The Rise of Compliance-Based Ethics Management

Compliance-based ethics management has become the primary method of maintaining high ethical standards in governmental and non-governmental organizations. There are several reasons why organizations have embraced compliance regulation as the key method of keeping public confidence in their integrity. Compliance-based management (1) provides organizations a certain level of immunity from illegal acts committed by their employees and officials, and (2) significantly reduces pressures to implement integrity-based programs by lowering organizational ethical expectations. The heavy reliance on compliance ethics has made it much more difficult for employees and officials to hold organizations accountable for actions that fall outside the scope of compliance-based ethics laws and regulations.