Whistleblowing” has entered the scholarly and the public debate as a way of describing the exposure by the member of an organization of episodes of corruption, fraud, or general abuses of power within the organization. We offer a critical survey of the main normative theories of whistleblowing in the current debate in political philosophy, with the illustrative aid of one of the epitomic figures of a whistleblower of our time: Edward Snowden. After conceptually separating whistleblowing from other forms of wrongdoing (...) disclosures, we introduce and discuss two families of normative views of this practice: the “Extrema Ratio” and the “Deontic” views. We show how the two views can be usefully considered in tandem to offer an all-round assessment of the moral justification of whistleblowing either as an extraordinary individual conscientious act of indictment or as an ordinary dutiful organizational practice of answerability that enables the capacity of self-correction of an organization. (shrink)

Whistleblowing is the act of disclosing information from a public or private organization in order to reveal cases of corruption that are of immediate or potential danger to the public. Blowing the whistle involves personal risk, especially when legal protection is absent, and charges of betrayal, which often come in the form of legal prosecution under treason laws. In this article we argue that whistleblowing is justified when disclosures are made with the proper intent and fulfill specific communicative constraints in (...) addressing issues of public interest. Three communicative constraints of informativeness, truthfulness and evidence are discussed in this regard. We develop a ‘harm test’ to assess the intent for disclosures, concluding that it is not sufficient for justification. Along with the proper intent, a successful act of whistleblowing should provide information that serves the public interest. Taking cognizance of the varied conceptions of public interest, we present an account of public interest that fits the framework of whistleblowing disclosures. In particular, we argue that whistleblowing is justified inter alia when the information it conveys is of a presumptive interest for a public insofar as it reveals an instance of injustice or violation of a civil or political right done against and unbeknown to some members of a polity. (shrink)

Research on whistleblowing has not yet provided a finite set of variables which have been shown to influence an employee's decision to report wrongdoing. Prior research on business ethics suggests that ethical business decisions are influenced by both organizational as well as intrapersonal variables. As such, this paper attempts to predict the decision to whistleblow using organizational and intrapersonal variables. External whistleblowing was found to be significantly related to supervisor support, informal policies, gender, and ideal values. External whistleblowing was not (...) found to be significantly predicted by formal policies, organizational tenure, age, education, satisfaction, or commitment. (shrink)

Research on whistle-blowing has been hampered by a lack of a sound theoretical base. In this paper, we draw upon existing theories of motivation and power relationships to propose a model of the whistle-blowing process. This model focuses on decisions made by organization members who believe they have evidence of organizational wrongdoing, and the reactions of organization authorities. Based on a review of the sparse empirical literature, we suggest variables that may affect both the members' decisions and the organization's responses.

Discussions of whistleblowing and employee loyalty usually assume either that the concept of loyalty is irrelevant to the issue or, more commonly, that whistleblowing involves a moral choice in which the loyalty that an employee owes an employer comes to be pitted against the employee''s responsibility to serve public interest. I argue that both these views are mistaken and propose a third view which sees whistleblowing as entirely compatible with employee loyalty.

Whistleblowing has been defined often and in differing ways in the literature. This paper has as its main purposes to clarify the meaning of whistleblowing and to speak for a narrow interpretation of it. A restrictive, general purpose definition is provided which contains six necessary elements: act of disclosure, actor, disclosure subject, target, disclosure recipient, and outcome.Whistleblowing is characterised as a dissenting act of public accusation against an organisation which necessitates being disloyal to that organisation. The definition differs from others (...) in many ways but especially by its emphasis on dissent, by being based on the ethical dilemma of conflicting loyalties, and by the strict way that dilemma is formulated in terms of confidentiality and proprietary rights over information. These features result in a definition in which motive has no part, and which requires a free choice decision to make disclosure to an external party. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to investigate external whistleblowers’ experiences of workplace bullying by superiors and colleagues, and to analyze how the bullying was influenced by factors such as the support they received from government or NGOs, and whether colleagues understood the reasons for the whistleblower’s actions. For bullying by colleagues, we also examined to what extent this was influenced by superiors’ behavior towards the whistleblower. We reviewed the relevant literature on workplace bullying and whistleblowers’ experiences of negative or (...) retaliatory actions and developed three hypotheses, which we tested using data gathered from Korean external whistleblowers. Results revealed that external whistleblowers experienced work-related bullying by superiors and social relation-related and person-related bullying by colleagues more frequently, and found it more distressing, than other types of workplace bullying. Superiors’ bullying was a dominant factor affecting bullying by colleagues. Colleagues’ understanding of the reason for the whistleblower’s actions was significant in reducing bullying frequency while support from government and NGOs was not significant in reducing it. Based on these findings, practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

This paper provides an exploration of whistleblowing as a protracted process, using secondary data from 868 cases from a whistleblower advice line in the UK. Previous research on whistleblowing has mainly studied this phenomenon as a one-off decision by someone perceiving wrongdoing within an organisation to raise a concern or to remain silent. Earlier suggestions that whistleblowing is a process and that people find themselves inadvertently turned into whistleblowers by management responses, have not been followed up by a systematic study (...) tracking the path of how a concern is repeatedly raised by whistleblowers. This paper provides a quantitative exploration of whistleblowing as a protracted process, rather than a one-off decision. Our research finds that the whistleblowing process generally entails two or even three internal attempts to raise a concern before an external attempt is made, if it is made at all. We also find that it is necessary to distinguish further between different internal as well as external whistleblowing recipients. Our findings suggest that whistleblowing is a protracted process and that this process is internally more protracted than previously documented. The overall pattern is that whistleblowers tend to search for a more independent recipient at each successive attempt to raise their concern. Formal whistleblower power seems to determine which of the available recipients are perceived as viable and also what the initial responses are in terms of retaliation and effectiveness. (shrink)

This article reports the findings of a cross-cultural study that explored the relationship between nationality, cultural orientation, and attitudes toward different ways in which an employee might blow the whistle. The study investigated two questions – are there any significant differences in the attitudes of university students from South Korea, Turkey and the U.K. toward various ways by which an employee blows the whistle in an organization?, and what effect, if any, does cultural orientation have on these attitudes? In order (...) to answer these questions, the study identified six dimensions of whistleblowing and four types of cultural orientation. The survey was conducted among 759 university students, who voluntarily participated; 284 South Korean, 230 Turkish, and 245 U.K. Although all three samples showed a preference for formal, anonymous and internal modes of whistleblowing, there were significant variations related to nationality and cultural orientation. The findings have some key implications for organizational practice and offer directions for future research. (shrink)

Previous studies investigating reports of corporate or individual wrongdoing have failed to examine the effects of an organization's structure upon the decision to blow the whistle. This paper suggests that an organization's structure may perform a significant role in the decision to report versus not report an observed wrongdoing. Five organizational structures were examined in regards to their effectiveness in encouraging or discouraging observers of unethical conduct channels for reporting such behavior. Discussion and implications are provided.

“Whistleblowing” has entered the scholarly and the publicdebate as a way of describing the exposure by the memberof an organization of episodes of corruption, fraud, or generalabuses of power within the organization. We offer acritical survey of the main normative theories ofwhistleblowing in the current debate in political philosophy,with the illustrative aid of one of the epitomic figures of awhistleblower of our time: Edward Snowden. After conceptuallyseparating whistleblowing from other forms ofwrongdoing disclosures, we introduce and discuss two familiesof normative views (...) of this practice: the “Extrema Ratio”and the “Deontic” views. We show how the two views canbe usefully considered in tandem to offer an all-roundassessment of the moral justification of whistleblowingeither as an extraordinary individual conscientious act ofindictment or as an ordinary dutiful organizational practiceof answerability that enables the capacity of self-correctionof an organization. (shrink)

Today's complex and decentralized organization gives rise to organizational needs for both loyalty and institutionalized whistle blowing. However, ethicists see a contradiction between both needs. This paper argues there is no such contradiction. It shows why earlier attempts to go beyond the dilemma are not satisfying. The solution proposed in this paper starts from an organizational perspective instead of an individual one. It does so by reframing the concept of loyalty into “rational loyalty”. This means that the object of loyalty (...) is not the physicality of an organization, but its corpus of explicit mission statement, goals, value statement and code of conduct. An implication is that organizations are – as their side of the duty of loyalty – obliged to institutionalize whistle blowing. (shrink)

Today's complex and decentralized organization gives rise to organizational needs for both loyalty and institutionalized whistle blowing. However, ethicists see a contradiction between both needs. This paper argues there is no such contradiction. It shows why earlier attempts to go beyond the dilemma are not satisfying. The solution proposed in this paper starts from an organizational perspective instead of an individual one. It does so by reframing the concept of loyalty into rational loyalty. This means that the object of loyalty (...) is not the physicality of an organization, but its corpus of explicit mission statement, goals, value statement and code of conduct. An implication is that organizations are – as their side of the duty of loyalty – obliged to institutionalize whistle blowing. (shrink)

Previous studies investigating reports of corporate or individual wrongdoing have failed to examine the effects of an organization's structure upon the decision to blow the whistle. This paper suggests that an organization's structure may perform a significant role in the decision to report versus not report an observed wrongdoing. Five organizational structures (that is, centralized, matrix, horizontal, hybrid, and divisional) were examined in regards to their effectiveness in encouraging or discouraging observers of unethical conduct channels for reporting such behavior. Discussion (...) and implications are provided. (shrink)

Discussions of whistleblowing whether in academic literature or in more popular media have tended to very one-sided assessments of the moral worth of the act. Indeed, much of the current literature concentrates on psychological or managerial aspects of whistleblowing while taking for granted this or that moral position or eschewing any normative commitment on the question. The purpose of this article is firstly to reemphasise the importance and complexity of the normative foundations of whistleblowing acts; and secondly, through a moral (...) philosophical analysis of the component decisions that make up any act of whistleblowing, to contribute to a more balanced and less polarised treatment of the topic. It is argued that the polarisation of views on the topic is in part due to a failure to decompose the act of whistleblowing into a number of inevitable component moral decisions leading up to the act. It is furthermore argued on the basis of the analysis that it is impossible to state a priori as a matter of general principle that whistleblowing is always morally right or morally wrong . The article will close with a reflection on the degree to which the weighing up of good and bad in the act of whistleblowing differs sharply among cultures; and with a conjecture as to a possible relation to a people's history which may serve as a pointer to interesting future empirical research on the topic. (shrink)

Whistleblowing on organizational wrongdoing is becoming increasingly prevalent. What aspects of the person, the context, and the transgression relate to whistleblowing intentions and to actual whistleblowing on corporate wrongdoing? Which aspects relate to retaliation against whistleblowers? Can we draw conclusions about the whistleblowing process by assessing whistleblowing intentions? Meta-analytic examination of 193 correlations obtained from 26 samples (N = 18,781) reveals differences in the correlates of whistleblowing intentions and actions. Stronger relationships were found between personal, contextual, and wrongdoing characteristics and (...) whistleblowing intent than with actual whistleblowing. Retaliation might best be predicted using contextual variables. Implications for research and practice are discussed. (shrink)

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.

Following the financial crisis of 2008, the Treasury Committee of the UK House of Commons undertook an inquiry into the lessons that might be learned from the banking crisis. Paul Moore, head of group regulatory risk at Halifax Bank of Scotland during 2002–2005, provided evidence of his experience of questioning HBOS policies which resulted in his dismissal from HBOS. The problems that surfaced at HBOS during the financial crisis were so serious that it was forced to merge with Lloyds TSB, (...) another UK bank, to form the Lloyds Banking Group in which the government took a significant stake. Moore’s evidence to the Treasury Committee revealed that long before the financial crisis, he had raised major concerns with the management of HBOS and with the Financial Services Authority, the UK financial services regulator. Moore’s evidence led to the submission of further disclosures, replies and rejoinders as evidence to the Treasury Committee. Moore’s case is therefore of considerable interest to researchers of whistleblowing because it is a rare instance of high-level whistleblowing, the details of which subsequently entered the public domain. The information revealed in evidence to the Treasury Committee sheds light on the process of whistleblowing in the context of the governance and regulation of a major UK bank that subsequently had to be rescued by government intervention during the financial crisis. The paper makes a contribution to the wider literature on whistleblowing, and to a greater understanding of aspects of the financial crisis. (shrink)

Neither the corporate view of whistle blowers as tattle-tales and traitors, nor the more sympathethic understanding of them as tragic heroes battling corrupt or abused systems captures what is at stake in whistle blowing at its most distinctive. The courage, determination and sacrifice of the most ardent whistle blowers suggests that they only begin to be appreciated when they are seen as the saints of secular culture. Although some whistle blowers may be attempting to deflect attention from their own deficiencies (...) and others may be disgruntled employees, the most serious instances involve a level of moral sensitivity that approaches religious proportions that are baffling for a culture that has dispensed with sainthood. (shrink)

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.