Ethical Issues In Ibm

Great Essays
Corporations have difficulty keeping a positive light shone on them, to the point where they have been diagnosed as psychopaths. Psychopaths typically show no empathy or compassion for others, feel no guilt for their actions, and can act irresponsibly or impulsively continuously. The Corporation outlined this theory on many different companies, such as Coca-Cola, Monsanto, and the Cochabamba protests in 2000, where instances of gross mistreatment of employees, deceit, and guiltless actions were highlighted. Although countless companies have checkered pasts, one seemingly innocent company stands out strong, that company being IBM. Throughout IBM’s history, there have been incidents of irresponsible behaviours, lack of empathy, and difficulty …show more content…
The aforementioned symptoms are shown in IBM; the inability to feel guilt, decietful and irresponsible behaviour, and lack of compassion for others. The company has denied discussion on the topic all together, preferring to disassociate themselves from one of the darkest periods in human history. Employees have denied knowing anything about the alliance with the Holocaust at all, while former employees claim that they knew all along. IBM has not settled on an exact standpoint on the issue, as different sources claim incongruous knowledge; apologists and telltales alike have their own version of the story, copiously contradicting one another. Leon Krzemieniecki, one of many few who were operating during the Holocaust, claims “I only know that this very modern equipment made possible the control of all the railway traffic in the General Government [of Poland].” Yet, Michael Zamczyk, a former IBM employee, researched heavily the effects IBM had during the Holocaust, and found connections to his own family being sent to Auschwitz, including his own father. Zamczyk has sought out apology, saying that “I felt that IBM owned an apology not only to me, but for what the company did during the war..I wanted the truth.” In The Corporation, vice president Irving Wladawski-Berger insisted “I really do believe that particular accusation has been fairly discredited as a serious accusation,” he says in the film. “They used equipment, that is a fact. But how much cooperation they got… that is the part that is discredited.” With the proof from documents and monetary gain accounted to the company, IBM has shown unceasing discrepancy involving the topic--one of many symptoms of a psychopath. IBM’s extent to obscure the association during World War II has gone so far that archives retaining to the 1940s are exempted from being examined.

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    The dilemma Cummins Engine Company, Inc. faced was Tim had a decision to either comply with the EPA or put the low emission engine production on hold and accept a non-conformity penalty. The challenge they faced was adhering to the consent decree and NOx emissions reduction would increase the total cost of ownership for companies purchasing the trucks and companies purchasing the trucks. This increased TCO could reduce their sales and upset stakeholders (Balancing Stakeholder Risks, 2014). This is an ethical dilemma within the stakeholder theory.…

    • 703 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The purpose of this paper is to show that throughout the 107 year history of General Motors, that the complex organizational structure suffered from fragmented divisions of mismanagement, the company culture remained secretive, unethical decisions were continually made, along with cover-ups concerning product safety. Research indicates that General Motors put profit before human lives and did not live up to its own ethics. Documented court cases against General Motor are referred to in this paper to show the unethical culture that existed within the corporation. In 2009, General Motors faced bankruptcy requiring a government bail out.…

    • 185 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    “Greed for the lack of better word is good” was one of the famous line from the 1987 movie “Wall Street”. Turns out not, nothing can presumably accentuate human greed more than corporate fraud. What happened with WorldCom Group, one of the world’s largest telecom giant, is a testament to how catastrophic human greed can be. With the failure of a multi-billion dollar telecom corporation, the world witnessed one of the largest accounting frauds in the history. What sets WorldCom’s case apart from Enron’s and other accounting fraud cases is that it didn’t fail just from accounting manipulations responsible for the overstatement of their earnings.…

    • 143 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The three companies, Tyco, HealthSouth and Nimble, all demonstrated a high level of unethical behaviour, which led to scandal and chaos. Unethical behaviour is not only detrimental to the company itself but also to society as discussed above in the…

    • 420 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Continuing to fail these guidelines, they demonstrate no willingness to listen, which is proven by symptom 5, feeling no guilt, as they tune out every harmful accusation and truism by justifying their need to make a profit, failing Nilsen’s guidelines. In addition, while meeting the criteria needed for Psychopathy, corporations are failing the guidelines William Rawlin’s advocates for ethical interpersonal communication as well. He focuses on four topics: openness, privacy, protection, and deception. He believes openness is not without limits and is not the need to be transparent. Corporations are neither open nor transparent in their communication, The Corporation documentary speaks of major companies functioning completely separate from society, not including the betterment of society in any of their major plans and goals.…

    • 685 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Ethical Case Study Answers

    • 1550 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Principal investigator-The first person I chose to explore was principal investigator (PI).. The first challenge faced involved deciding whether or not to send a visibly Greg home. I chose to send him home because he was visibly tired and the likelihood that his work would be subpar or involve mistakes would increase. In addition to preventing costly mistakes, I sent Greg home for his own health, and to let him know that PIs believe in rest. Next, Kim approached the PI with a problem while he was talking to Greg about exciting data.…

    • 1550 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Each year, “200 to 350 corporations are convicted in federal courts for offenses ranging from tax law violations to environmental crimes” (Adler et al. Pg. 322, 2013). The biggest problem many corporation face is defining corporate crimes. In order to understand the causation of crime and criminal behavior, these corporations need to become familiar with early interpretation and theories of criminality.…

    • 580 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Ailyn Chavira and Lucero Dominguez HealthSouth How do internal and external factors nurture the type of unethical behavior that has led to corporate scandals? In the case of HealthSouth they had both internal and external factors that lead to their issues with fraud. It's hard to believe that they never noticed the things that were slowly bringing them down but it's those sneaky things that can bring an entire company down.…

    • 862 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Inspired by Joel Bakan’s book, “The Corporation: The Pathologic Pursuit of Profit and Power”, The Corporation is an evoking documentary that presents the history of the corporation and the role it plays in society and our daily lives. The documentary presents the corporation as a paradox: “an institution that creates great wealth but causes enormous and often hidden harms.” Originally, corporations were gifts from people to serve the public. After the civil war, corporation lawyers gained rights of a person using the 14th Amendment. As a person, filmmakers diagnose the corporation as a psychopath.…

    • 990 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    The Schindler's List

    • 1747 Words
    • 7 Pages

    The Schindler’s List is Steven Spielberg’s award-winning film, which illustrates the profoundly nightmarish Holocaust. It recreates a dark, frightening period during World War II, when Nazi-occupied Kraków first dispossessed Jews of their businesses and homes, then forced them into ghettos and labor camps in Plaszów and finally resettled in concentration camps for execution. It is quite terrifying to think how far the Nazis were able to go with their murderous ideology. Which is the primary component of what makes the novel and film so nerve-wracking. It is difficult to imagine how an entire group that were so dehumanized by another group of people and were killed as if they were nothing but ‘bodies’ without minds or emotions.…

    • 1747 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Here I have identified three situations that I feel that needs to be addressed concerning some questionable practices by Joe Smith. My first concerning is that The CEO of Peninsula Hotel gave Joe Smith a case of some very expensive wine he happens to mention that his wife likes. Or how Joe was invited to go sailing with Bill and how he would hold business meeting at the Peninsula Hotel.…

    • 768 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Sena, Thank you very much for your valuable comment. I appreciate your comment. I want to say about this case, infact, Fingerhut is doing unethical practice only for their profit, they don't care about business ethics. So, we should not promote that type of business and practices in real life. We should realize what is consumer right and what is our business ethics concerning advertising and marketing issues.…

    • 72 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Deviance is a term used to describe behavior that goes against the established social and cultural norms. This behavior can have significant consequences for individuals, especially when committed by those who have power in society (Little, n.d., p. 4). The normalization of deviance can occur when unacceptable practices or standards become a new acceptable norm. Eventually, the deviant individuals themselves begin to believe that this behavior is routine and normal (Little, n.d., p. 9). Knottnerus et al.…

    • 1563 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Analyzing such ethical issues is very important as it illustrates the importance of ethics in nursing practice. It also provides an understanding of nurse’s responses to ethical dilemma following the ethical principles of nursing. The case scenario is going to be used to analyze how healthcare providers use the code of ethics in providing an excellent quality care to all patients regardless of their socioeconomic status, ethnicity, cultural, race, and…

    • 71 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Ethical Issues

    • 732 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Ethical issues faced by managers in dealing with international business There are many ethical issues that managers often face with dealing with international business, especially when they have to move to different countries. Not only do managers have to learn different languages and cultures, but they also have to learn how to deal with many ethical issues in other countries. Managers face ethical issues such as corruption, pollution, and employment issues when dealing with international business. It is a manager’s responsibility to learn how to deal with these issues in an ethical way. It is also their job to learn how to understand the ways of other cultures and what their political systems are like.…

    • 732 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays