Transcript Lawrence J. Kohlberg

Lawrence J. Kohlberg
STAGES OF MORAL
DEVELOPMENT
Moral Development
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cognitive psychology roots (Piaget)
Kohlberg’s focus on moral, not just
cognitive, development
40 years research at Harvard
Moral Development
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Heinz has a terminally ill wife, and he’s
desperate to help her.
He visits his druggist friend, who says
there’s a new cure, very expensive.
He sets the drug on the counter and
turns away to answer the phone.
WHAT SHOULD HEINZ DO? WHY?
Heinz answers
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He should steal the drug because:
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He should NOT steal the drug because:
Moral Development
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To Kohlberg, it is the reason that is
important, not the choice itself.
Reasons indicate levels of moral
development, from low to high.
Kohlberg’s Stages
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Pre-Conventional:
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Stage 1: OBEY OR PAY:
authority, fear of punishment
Stage 2: SELF-SATISFACTION:
what's in it for me?
Kohlberg’s Stages
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Conventional:
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Stage 3: APPROVAL:
group norms, loyalty, belonging
Stage 4: LAW AND ORDER:
duty to obey society’s rules and
laws
Kohlberg’s Stages
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Post-Conventional:
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Stage 5: STANDARDS OF SOCIETY:
abide by the complex relationships
of the social contract
Stage 6: DECISION OF CONSCIENCE:
choose action based on ‘universal’
moral principles
Challenges to Kohlberg
Carol Gilligan’s stages:
(from research on abortion decisions)
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Self-interest (consequences to self only)
Other-interest (consequences to others
only)
Self AND other interest (consequences to
both self and others)
Challenges to Kohlberg
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Domain theory: an attempt to explain
inconsistencies in Kohlberg’s research
Domain of morality: learned from
experience with pleasure & pain.
Domain of social convention: arbitrary
rules learned through teaching and
observation.
Moral conflicts occur when strong moral
values rub against strong conventions.
Moral Reasoning and MyLai
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During the Vietnam War, U.S. soldiers
massacred civilians in MyLai. (A recent
article in the Star Tribune, Oct. 20,
2003, shows that the killing of civilians
in Vietnam was not an isolated event.)
Following are quotes from people
involved in the MyLai massacre. Can
you identity the stage of moral
reasoning these quotes express?
Private Paul Meadlow
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admitted he was involved in the massacre of
civilians at MyLai.
During basic training if you disobeyed an order, if
you were slow in obeying orders, they’d slap you on
the head, drop-kick you in the chest and rinky-dink
stuff like that. If an officer tells you to stand on your
head in the middle of the highway, you did it. Why
did I do it…we was supposed to get satisfaction
from this village for the men we lost. They was all
VC and VC sympathizers. I felt, at the time, I was
doing the right thing because, like I said, I lost
buddies. I lost a damn good buddy.
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What seems to be driving Pvt. Meadlow?
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Egocentric concerns
Desire for personal satisfaction
Doesn’t want to get in trouble
True, he’s grieving, so he’s not a psychopath. But
what Kohlberg level would a person have to be to
reason that killing babies is just retribution for
losing friends, or is a satisfactory consequence of
not getting in trouble himself?
Lieutenant William Calley
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the officer who was subsequently courtmartialed by the army for ordering Meadlow
& others to fire on civilians.
I was a run-of-the-mill average guy. I still am.
I always said the people in Washington are
smarter than me. If intelligent people say
Communism is bad, it’s going to engulf us. I
was only a Second Lieutenant. I had to obey
and hope that the people in Washington were
smarter than me.
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What seems to be driving Lt. Calley?
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Norms of his social position
Following orders from legitimate authority
Duty to obey
I was ordered to go in there and destroy the enemy. That was
my job on that day. That was my mission I was given. I did
not sit down and think in terms of men, women and
children. They were all classified the same and that was the
classification we dealt with them, enemy soldiers…I felt, and
still do, that I acted as I was directed to…and I do not feel
wrong in doing so.
Private Michael Bernhardt
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refused to obey the orders to shoot at Vietnamese civilians.
If I recognize something is right or wrong…this is the fist step to
actually doing right. And this is the thing. I can hardly do
anything if I know it is wrong. If I think about it long enough I
am really in trouble, and I won’t be able to do it…I am just
positively compelled. No matter whose law it is, no matter
whose leadership I am following, It has never been as good as
what I would have done myself…Since My Lai, I have had to
follow my own decisions, I have had to follow my own way
because nobody else’s has been right…Now this is what I try to
do: I try and apply logic to it rather than anything else; logic to
say, “Is this right, or should I do this.
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What seems to motivate Pvt.
Bernhardt?
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Universal standards and principles
His own judgment on the law, orders, and
right/wrong
His ability to apply principles to a particular,
concrete situation
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“I was telling Captain Franklyn about an old woman
that was shot. I couldn’t understand why she was
shot because she didn’t halt. First of all, she is in her
own country. We never found anything to indicate
that she was anything but what she appeared to be-a
non-combatant. It wasn’t a case like we had been
wiped out by an old woman with a fish-bag full of
grenades. I told him that she was shot at a distance.
They said to shoot her was brigade policy. They
couldn’t think of a better way of stopping her. I would
have said, “No.” I just wouldn’t have stopped her at
all. Nothing needs an excuse to live. The same thing
goes for bombing a village. If there are people in the
village, don’t bomb it… “
Bottom Line: Kohlberg
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Ethical conduct in business (or in war,
or elsewhere in real life) is all about
choices and the reasons for making
them.
People do develop morally as well as
cognitively.
(So, ethics education makes sense!)
How Do People Progress in
Moral Development?
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Interact to discuss and resolve moral
dilemmas.
Listen and understand each other’s
viewpoints.
Discuss, argue, and defend one’s own views.
Expand perspectives, deepen justifications for
decisions.
Interact with people who are at later stages
of development.
Practice thinking about ethics in principled
ways.
Some Questions…
if Kohlberg Is Right
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How can an organization encourage ethics if
there are Meadlows, Calleys, and Bernhardts
working in it?
Which would you rather have working for
you?
Which type would you rather work for?
What needs to happen so that each
employee, regardless of stage of moral
development, can contribute to an ethical
climate?