Winter 2004

The contemporary negative view of rules seems to have arisen out of extreme interpretations of three otherwise positive contributions to the discipline of ethics: 1) the principle of toleration, 2) prescriptive ethics, and 3) personalism.

With respect to the first point, the principle of toleration has been a mainstay not only for personal ethics but also social and political ethics. Without it, a pluralistic democracy would be virtually impossible. However, recent tendencies to absolutize toleration have led to an undermining of inviolable principles. People in the workplace feel that they are "laying a trip on others," "imposing their ethics," or being intolerant of others when they raise legitimate ethical questions.

A cursory overview of the history of ethics reveals almost universal agreement about times when non-toleration is more legitimate than toleration (e.g., unacceptable risks to life and safety; prejudice and disrespect; unfairness, cheating, stealing, and lying). Yet in today's environment, sheepishness about raising ethical questions has allowed legitimate non-toleration to all but disappear from organizational environments.

With respect to the second point, the last 40 years has bought a wave of positive, proactive, creative thinking which has led to an emphasis of prescriptive (positive) over proscriptive (negative) motivations. In ethics this had the effect of emphasizing the golden rule over the silver rule. Recall that the silver rule is ethical minimalism ("do not do unto others what you would not have them do unto you"). This places emphasis on the avoidance of harm ("do not do a harm to others that you would not want done unto you"). In contrast to this, the golden rule is ethical maximalism ("do unto others as you would have them do unto you"). This places the emphasis on doing as much as one can to benefit one's neighbor and does not stop at the avoidance of harm.

This emphasis on the golden rule is responsible for important advancements in the areas of social justice, social responsibility, servant-based leadership, and the common good. So long as the silver rule is seen as the necessary presupposition of the golden rule (and the golden rule as the fulfillment of the silver rule), this trend will continue to produce good fruit for organizational and social ethics. Unfortunately, some theorists opposed the golden rule to the silver rule by implying that attention to the latter would undermine the former ("the silver rule is negative and constraining while the golden rule is positive and freeing; we need to get away from restrictive thinking so that we can accentuate the positive and creative"). Needless to say, without the silver rule, the golden rule will fail because "the end will not justify the means."

With respect to the third point, personalism has been an important part of the Jesuit contribution to ethics during the last 40 years. Attention to empathy, intrinsic dignity, individual ideals, affective contents, and the transcendentality (mystery) of the other have contributed considerably to the culture of workplace, family, community, and society. As long as rules and personalism are viewed in a complementary relationship, they will enhance one another. Personalism can put a human face on rules while rules provide guidance to persons with fully recognized intrinsic and transcendental dignity.

Unfortunately, some theorists opposed rules to personalism by implying that rules depersonalize. Many began to believe that rules were "impositions of an uptight elite" instead of necessary protections of the rights and dignity of all human beings. This led to a further undermining of "the end not justifying the means."