What Has Rupert Murdoch Taught Your Local Government About Ethics?

As I was finishing off a post earlier for my Ethics Nexus blog, it occurred to me that the post fit just as well here on Municipal Ethics News and Views. So here - in a slightly adapted form - it is:

The news world and blogosphere have been filled for the last couple of weeks with all of the revelations regarding Rupert Murdoch and the wild ethical transgressions by employees of News Corp. Along with these stories there have been loudly trumpeted all the valuable ethics lessons we are to have learned from this still-unfolding debacle.

So what exactly have we learned that can be applied to local governments to improve their ethics? Here, I believe, is precisely what we have learned - and it is exactly the same as what the private sector should have learned; nothing. Absolutely nothing. Really.

For all the lurid details and alarming oversteps of News Corp, please tell me one new thing we have actually learned about ethics from them.

Is it news that managers, department heads and officials still maintain the responsibility for all work done by others in their chain of command?

Is it news that tone at the top - including the top of any portion of your organization (e.g. managers and supervisors at all levels of your government) - has a significant impact on the behavior of other officials, employees and contractors alike?

Is it news that transgressions which are ignored are likely to continue if overlooked and essentially certain to continue if rewarded?

I keep looking for even one new thing about ethics that we are to gather from all of this and I seem to keep coming up empty.

If you have gleaned something new and enlightening, I do hope you will come forward and share it.

In the meantime, sadly, all I think we may end up learning from Rupert and son is that - as has historically been the case so often - simply knowing what is right can be a startlingly poor predictor of doing what is right. (Especially when there is so very much to gain by stepping, even egregiously stepping, over the line.)

So what are you and your local government doing to make sure that everyone there not only knows what's right but is actually doing what's right? Far more than News Corp, I hope.