Since my first car was a Ford Pinto, I have always been curious in the Ford Pinto explosions that were caused by a defective gas tank manufacture provides an animated case study into approaches to ethical decision making. There are three potential approaches to make when production ethical decisions; a consequentialist approach, a deontological arrival and a psychological approach. In a consequentialist approach, the decision maker would base their decision by focusing attention on the consequences of their activity (Trevino and Nelson, 2005, p. 89). In the deontological approach, the decision maker would base their decision by focusing on what is right or wrong based on base values and rights of individuals and/or groups (p. 91). A decision maker basing their activity on a psychological arrival may vary their actions based on the level of their cognitive moral development (p. 115).
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In the Ford Pinto case, an personel who took a consequentialist arrival could really make the decision which Ford did and yield the car despite the possibility of having the gas tank explode on low speed rear-end collisions. Furthermore, they would likely agree with Ford that the car did not need to be recalled once it was on the market. A decision maker using the consequentialist arrival would look at the consequences for the broadest whole of personel and groups as potential and make their decision based on doing the least harm and the most whole of good to all. Since the data should that there were no more accidents with the Pinto than with other vehicles and the fellowships stakeholders would greatly advantage from retention the costs low and bringing the car to market as fast as possible; they really could have decided that the most advantage would come from going ahead with the manufacture since there would be many who would advantage and likely no more than what existing standards permitted would be harmed.
On the other hand, a decision maker using the deontological arrival would really have decided not to move ahead with output and/or to recall the car once it was on the market. Since this personel would base their decision on a set of moral values and/or the rights of individuals, they would likely argue that the car should not be produced unless the rights of the minority group who would be harmed could be assured.
The results of a decision of an personel following a psychological arrival would vary depending on their level of cognitive moral development (p. 115). If for example, they were at a preconventional level they likely would have agreed to move transmit with the sale of the Pinto and/or not to recall it from the market because they would have been highly influenced by others in the company. They would have feared punishment from supervision or they would have hoped that by supporting the majority view that they would have been rewarded in some way. Even if the personel was at the conventional level they might still not have decided to redesign the Pinto's tank. While striving for "good behavior" they would have been highly influenced by the majority of decision makers in the company and not gone against their will. They also would have followed the "letter of the law" which supported the case of not needing to make a turn to the design. Only if they had a highly advanced postconventional or principled level of moral development would they have felt the need to go against the trend within the company in order to uphold the rights of the minority "regardless of the majority view (p. 115).
By the way, I survived my 1974 Ford Pinto! Thank goodness I wasn't rear-ended!
References:
Trevino, L., and Nelson, K., (2005). Corporate collective responsibility and managerial ethics. Hoboken, Nj: John Wiley and Sons, Inc.
3 Approaches to Ethical Decision manufacture and My Ford Pinto
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