Ethical Codes: Ethics In Police Administrations

Ethics in Police Administrations In the past year or so, the police administration has been plagued with lack of community trust and the representation that all officers are corrupt. Though many of these statements are made daily by the media, little light is shed on how police administrations around the country are adapting to these negative comments, however, one thing that needs to be looked at within all levels of the police administration is their definition of ethics. The dictionary defines ethics, as something that one believes is morally right or wrong (Webster). However, what one may think is “morally” right could be wrong to another. An article by Carole L. Jurkiewicz and Robert A. Giacalone states that there are three main components …show more content…
For example, even street gangs have an ethical code; however, although these codes are based on normal behavior to these individuals, outsiders believe these ethical codes are morally wrong. Jurkiewicz and Giacalone argue that the foundation of “good” ethical standards begins with the leader of the organization itself, if the leader has negative ethical values, so does the rest of the group. In order for a leader to be ethical, they must meet the following criteria in order to be successful: transparency, universalizability, justice, rights, egoism, principles, utility, and social contract (Jurkiewicz & Giacalone, 2016). It is important to remember that any issue proclaimed an ethical act is subject to bias and scrutiny from outside sources. This again, goes back to the issue of how one can tell what is ethical, or something that only appears to be …show more content…
The competence-based education is believed to be the most effective when stressing the importance of enforcing laws that are morally right. The goal of competence-based police education is to reach a point that the student is competent to perform the duties asked of him/her without question (Suva, 2012). Again, the problem that police organizations keep facing is how to teach ethics in general. As a community, do we want police to perform ethically or only wish they would? In other words, do we want them to be so ethically sound that some laws are not enforced? This comes down to the difference of morality and moral reality (Suva, 2012). Morality is more difficult and demanding, it is forced, whereas, moral reality is when one group begins to act morally responsible which leads to a more natural and desired behavior from the rest of the