Ethical behavior in the public office

Public administration
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Public administration
Public administration involves the continuous and active part of any government structure that is responsible for the implementation of the recommendations made by the management through the organization process. Public administration is governed by a code of ethics and values.
Dwight Waldo notes obligation to profession and professionalism as a core aspect of public administration ethics. In his article, Public Administration and Ethics: A Prologue to a Preface (2009), he argues that each profession should have values that guide the behavior of members towards fellow workers, employers, clients and humanity at large. He further suggests that action should be a priority to every profession and the driving force should involve producing results (Stillman, 2010). This value is clearly evident in the occurrences that led to the blast in Centralia Mine No.5 and the rise of George Tenet to head the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Robert Weir was the assistant director of the Illinois Department of Mines and Minerals. He was the person in charge of receiving and processing reports made by the mine inspectors. Several inspections were made in the years before the explosion and he signed all the reports that clearly outlined the inspectors concerns of the hazardous status of the mines. In January 1947, a Coal Mines Association (CMA) official wrote a letter the management of the Centralia Mine instructing them to rectify the hazards noted in the inspector`s reports and notify him once the implementation was done. Feedback from the mining company representative acknowledged the correction of the hazards in the mine and later sent details upon request. Many employees in the mine management violated the Federal Mine Code for Bituminous Coal and Lignite Mines. The Mine inspectors Scanlan and Prez notified the company and their agencies of the violations in the mine but no action was taken by mine management to abate hazards. Weir`s focus however was on conducting the inspections, visiting the mines and holding meetings. He did not push for the implementation made in the reports to avert the looming disaster. In the end the mine exploded killing 111 men (Fanning, 2007).
This was a case of the superior officers focusing on the procedures rather than the results intended to be achieved by conducting the said procedures. One would arguably cite this as a classic case of negligence by a person in authority and unprofessionalism on their part. Ethics governing public administrators would have compelled the senior administrators to take action on the recommendations of the reports issued by the inspectors, and correct...