Limitations of this study

Because of the comparative and empirical approach of this study, the authors were well aware of the many difficulties and challenges involved in performing this study. To this should be added the fact that public-service ethics is a highly sensitive and even political issue in times of a deep economic crisis that many Member States are facing. The response rate, 26 Member States and the European Commission, confirms the great degree of interest in this subject.

Still, a number of limitations should be taken into account when interpreting our findings. The first limitation concerns our own approach. In this study, we do not focus on corruption and the fight against corruption. Although anti-corruption measures are related to ethics measures, we decided to keep our attention focused on administrative ethics. Another reason was the need to avoid repeating the already accomplished by other international organisations such as the OECD, the World Bank and the Council of Europe (GRECO).

Also, in the field of ethics we can only discuss and analyse what “we see”. In fact, ethics is like an iceberg, and we see only the top of it. In Objective Knowledge (1972), Karl Popper distinguished between predictable, rational, machine-like orderly social systems and social systems that are like clouds. Studying ethics belongs to those systems that are like clouds - fuzzy, complex and fluid.

As already discussed, ethics reforms and policies in the public services constitute many legal, economic and political reforms that have cultural, psychological and behavioural effects. In

“The Honor Code. How Moral Revolutions Happen (2011)” Appiah illustrates how moral upheaval is motivated by disregard, the violation of honour codes and the lack of respect –not by (learned) principles and virtues.

Consequently, administrative ethics have also become more complex. One of the greatest strengths of research in the field of public sector ethics lies in the diversity of those who are interested in the topic. Where else could we find more management scholars, public administration experts, psychologists, political scientists, moral philosophers, organisational sociologists and behavioural economists? In the meantime, this literature covers a wide array of fields ranging from the design of ethics infrastructure to workplace ethics.

Other difficulties are that the factors of explanation are multiple and that they are found simultaneously at the individual level (problems with handling money, profession-related

problems, dubious social contacts, etc.), at the organisational level of the public sector (bad leadership, unfair HRM decisions, insufficient preventive measures, low salaries, etc.) and at the political/economic level (no clear distinction between the executive and judiciary, etc.).

The best solution is to perform research concerning the link between ethics and trust levels. In this study we will explain why studying trust requires a much more complex approach.

Such complexity must of course also be taken into account when determining the effectiveness of ethics policies and ethics instruments. Unethical behaviour is not attributed mainly to a few dishonest individuals. Ethical behaviour of public officials depends, to a large extent, on the organisational, institutional and legal features in place. According to this assumption, breaches of integrity are primarily a consequence of the negative impact of specific opportunity and motivation structures, such as the lack of efficient awareness and control mechanisms, bad working conditions, low civil service ethos, or simply the fact that the chance of being caught is rather small.

The relevant literature illustrates very well that proper behaviour in the public sector not only depends on one single instrument such as an effective disciplinary legislation, setting-up of efficient control and monitoring bodies, or an attractive code of conduct, but more widely on the existence of an overall national integrity system (Transparency International), or multipronged anti-corruption strategy (World Bank, GRECO), or a multidimensional ethics infrastructure (OECD). The main characteristic of such a multidimensional approach is that ethics, according to this view, is considered a key principle of good governance. It is also influenced by the characteristics and interaction of the political and legal context, as well as by economic policy. ³⁵ Any effective ethics infrastructure should at the same time aim to control, guide and manage (also through better leadership) civil servants³⁶. Consequently, it is an illusion to think that one instrument or one approach alone is sufficient to create an honest civil service with motivated and ethical civil servants.

Therefore, this study is based to a large extent on the hypothesis that an effective fight against wrongdoings requires a combination of holistic and detailed approaches. To this must be added the need to design effective instruments which fit into the national administrative culture and tradition. This means, for instance, that it is much more difficult to promote integrity in low trust countries than in high trust countries. Thus, even if discussions about ethics are relatively stable, ethical considerations always reflect the given social, cultural, political and economic context and the change of values in our societies.

Furthermore, various instruments must be in place to deal with different forms of misbehaviour. It seems evident that changing behaviour - such as reporting sick when not ill, showing minimal effort and commitment or the use of working hours for private purposes - which can clearly be identified as unethical, may require different instruments than it is the case for accepting a bribe in exchange for doing someone a favour. The first set of behaviours

35 See for instance, The World Bank (2000), Anticorruption in Transition: A Contribution to the Policy Debate, Washington; OECD (1997), Trust in government, Paris 2000; OECD, Managing government ethics, Puma Policy Brief No. 1.

36 OECD (2000), Building Public Trust: Ethics Measures in OECD Countries, Puma Policy Brief No.7, Spring 2000.

might be the result of demotivation or bad leadership, while the second may stem from the lack of monitoring capacities. In other cases, e.g. when officials are paid illegally for making certain decisions, it might even be difficult to find any effective instruments, as it might be impossible to prove the act even with increased monitoring.³⁷

Ethics is a complex issue and, as such, there must be many alternative patterns of causality that explain individual behaviour and individual fairness perceptions. Similarly, we acknowledge that the data collected stems from a too low sample, since only governmental representatives answered to this study. Answers were given by ethics and HRM experts from the responsible national ministries in the Member States of the EU. We were aware of the danger that some responses could be, to a certain degree, political biased, and tended to represent the official government’s and/or the employer´s point of view. One should also add that the data collected comes from a fairly homogenous group of the same organisational level (mostly experts from central ministries and central agencies). Future research should include a much wider sample and ought to cover lower level employees, top level civil servants, trade unions and employee representation, employees from sub-central organisations etc.

Other limitations include the methodology applied. All data in this study were collected through questionnaires, discussions and validations during two workshops and one top-level meeting. In an ideal situation, one should have had the opportunity to carry out more interviews and to perform confidential self-report surveys to crosscheck the findings.

The present study was based on a new innovative concept. Firstly, we developed and put forward in the EUPAN network a policy paper for discussion by all Member States, as well as by the European Commission. This paper was distributed amongst the Member States at the earliest convenience, beginning of July 2011, in order to give all parties involved enough time to prepare the answers. The Member States were invited to reflect upon the content and give feedback whenever they felt ready.

Secondly, the paper included some clarifying questions which we proposed to be discussed at the first HRWG meeting in September 2011. The team of researchers introduced the topic and its relevance for the Member States, and the participants presented their views concerning the questions. We also invited some national delegations to present interesting case studies and good practices. The Dutch BIOS, the Latvian KNAB and the OECD took part to the HRWG meeting and gave a presentation on their operations. With this approach, we aimed to offer the Member States more time to prepare for the discussions within the HRWG. Consequently, the process was less characterized by the traditional ad-hoc approach. The ultimate aim of this approach was also to enhance the added-value of EUPAN.

Thirdly, many discussions about the effectiveness of ethics have so far proven quite unsatisfactory. Almost no statistics, publications and facts exist on this subject. This is surprising since some Member States have established advanced and professional integrity systems, such as the Dutch Bureau Integriteitsbevordering Openbare Sector (BIOS), the British Committee on Standards in Public Life or The Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau (KNAB) as well as sophisticated ethics infrastructures (see OECD 2000). However,

37Andvig, Jens Chr./Odd-Helge Fjeldstad, op.cit., p.131.

only few studies have been carried out on the effectiveness of ethics systems and issues related to organisational justice (e.g. the impact of HR reforms on fairness perceptions and workplace behaviour).