Child trafficking has become one of the most controversial issues in business ethics. This is one of the most interesting cases of business ethics of our time. This is a clear example of how people will begin to think irrationally when they are in `non-organized` societies (chaos). After the earthquake in January 2010, Haiti became a chaotic country. People thought that there was no official legal control anymore. People began to act in ways they would never act in normal situations. The moral and legal overlap was distorted.
Ten American missionaries were caught trying to take 33 children out of Haiti. They stated that they wanted to save the children by taken them to an orphanage in the Dominican Republic.
The missionaries acted moral in their point of view. They thought that because of the chaos and lack of control in the country, they could `save` children without getting in trouble. This was a mistake in my opinion. As the Justice Minister of Haiti said, without laws the Haitian state would cease to exist. I also agree with the Prime Minister of Haiti that the missionaries knew that what they were doing was illegal. This is a very important fact. Although they knew that what they were doing was illegal, they still ignored the legal discourse to act `moral`. But there is a moral rule that states to always obey the law.
The fact that made me realize that this was something that could end up in a disaster is the fact that several of the children were not orphans. Some of their parents were still alive. To me this was the fact that made me wonder if the intentions were really moral.
A lot of critics said that these people looked more like child thieves than missionaries. This statement takes it a little too far in my opinion. This is a clear case of a morally hard case. Not a problem of moral motivation.
I can conclude that the missionaries decided that they would ignore the legal discourse, and act in an illegal way to attain a (in their eyes) morally correct goal. Their `heroic` act could have resulted in a disaster because they did not use the moral rule to always obey the law. It was fair for them to get arrested since this sends a clear signal to illegal child traffickers.
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2 comments:
Another moral problem is that the missionaries claimed that God claimed to help the children by taking them to the US. The question is if this is morally wrong.
One of the characteristics of the hermeneutic perspective is that we should uphold certain principles that strike us as rational.
In a society where people could steal children and claim it was the word of God this society wouldn’t exist long. People could act as they want and claim it is the word of God. Since any rational person understands that God isn’t the creator of moral rules it is irrational to act in the name of God. People in society decide moral rules and are being held morally responsible for the acts they committed. They can’t brush aside their moral responsibility to God. In this case the missionaries did and therefore I conclude that they acted morally wrong.
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Martijn Stouthart
According to the book from dubbink, society cannot function without people obeying moral rules. And society has a crucial interest in making sure there is always overlap with other discourses, such as legal or social rules.
As the writer said society of Haiti, after stroke' didn't function well. And because it has in chaos it was hard to find the overlaps and therefore people became irrational. In this chaos the missionaries also acted as what 'they believe'. I think they were very irrational that they knew that they were doing illegal and this act were not allowed by any discourses. And as the student above said society which the god is only rational cannot be rationale. And being being rationale is basic pre-assumption to be moral. So I also conclude that the missionaries acted morally wrong.
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