980). How to limit government spending. Berkeley: University of California Press.
107.
Wilson, J. Q. (1975). The rise of the bureaucratic state. Public Interest, 41, 77-103.
108.
Wilson, J. Q. (1985). The rediscovery of character: Private virtue and public policy. Public Interest, 81, 3-16.
109.
Wilson, W. (1941). The study of administration. Political Science Quarterly, 56, 481-506. (Original work published June 1887)
110.
Wise, D. (1973). The politics of lying: Government, deception, secrecy, and power. New York: Random House.
111.
Wolfram, C. W. (1978). Barriers to effective public participation in regulation of the legal profession. Minnesota Law Review, 62, 619-647.
112.
Wolin, S. S. (1960). Politics and vision: Continuity and innovation in western political thought. Boston: Little, Brown.
