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WHAT IS WHISTLE-BLOWING?
Section of 7,000 word entry on ‘whistleblowing’ by Geoff Hunt in Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics, Academic Press, 1997. For the whole article and related entries please obtain the book in your library.
| WHISTLEBLOWING is the public disclosure, by a person working within an organisation, of acts, omissions, practices or policies perceived as morally wrong by that person and is a disclosure regarded as (or said to be, or treated as) wrongful by that organisation’s authorities. |
Here is a simple illustration: a civil engineer believes that a certain building practice is unsafe and reports this to their employer. The employer does not act on the report so the engineer takes it to their professional body. This body also does not act to the satisfaction of the engineer so they then decide to take their report to the media. The employer dismisses the engineer for gross misconduct in breaching confidentiality.
The term probably arises by analogy with the referee or umpire who draws public attention to a foul in a game by blowing a whistle, as in soccer.
Whistleblowing thus has three essential elements:
Conceptual and ethical difficulties arise over such questions as the rightness of the perception of wrongdoing, the justifiability of ‘going public’, the nature and scope of corporate, managerial, professional and employee responsibility, the conflicting claims of confidentiality and freedom of speech and of loyalty and honesty, and the openness and accountability of organisations.
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When is Disclosure Justifiable?
When is an unauthorised public disclosure justifiable and when unjustifiable? Although perceptions will differ in a particular case there are some clarificatory rules. (Note that ‘justifiable’ means that an act or omission in principle has a justification, that is, that it is possible to justify it, not that it has in fact been justified; and ‘unjustifiable’ means that there could be no justification in principle.)
1. Criteria of Justifiability
The justifiability of a whistleblowing act revolves around issues such as the manner of the disclosure, the reasons for it, and the motives which lie behind it. Extremes positions are that whistleblowing is always justifiable and that it is never justifiable. In the former, sometimes associated with advocates of unlimited freedom of speech, the argument depends on a narrow and positive understanding of whistleblowing. In the latter, sometimes associated with a advocates of organisational confidentiality, the argument depends on a narrow and negative understanding of whistleblowing. A broadening of this understanding brings both extremes into a more balanced and fruitful debate in which whistleblowing is sometimes justifiable and sometimes not.
It would appear reasonable to claim that whistleblowing is only justifiable where certain minimal conditions have been met. A justifiable disclosure is arguably one which:
Even when these conditions are met it is possible that, for someone, there is some other reason which makes the disclosure unjustifiable. There may be disagreement about whether this is a good reason or, indeed, whether it counts as a reason at all. Thus one may argue for including the legality of the disclosure as a condition. But, while an illegal disclosure probably needs a stronger justification (especially if it is criminal, as opposed to contestable in a civil court) it is the ethics of the disclosure that is at issue here. In a liberal democracy in which civil disobedience is regarded as acceptable under some conditions most would agree that an illegal disclosure may be morally justifiable. (Indeed, whistleblowing and civil disobedience may be regarded as conceptually related.) Of course, the position that it is never morally justifiable to disobey the law is not indefensible.
Furthermore, each of the prima facie conditions given is contestable in any particular case, since every case is open to interpretation, within a reasonable range, depending on the interests and values of the parties involved.
2. Good and Harm
A whistleblower may find it difficult, or impossible, to ascertain whether a disclosure will do more good than harm. All the well-rehearsed arguments for and against utilitarian calculation could be invoked at this point. Some would take the view that it is not unreasonable to make a disclosure simply and only because ‘it is the right thing to do’ even if harmful consequences are known to be more likely than beneficial ones. A whistleblower in this position might feel, for example, that they are ultimately answerable to a God who will judge them only for being virtuous or following moral principles and not for the consequences of the right act. In real situations a potential whistleblower is very unlikely to be able to assess all, or even most, of the consequences of disclosure. Even if they could it would always be their interpretation of harms and benefits rather than, say, the employer’s.
It must be admitted that it would give rise to legitimate suspicion about motives if a whistleblower was not disappointed or regretful if their disclosure clearly did more harm than good. But even this is problematic since there need be no inconsistency in the whistleblower being in a minority of one regarding the rightness of their act. Conversely, a whistleblower may not be comforted in the knowledge that most (or even all) people believe the disclosure was, on balance, the right thing to do when the whistleblower now perceives harmful consequences which would have been sufficient to make them refrain from disclosing had they predicted them. All that can be said with certainty is that potential whistleblowers are well advised to give thought, together with supporters and well-informed parties, to the consequences of the disclosure before making it. If they fail to do this there may be a widespread opinion that their disclosure was unjustified, even if it was justifiable.
A disclosure which could not possibly do anything to rectify the wrongdoing or prevent future wrongdoing may be regarded as unjustifiable. After all, it may be asked, what is the point of making the disclosure? In all the examples we have given above there is the possibility of rectifying the matter which is perceived as wrong and preventing reoccurrence. Quite often, however, people disagree about what is possible and what is not. Optimistic and courageous whistleblowers sometimes find themselves isolated by their well-meaning colleagues on the grounds that, ‘There is no point, the system cannot be changed’.
Furthermore, the rectification criterion is itself contestable. The whistleblower, as we have seen, may not be concerned so much with the consequences of the disclosure as with simply making the truth known, because it is the truth. Even the most pessimistic person may blow the whistle without ill-motivation. Some may blow the whistle primarily, or only, to redeem themselves for years of complicity or collusion in organisational wrongdoing. No doubt it remains the case that most whistleblowers would appeal to rectification to justify their act, at least in part.
Potential whistleblowers are also well advised to make their disclosure in a responsible manner if only for the pragmatic reason that those who object may be inclined to make an issue of the manner thereby drawing attention away from examining the matter which is being disclosed. This is one aspect of ‘shooting the messenger’. Then there is the additional point that disinterested people will tend to treat the level of responsibility manifested in the whistleblower’s behaviour as a test of the truth and importance of the matter being disclosed. Someone who is clearly irresponsible in handling a matter is usually less likely to be listened to and believed than someone who handles it with great care.
Putting prudential considerations aside, responsible disclosure is surely a moral requirement, and it is here that it may be considered as a condition of justifiability. In concrete terms, responsible disclosure might include:
None of these can be regarded as a necessary requirement, regardless of context, however. Indeed, ‘responsible manner’, like the other criteria, can serve only as a general guide to justifiable disclosure for it is always possible, if exceptional, that a particular disclosure is justifiable even where the manner was quite irresponsible. Thus it is arguable that a cleaner at a child care institution who blows the whistle on serious child abuse has acted justifiably and was justified even though, in their ignorance, they made it in an irresponsible manner - perhaps publicly revealing to a newspaper the names of the children.
3. Exhaust Internal Channels?
Again, it is judicious to exhaust all channels of complaint and concern internal to the organisation, and to be seen to do so, before blowing the whistle. Public sympathy may not be very strong for someone who is seen to have acted hastily or impulsively. A preparedness to exhaust internal channels may be regarded as a test of the whistleblower’s sincerity and professionalism.
But it is more importantly a moral matter. To fail to give an organisation a chance to deal with the wrongdoing, or even consider whether it is a wrongdoing, is to act unfairly. An organisation and its executives and managers, and even its employees and clients, may suffer extensive collateral damage from a disclosure about a serious wrongdoing which the organisation would have been prepared to rectify with less damage had it been informed in a timely and helpful way.
Difficulties may arise with attempting to use such channels however, and again these show that this condition cannot be a necessary one, although it is consideration potential whistleblowers should always keep in mind. One difficulty is that the organisation may not have adequate channels for staff to raise concerns. Whether the channels which do exist are adequate or not will sometimes become part of the controversy around a public disclosure, for there is often a difference between management and staff about what constitutes adequacy here. Channels such as complaints, grievance and disciplinary procedures may have fallen into disuse or may be biassed or perceived to be biassed in favour of management. That is, such channels appear to be better designed to deal with managerial complaints against staff rather than the other way round.
If an organisation suffers from systemic maladministration, mismanagement or corruption then it may be very dangerous for the conscientious employee to raise a concern internally. It might be tantamount to taking a concern for adjudication to the very people who are implicated in the matter of concern. More radically, even where such channels do function well, they are almost entirely negative in form. That is, they are designed to deal with complaints about what is going, or has gone, wrong, rather than with preventing wrong (see III.C.3.).
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