Fraud
As Elieen Morgan notes, “Fraud is big business internationally and its nature is constantly changing. Corporate restructurings, political instability in various areas of the world and rapid technological advances are among the factors giving rise to new and more complex mechanisms for fraud. According to the KPMG study, two of the major factors affecting the level of fraud are society’s weakening values and economic pressures. There is less ambiguity in finding a ‘slot’ or an ethical ‘home’ for these actions. At the same time we are pointing our fingers and labeling, we can sigh with relief that at least some things are clear, and each is tied to specific legal structures. ‘People are very inclined to set moral standards for others’ (Elizabeth Drew’).” And “Unethical behaviors…violate our deeply held personal norms and beliefs regarding important values about right and wrong as we learned them in our own culture and from our own families.”
For this week’s discussion board please discuss, how each culture interprets the meaning of The Institute for Global Ethics’ eight core values, i.e. love, truth, freedom, fairness, unity, tolerance, responsibility, and respect for life, upon which all cultures base their ethical constructs and the ramification this has for fraud fighters, e.g. Certified Fraud Examiners, Certified Professional Accountants, Certified Internal Auditors, members of the law enforcement community, etc.
For a primer, I encourage you to read the articles:
Michael Segon, Corruption as part of National Culture: The disconnect between values, ethics and etiquette, International Review of Business Research Papers, Vol. 6. No. 6. (Dec. 2010) Pp.259 –275. Available at: http://www.irbrp.com/static/documents/December/2010/20. Segon.pdf (Links to an external site.)
John Hooker, Corruption from a Cross-Cultural Perspective, Carnegie Mellon University (Oct. 2008). Available at: http://web.tepper.cmu.edu/jnh/corruption08s.pdf (Links to an external site.)
Solution
There are many kinds of cultures around the world, which share some same values, but interpret those same values differently. This is because of the diversity in meaning and relationship with one another. Cultures are created to serve a particular set of society and societies around the world differ in their interpretation of ethical values. Value such as love is interpreted differently across different cultures (Hooker, 2008). The western culture interprets love based on human emotions in which they consider their core value. Non-western cultures, on the other hand, interpret love based on loyalty and commitment to family. This is evident in Mexican cultures and Arabic cultures. Western culture understand truth based on the willingness of a person to become honest with another person. While truth is interpreted as form of obedience and respect to another person according to non-western culture. Different cultures have different opinions and interpretation on their meanings and their understanding. (Segon, 2010) According to western cultures freedom is interpreted as a right of individually, but in many other cultures freedom is interpreted as the right of the individually as stated by the state. This means freedom can be limited by the state if it tends to bring disorderly conduct.
Values such as fairness, unity and tolerance are in some cultures are deemed necessary as this can lead to peaceful conduct amongst the public. Non-western cultures consider these values as the core of their livelihood and use them to keep peace amongst their countries. In most cases, fairness, unity and tolerance are have been included in national anthems of many countries. Values such as responsibility and respect for life is what defines many cultures in today’s society (Segon, 2010). All cultures consider respect and responsibility is core aspect of their culture and is well treasured. Therefore, in order to create a universal norm which reflect on all cultural aspects, fraud fighter can utilize the eight core values to set standard of conduct that is ethically and morally upright (Segon, 2010).
References
Hooker, J. (2008). Corruption from a Cross-Cultural Perspective. Journal of Business Ethics, 2-10.
Segon, M. (2010). Corruption as part of National Culture: The disconnect between values, ethics and etiquette. International Review of Business Research Papers, 259 –275.