Whistleblowers

It came to my attention in an interview with Professor James
Svara, for a paper I am writing for the journal <i>Public Integrity</i>,
that in March 2013, the American Society for Public
Administration (ASPA) made substantial — sometimes beneficial, sometimes
harmful, sometimes baffling — changes to its Code of Ethics (the
revised code is attached; see below). This post will look at the
changes that involve conflicts of interest.<br>
<br>

Yesterday, <a href="http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20130806/STATE/308060018/DOC-of…; target="”_blank”">Oregon's
<i>Statesman Journal</i> reported</a> an interesting case that involves a
number of important government ethics issues.<br>
<br>
The state's Department of Corrections (DOC) deputy director
allegedly used his position to influence an Oregon Corrections

<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/04/opinion/sunday/the-whistle-blowers-qu…; target="”_blank”">An
op-ed piece in the New York <i>Times Sunday Review</i> today</a> looks at
whistleblowing from the perspective of whether people lean toward
fairness or loyalty (those who lean to fairness are more likely to
blow the whistle on misconduct). This is, of course, a simplistic

According to <a href="http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-09-12/news/os-malcom-thompson-…; target="”_blank”">an
article in the Orlando <i>Sentinel</i></a> last week, the Florida
Commission on Ethics found probable cause that the Osceola County
Clerk of the Court "[used] his position to intimidate [his office's]

<br><br><br>This is the second of two posts looking at Kathryn Schulz's excellent book, <b><a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=5OCnB78Bsp0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=be…; target="”_blank”">Being
Wrong:

It's hard for ethics codes to deal with every kind of relationship where nepotism might be a problem. In a
matter involving the <a href="http://www.sfwmd.gov/portal/page/portal/sfwmdmain/home%20page&quot; target="”_blank”">South
Florida Water Management District</a> (SFWMD), the relationship involves oversight.<br>
<br>

In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Individuals-Self-Respect-Obligation-Paper…; target="”_blank”"><i>The
Kingdom
of
Individuals</i></a> (Cornell University Press, 1993), F. G.
Bailey's principal concern is what he calls svejks (pronounced
"shvikes"), that is, individuals in organizations who put their

Recently, Google has taken what appears to be a distinctly less transparent and open approach to their news distribution search engine. Matthew Lee maintains a small blog/website called <a href="http://www.innercitypress.com/">http://www.innercitypress.com/</a&gt; and has a reputation for hounding the UN - specifically the UNDP about what he considers corruption. Recently though, google announced a partnership with the UNDP and here is what happened next: