Enron. Tyco. WorldCom. These are just a few of the companies that have been featured in the headlines for their monumental scandals. According to philosophy professor Lisa H. Newton, more and more people like Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling; who held high-ranking positions in Enron, seem to be finding subtler ways to make greater profits under-the-radar. But in her new book “Permission to Steal,” Newton argues that this does not in fact make them inherently greedy and evil people.
Newton, who is also the director of Fairfield’s Applied Ethics Program and an associate in medicine at Yale Medical School, is seeking to correct our view of the people responsible for these scandals in her new book.
“The aim of my book is to help readers understand that the executives who orchestrate these shameful corporate wrongdoings are not evil. In fact, people like Kenneth Lay of Enron are actually good, decent, and hard-working individuals.” said Newton.
Despite the fact that Newton argued that they were good people, she explained how they could go down their dirty paths.
Quite simply, Newton used basic philosophy to help us understand what was going on in their minds.
“The basis of my book comes from Plato’s discussion of Gyges and the ring that made him invisible. Once he became invisible, he committed all the crimes in the book,” said Newton.
She said that the philosophical point behind the age-old story is if one is invisible, he or she would be more comfortable doing what they might not normally do if others could see them.
Coming back to the 21st century, this is exactly what is going on in corporate heads and beyond. We no longer live in small villages, Newton explained, where everyone knows who you are and what you are doing 24/7.
“We are obviously living in a society where much of what we do is private or anonymous. For example, people run rampant on the internet as “spammers” or “trolls,” as long as no one can find out who they actually are,” said Newton.
Much in the same way, people can’t exactly know whether or not a random executive is actually engaging in insider-trading, manipulating markets, or falsifying financial results under our noses, according to Newton.
Newton said that no matter what the government does to police the industries; people will always find ways to get around the rules.
“Instead of relying on regulation, all we can really count on is what is known as the “front page test,” she said. This term, which asks if one would be proud or ashamed to have their actions show up on the front page of the newspaper.
This is the risk that these executives make when they decide to do these dishonorable things.
Newton said, however, that is just the icing on the cake. They also lose their jobs, pay hefty fines, and spend years in prison. Newton’s advice is to “carry the village crowd in your hands” to help avoid the temptation that may come up in the future.
It isn’t like these executives are awful and sinister people. They are just as human as we are. As opportunities arise, it would seem wrong not to act on them.
“It is their decision to make, and ours to judge if and when they are caught,” said Newton.
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