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Is it crucial for public leaders to obey the highest moral standards? It is more reasonable to distinguish the public role from the private role of public leaders than to give a general answer. In my opnion, it is fundamental for all public officials, not only in politics but also in business, to maintain the public morality which is determined by their own careers. The most important duty of political leaders is to create welfare of the country, to maintain prosperity of the society, and develop a good environment for people to live and work in. The public morality in political realm is that any leader should not gain his or her own interests on the cost of the country, the society and the people. Anyone who betrays this morality will eventually be abandoned by his or her country and people. For example, Hitler, as the leader of German, initiated the invasion of Portland and sequent the World War Two in order to meet his own greedy. All his military determinations and movements not only endangered other countries but also put German into a hazardous dilemma, and made Germans facing difficulties of starvation and exposures for country's expenditures were used in the war. All of these drove most German officials to resist Hitler's command and Hitler had to end his career and life in suicide at last. In democratic society, it is more obviously that the violation of this public morality costs a high price, just like what Nixon paid for the Watergate Scandal. In business realm, although the profit maximization is the goal on which all leaders in company have to pay most attention, they still cannot break the principles of their own pubic morality--not to pursue profits on the cost of consumers. Otherwise they would have to face the same fate as political leaders who violate rights and infesters of people since the company's market and even the long-term profits are based on the attitude of consumers. A negative example can be drawn from Toshiba, one kind of whose notebook computers has great defects. The company confessed this and allowed its users in North America to refund wholly or exchange an advanced one for the old one while this service were not provided to Chinese users. Since then Toshiba lost a huge market in China and confidence of consumers all over the world which weakened the company greatly. The leaders of Toshiba should be responsible for their short-sight and leaders of other companies can learn a significant lesson from this. Comparing with the public morality, some defaults in the private morality and behavior are not the key factors to valuate the efficiency of leaders' work. Bill Clinton, the former president of USA, is a good example in the point. After sex scandal people noticed his personal defaults in some behavior and habits but the supporting rates for his work as president remained high all over the country. The reason is that Clinton didn't violate the public morality and people were satisfactory with his efficient work as public official. In fact, not only Clinton, many other leaders also have this or that problem in their own lives which doesn't always prevent them becoming an efficient leaders. Although the fact that leaders maintain the highest moral standards can have an enormous effect in all aspects of our society, unfortunately our hope of all merits with our public leaders is hardly to come true. Facing the limitation of human nature, we have to focus on whether public morality is maintained by those leaders. At the same time, it is wise for leaders to realize that their long-term interests are based on the obedience of public morality. | 
发表于 2007-8-10 23:05:14
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