- Values
- Value vs. Belief
- Classification of Values
- Human Values
- Private relations vs. Public Relations?
- Case study: role of Cinema
- Case Study: Homosexual Opposition leader
- Descriptive Questions (200 words)
In the previous part (E1/P2), we looked at various theories of ethics. In this part, we look at the last portion of syllabus topic#1 viz. Human values, role of family-society-edu.insti. and ethics in public and private relations.
Values
- Values help as “Short hand” or “tools” of the theory. E.g. in a case study, every time you need not go back to xyz theory, IF you’re able to justify it on the grounds of non-violence, truth, compassion.
- So, theory => Values => Daily life we follow the “Value” and not “theory”.
- Deontological Ethics=> Karma Theory=> Value of “duty”.
- Deontological Ethics=> Gandhism => Value of “Compassion for the Poor”.
- Thus, Values make life meaningful, help in self-realization, underline our attitude-behavior-judgment.
Human Values
- Common to All humans. Love, truth, Compassion. Even Osama Bin Laden would love his children. So, merely by being a human being, at minimum you’ll have these values.
- Examples: Universal human values, fundamental rights
- They remain static. Never change with time or region (unlike environmental values or privacy- western world person would be more focused on them).
- We gain human values through two ways
Socialization |
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Social control |
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Role of Family
- If parents informally talk bad things about a particular caste or religion, if they knowingly violate traffic rules, child will imbibe the same.
- If child raised in an authoritarian manner, he’ll show less concern for democratic values.
- If a boy raised in an environment where girl child is treated as a second citizen, he’ll treat his wife in similar fashion and find nothing wrong in it.
- If parents are meticulous about cleanliness in both private and public property, child will follow the same.
Type of family | Value system acquired |
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Nuclear family |
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Joint family |
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Role of Society
- Within society- neighbors, classmates peers, colleagues, media, movies, television
- Conformity: What peers/colleagues are doing, person is forced to mimick the same.
- If they’re smoking, he’ll smoke; if they’re living in nuclear families, he too will feel to separate from his joint family and so on.
- If they’re participating in decoration of residential complex for Ganesh-festival or Navratri, he too will feel the moral obligation. Recall how Lokmanya Tilak used the Ganesh Utsav, to collect people and inculcate spirit of nationalism and pride among them.
- Social control: reward and punishment, we already learned.
- Tolerance: if you’re living in a building with people from variety of caste, religion and regional background, you develop tolerance.
Role of Educational institutes
- Teachers and curriculum have profound impact on a person’s value system.
- If child participates in sports: values of sportsmanship, team-spirit.
- If college kid participate in college-festival to get stupid extra-curricular certificate for UPSC/CAT- he is learning leadership, cooperation, event management.
Similarly, School environment also plays a role in the value system of a child e.g. child from Government school, vs. that from a boarding/convent school.
Content of the textbook plays important role in imparting value system
- If a textbook has passage “papa is coming from office while mummy is cooking food and munni is helping mummy.”
- While it sounds innocent, but its putting ‘gender-roles’ in the minds of children that men goto office and women are supposed to stay at home and cook food only.
Value education: desirable?
- Should Government impart values to children through school education?
- North Korean Government uses textbooks to poison the brains of children against South Korea and Western World.
- Same way Pakistani textbooks pouring Anti-India venom.
- Even within India, ruling party regime’s ideology would be poured in the textbook. For example,
- 2008: In Kerala class 7 social science textbook contained a chapter with an imaginative interview between a headmaster and parents seeking admission. The boy carries a Christian name; the father is named Anwar Rashid and the mother Lakshmi Devi. The headmaster asks the father what religion should he fill in for the child in the required column to which the reply is: “Let him choose his religion when he grows up.”
- Protests irrupted in Kerala, because people saw that chapter as a move by the Communist State Government to promote “atheism” among children.
- So, IF Governments are misusing textbooks to impart their ideologies, should we ban value education in school textbooks? Ans. Nope, because then child will only learn facts but his holistic education will remain unfinished.
- Solution: “Middle way” i.e. Textbooks should only impart Constitutional values -democracy, secularism and human values (truth, love, compassion). Other values should be avoided.
Event | Values imparted |
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Take them to old age homes | Compassion, altruism |
museums, cultural centres | Tolerance, secularism |
tree plantation, street cleaning | Environmental protection |
Yoga | It internalizes your mind. Once your mind is focusing inward, you’ll have more clarity of thought. |
Private relations vs. Public Relations?
Private relations | Public relations |
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They’re Inherited with or without choice- example your parents, cousins, relatives; love marriage vs. arranged marriage. | They too are inherited with or without choice. |
Your private relations are confined to small number of people. | Large number of people. |
Even with imperfections and problems they’re relatively permanent. | Not the case. e.g. disgruntled employee or customer may leave, without giving explanation or giving you chance to correct mistakes. |
You begin private relations to get intimacy, loyalty, love, affection. | You begin public relations to get respect, attention, power, authority and materialistic benefits. |
In private relations, you usually involve with people sharing ‘similarity’ with you in value system. | You will have to deal with people having completely different temperament from you. |
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Your actions are guided by internal control | External control e.g. must behave in respectful manner in front of the boss / client. |
Separation of Public & Private life?
- If a person becomes bankrupt because of his lavish “private” lifestyle (Hedonism), then he is automatically ineligible from various constitutional / statutory “public” posts in India. Because if such financially distressed person is holding a public office, he is more likely to accept bribes and take decisions that will not lead to maximum benefit to maximum people. (Utilitarianism)
- Thus, private life does have bearing on the public life of a person. We can’t look at them two as isolated compartments.
- For the same reason, Judges have to ‘rescue’ themselves from the cases involving their relatives or friends.
- President Clinton’s impeachment process was initiated because of his scandalous affair with Monica Lewinsky.
Family man = Responsible man?
- American/Christian society considers happy married family life auspicious. Therefore, you’ll find US Presidential candidates or State Governor candidates- always appearing in media with their wives and daughters, holding hands, sharing hugs and kisses, running parallel social media accounts. They do it to portray that “I’m a happy family man- I’m a good husband and a good father so, I can run the public office in a responsible manner, you should vote for me.”
- In India, scenario is different- tell me the name of Manmohan Singh’s wife or Anandiben Patel’s husband!? We are not concerned much with private life of a public leader.
- Bad private life doesn’t mean bad public life. There have been Kings, Prime Ministers and Presidents with ‘not good’ private life in their role as father, husbands, lovers and yet historians term them to be ‘good’ leaders in public life.
- E.g. Mahatma Gandhi, the father of India vs. M.K.Gandhi, the father of Harilal.
Inconsistencies in Public and Private life?
- Kesab Chandra Sen opposed child marriage but married his own underage daughter to Maharaja of Cooch Bihar. Consequently his followers abandoned him and founded Sadharan Brahmo Samaj (1878)
- Thus, If there is inconsistency in the public life and private life of a person, it leads to disastrous outcomes.
State encroachment in Personal sphere?
- It is held that the State should stay away from private life of an individual.
- But it is the private life, from where most injustices begin such as domestic violence and malnutrition of girls in a family.
- An officer starts drinking in his home to cope up with stress. Although he doesn’t come drunk in the office, still in long term alcoholism would hurt his work-efficiency.
- Field officers in revenue, police and forest department, are on duty for 24/7 basis. They can’t give sufficient time to wives and children, often leading to marital discord. The same stress from ‘personal life’ may reflect passively in their dealing with general public.
- So, should the state begin monitoring the private life of its officers and ministers? Won’t it violate their “right to privacy”?
Personal Religion vs public duty?
- Orthodox Christians consider contraceptive (birth control) drugs and abortion as sinful. So, what if he becomes a chemist or doctor? Should he run away from his duties?
- Muslims consider Alcohol as sinful. What if a Muslim IAS officer is transferred to liquor-excise department of the state government? Should he refuse to take charge in the new department? Similar case for a devout Hindu IAS officer transferred to fisheries department?
- These questions lead to UPSC syllabus topic #3: aptitude and foundation values of civil services- that we’ll learn in subsequent lectures.
Case study: role of Cinema
In 1950s , following criticism was made against movies:
- poor wage earners can find better use of the money. (CM of Madras)
- Sex and murder depicted in movies, is corrupting India’s youth and encouraging to repeat the same acts in real life. (Petition signed by 13,000 housewives).
- Cinema responsible for high rate of failure among students. (Study by Calcutta University)
In this context, discuss your views about role of cinema as a social agent for value inculcation among the children and the youth. Do you think, above views justify stricter control by Censor board over the cinema?
Case Study: Homosexual Opposition leader
In 2008, the Malaysian authorities accused Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim of sodomizing an aide who worked for his opposition party. In 2012, Malaysian High court acquitted him, although media and critiques continued to cite some procedural lapses. Parallel to this, the Members of Malaysian parliament have come up with a demand for his removal/impeachment. Whether to accept such motion or not, is under the discretionary powers of Speaker. If you’re the Speaker of Malaysian “Lok Sabha” (Dewan Rakyat), would you accept such motion or not? Discuss the legal and ethical rationales behind your decision.
Descriptive Questions (200 words)
- According to Confucius, “all human beings are fundamentally good in their nature, and if uncorrupted by external circumstances, their actions will be morally correct.” Discuss the role of family, society and educational institutes in this context.
- According to Dostoevsky, “If God doesn’t exist, everything is permissible.” In this context, discuss the role of religion in ensuring moral behavior in the society.
- Discuss the merits and demerits of using “Social osctricization” as a tool for ensuring moral behavior among people.
- The way a person conducts their private life is an indication of how trustworthy they are in public life. Do you agree? Justify your stand.

First Pillar is Over.
This concludes Syllabus topic#1 Ethics and Human interface. Next time we’ll see “Attitude”. Visit Mrunal.org/Ethics for more study material on Ethics.
my score in mpsc mains 2015 is 162.whats your score?
what is the range of score?
170
lots of spelling mistakes…otherwise, a good write up
plz suggest
hindi books on ethics paper 4
Waiting for E2/P1
How we prepare for cse mains GS paper?
Hi sir ……my great wishes to u sir..sir I am BE final year student…I want to become an IAS so I would like to know what are things I have been followed to get my aim..please help me sir..
great work
Amazing!! Before you have destroyed business of geography and economics coaching classes. Its time to cry for ethics coaching centers.
Hats off! I could comprehend everything in just one go. Thank you so much Mrunal sir!!!!
upsc material
upsc material
Sir plz upload PIN for remaining months of 2015 for IBPS level.
Exam is coming……….
plz sir ji help
Sir,
Thanks a lot for your help. Please upload the rest of the topics in one go. Your articles gives aspirants CONFIDENCE n HOPE…!!!
need analysissss and strategy for 2016 prelims…
anybody please let us know when the prelims result is coming…under immense pressure as i am a working and has to plan the leave accordingly….please those of you who have any info please share
sir we were informed during your prelims lecture series that special lectures would be conducted on topics such as food processing after the prelims. could we expect any lectures on some of the topics for mains ?
I hope we will get all those lectures delivered in SPIPA by mrunal, for mains. Thank you.
Ethical issues are.. first it is not clear in the question that wheather the sodomise realtion btw misiter and female aide is through mutual consensus or forcefully so its a matter to look once again and
Second court has acquitted minister so it means he is not involved in that case.. futher I will not go by midea trials and opposition blame game drama because its not full proof..
So.. option available to me as speaker.
1.. I can simply order impeachment resolution as null and void but that will not be fair to process of impeachment.
2.. I would ask for written detailed description from minister for his statement so that picture is clear to all .. then I will take decision..
And I will also consider that girl’s statement in my final decision so that my decision will not be impartial or unbiased.
So I think 2nd option is more relevent in his case because picture is more clear in many senerio.
Where are you ,sir
dear sir ,
Please Upload lecture of other subject eg-ethics, etc .
geography and economics lectures are so good .
Thank you .
Aur articles bhi daal do ethics ke.. What is taking u so long ?
Very good ..collection
.of imp topics as per syllabus ..of GS4
Thanks again..sir
thanks a ton sir.. the examples are superb
The post of the speaker holds a special importance in the liberal democracies of the world. Despite being the member of the ruling party,the oath of the speaker binds him with the responsibilities of the protecting the liberal values of the constitution with impartiality and provides special impunity to take such decisions which may harm the political designs of the ruling party but at the same time may protect the democratic principles. There are various stakeholders in this scenario ( ruling party, opposition party, judiciary,mr. ibrahim, the people of the country, the democratic principles, the claimed victim including the speaker)
From the prism of the legality , the speaker is caught in the dilemma of whether the parliament has the authority to test the legality of the crime or is it the judiciary which has been conferred the power to do so ? If the motion is allowed to prevail will it not undermine the principle of separation of power ? Can it in future leave a door open for the judiciary to interfere in the working of the parliament ? Doesn’t it seem to be a case of political vendetta given the popularity of the leader of the opposition? Will it not undermine the democratic values of the constitution , violating the right to justice of the accused ? or even Can it lead to law and order problem due to demonstrations in support of the leader being impeached unfairly when the high court has acqitted him?
The ethical dilemma of protecting the dignity of office which is meant to be anti-partisan,impartial, justice driven, holding intellectual integrity and, equity in opposition to the loosing of loyalty with the ruling party, leading to removal from the post , annoying party members and dilution of the long held status in the party.
I would reject the motion on the basis of the unconstitutionality of it being against the separation of power. When the high court has acquitted Mr. Ibrahim , the parliament has no authority to punish him as it would tantamount to insulting the judiciary. The minister may take the recourse to the Supreme court in this case. The party politics or the whip of the party cannot be held higher to the liberal values of the constitution. The speaker cannot take arbitrary decision as it pertains to equity in the parliament. The oath of intellectual integrity has be maintained at every cost .
Thank you so much sir :)
Sir ,plz provide e1/p1,e1/p2,and e1/p3 of ethics lecture series. Plz sir.
Great
Very mmi topic describe GS4
.of imp topics as per syllabus ..of GS4
Thanks again..sir
thanks sir