Ethical Behaviour in Non-government Organisations

Abstract

What does it mean for NGOs to behave ethically? Most NGOs operate from a value base and seek to promote those values more widely in the world. As organisations they do good work, they seek to help poor people and others who are marginalised in their society and generally try to make the world a more just and reasonable place. What does the consideration of ethics add to this value based work? In considering these questions I want to draw from case studies of different types of NGOs and examine what might be ethical about their behaviour. The case studies appear to illustrate two types of ethical considerations for NGOs. First that NGOs, which seek support from others on the basis of their good work ought to behave with integrity, that is they should do what they claim to do. Second and perhaps more importantly NGOs might be considered to be behaving ethically if they choose to undertake their interventions with people as effectively as possible.