An Analysis of the Ethics Infrastructure and Ethical Climate in Slovenian Public Administration

Abstract

In consideration of the fact that public administrations worldwide face a number of challenges, many governments are dedicated to improving the ethical climate in public administrations. Th e same issue is also the focus of the attention of many transnational associations. Th e basic goal is to ensure the development of comparable ethical climates, ethical behaviour in diff erent public administrations and to develop comparable, suitable ethics infrastructures to enable this. Modern public administrations must bring ethical conduct to the fore and resist unethical behaviour. Th ere are diff erent ideas on how to build ethics infrastructures in public administrations, and examples of good practice that could facilitate the development of such infrastructures are found in the public and private sectors of diff erent countries. In this paper, we connect ethics infrastructures and ethical climates. Th e evaluation of Slovenia's ethics infrastructures is based on the framework prepared by the OECD, using its questionnaire developed by Victor and Cullen. Th e results show that there is no general relationship between ethics infrastructures and ethical climates in public administrations. Nevertheless, some determinants of ethics infrastructures correlate to a high degree to the ethical climate, the strongest impact on ethics climates being the ethical infrastructure's determinant "public involvement and scrutiny".

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“…Nevertheless, other opinions presented by J. Stare and M. Klun (2016) show that there is no general relationship between ethical infrastructure and ethical climate in the sphere of public administration. We may conclude, then, that some experts are of the opinion that the ethical workplace is something that could not be affected by an organization.…”

Compliance of Ethics Infrastructure for Public Officials' Assets Declaration in Tanzania

“…According to Parker et al (2008) the concept of ethics infrastructure was initially introduced in the United States to denote policies and structures that upkeep compliance with professional conduct (Parker et al, 2008). Ethics infrastructure is also called ethics regime or integrity (Stare & Klun, 2016). These rules, regulations and policies guide public officials to abstain from unethical conduct through directive and description of what is permitted or not permitted (Lameck, 2017).…”

Management and Business Ethics in Central and Eastern Europe: Introduction to Special Issue

“…Private companies and other not-profit organizations, together with academics, took the initiative and started to develop the theory and practice of business ethics (Remišová et al, 2019). In the field of public administration and local government there have been relatively few studies of ethics and ethical behaviour by public servants (for exceptions, see Bohatá et al, 2018;Kooskora & Virjoka, 2015;Rybnikova & Toleikienė, 2019;Stare & Klun, 2016). It has taken considerable time for ethics to become more important in the field of public administration.…”

“…In terms of future directions for research, it would therefore be very important to explore the role of professional and employers' associations in the development of business ethics in these countries. As discussed above, in the field of public administration and local government there have also been relatively few studies of ethics and ethical behaviour by public servants (for exceptions, see Bohatá et al, 2018;Kooskora & Virjoka, 2015;Rybnikova & Toleikienė, 2019;Stare & Klun, 2016). More research focus on this would help develop more understanding of the importance of ethical behaviour and standards in public administration.…”