A visiting American executive finds that a foreign subsidiary in a less develope

Question

A visiting American executive finds that a foreign subsidiary in a less developed country has hired a 12-year-old girl to work on a factory floor, in violation of the company’s prohibition on child labor. He tells the local manager to replace the child and tell her to go back to school. The local manager tells the American executive that the child is an orphan with no other means of support, and she will probably become a street child if she is denied work. What should the American executive do? A visiting American executive finds that a foreign subsidiary in a less developed country has hired a 12-year-old girl to work on a factory floor, in violation of the company’s prohibition on child labor. He tells the local manager to replace the child and tell her to go back to school. The local manager tells the American executive that the child is an orphan with no other means of support, and she will probably become a street child if she is denied work. What should the American executive do? A visiting American executive finds that a foreign subsidiary in a less developed country has hired a 12-year-old girl to work on a factory floor, in violation of the company’s prohibition on child labor. He tells the local manager to replace the child and tell her to go back to school. The local manager tells the American executive that the child is an orphan with no other means of support, and she will probably become a street child if she is denied work. What should the American executive do?

Explanation / Answer

Here the American executive is facing an ethical and moral dilemma with regards to the 12 year old girl working in the factory floor.

Both the choices are an evil and will involve compromising on the ethical standards. Allowing the girl child to continue to work will mean encouraging child labor which is both unethical as well as illegal. It is also against the policy of the company. Dismissing the girl child will mean pushing the child into a life of poverty and desolation.

In this case the American executive will have to select the lesser of the two evils and allow the girl child to work on the factory floor. The American executive will have to follow the principles of ‘utilitarianism’ and hence should be concerned with the morality of the outcome of his action (and not about how moral his action is). Here the outcome of allowing the girl to continue to work is that she is able to earn for herself and hence is financially independent and so can live a decent life, wearing decent clothes and eating decent meals. This would not be possible if the girl is dismissed and the consequence of her dismissal will be that she will be denied of leading a decent life.

Thus on the basis of the principles of utilitarianism the American executive should allow the girl to continue working at the factory.

Related Questions

Navigate

• Browse (All)
• Browse A
• Subjects

---

---

Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.