The need to regulate the way in which human beings behave is what leads to the creation of legal behaviors and ethical behaviors. It must be noted that human beings came to realize that one person’s action can directly or indirectly affect another person. Therefore, to reduce cases of conflicts and also to have proper ways of solving disputes emerging from people’s behavior, laws and ethics were created by each community in a way they feel fit for their people. However, there is a difference between legal behaviors and ethical behaviors even though at some point they overlap. The significant difference is that legal practices are mandatory to all, but ethical behaviors are not binding. In this compare and contrast of legal and ethical action, the discourse reveals that legal behaviors are expected from every member of the society which is not the case with moral conducts, even though both are used to regulate behavior.
Legal Conducts that are Highly Unethical
Legal conducts that are also very unethical are best seen in cases of businesses. Here, minimum wages and advertisement practices have been chosen as the best examples. When it comes to cases of companies, the agreement between the employer and the employee is always considered legal. In other words, if an employee has agreed to work for an employer for minimal wages and has signed a contract, such agreements are legal and binding. However, this legal act of employing people for minimum wages is unethical because in some cases the employer makes a lot of profit but pays his employees very little which ethically amounts to ‘using them’ (Agle, 2014). The second practice is advertisement practices that are at times misleading to uneducated or unsuspecting customers. The best example here is the advertisements used by gambling and betting organizations. These advertisements are often characterized by images and messages from people who have worn lots of money. While this is ethical, it is misleading to many who are likely to misuse their money in betting and gambling instead of investing. Therefore ethically, this advert will have misled a person.
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Similarities and Differences between Legal and Ethical Conducts
Similarities
Ethical conducts are put in place by society, and so are legal behaviors. The society is the one that determines what behaviors are moral even though they may not be written down; they are passed on by older individuals (Koumbiadis, 2014). Similarly, the members of the societies are the ones that create legal conducts. Through their governments, they decide which conducts are legal and which are illegal. They even set up punishments for such actions. For instance in the cases that have been chosen above, paying fair wages helps others in society improve their lives and alleviate suffering. Similarly, a law that requires the employer to ensure safe working conditions relieves pain, and as seen they are all created by society.
Additionally, legal and ethical practices are similar because they help in creating harmony among members of society. In both cases, the actions of a person are regulated so that they do not harm themselves or other people in society (Agle, 2014). For instance, when a law requires that an advert should not promote a given behavior, conflicts will be lessened. Also, if an organization chooses to use adverts that are not misleading, people will not feel frustrated when they do not win in a gamble or abetting game. Moreover, legal and ethical behavior in one community cannot be similar in another community. Using the example above, each country has their labor laws which may seem similar but are different in their details.
Differences
Legal conducts are anchored on the law, and there are punishments for acting illegally. However, ethical behaviors are based on the perception of what is right and wrong, and so they are rarely punishable (Agle, 2014). For instance, it is in the law that the employer should pay the employee for work done according to the wages they have agreed. However, it is considered proper to pay employees well so that they improve their lives.
Secondly, legal behaviors are required form everyone and they are mandatory. That is why there are punishments for illegal conducts. In other words, if an employer does not pay the employee for work done, they can be arrested and charged. On the other hand, ethical conducts are a matter of choice and depend on what a person deems right or wrong ( Emelda, 2011). For instance, casinos and betting organizations are doing the right thing according to business minded people. However, a moralist would consider their conduct as unethical. But they cannot sue them.
Conclusion
In my opinion, I would like to see ethical and legal conducts work hand in hand. The reason for this observation is that there are cases like examples given in this discourse where highly unethical behaviors that are legal may still cause harm to other people. However, in as much as they should work together, only extreme cases where ethical behaviors should be supported legally supported. For instance, when an advert is likely to mislead ignorant people, then the law must come in to control the conducts of business personalities.
References
Agle, B. R. (2014). Research companion to ethical behavior in organizations : Constructs and measures. Cheltenham: Elgar.
Emelda, M. (2011). Difference Between Law and Ethics | Difference Between . [online] Differencebetween.net. Available at: http://www.differencebetween.net/miscellaneous/politics/difference-between-law-and-ethics/ [Accessed 22 Nov. 2018].
Koumbiadis N., (2014). Morality, ethical awareness and ethical behavior in business: challenges for twenty-first century organizations, Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change, Vol. 10 Issue: 2, https://doi.org/10.1108/JAOC-10-2013-0082
