Joseph Ellin's Commentary on "Occupational Health"
Author(s):
Joseph Ellin
Don is trying to research health problems he fears may
affect workers at ABC Manufacturing. He shows admirable
initiative and concern for fellow employees. But his
supervisor, Cal, prefers that potential health problems remain
unknown, presumably for fear that ABC will have to make costly
changes in the factory. To this point, Don's actions indicate
commendable concern for the welfare of others, extending beyond
his official responsibilities.
Now we're supposed to believe that Cal has blocked Don's
access to the library. Don should confront Cal with this and
get it cleared up. If Cal has covertly refused Don's library
access, he is being sneaky and shows himself to be
untrustworthy. If he has reason not to want Don to use the
library, he should order Don directly not to do so. Don should
simply tell Cal that there are other libraries and he's going
to get the article he wants somewhere, so Cal should stop being
so petty. If Cal then orders Don to drop all further
investigation into the problem, Don has the right to tell Cal
that it's not within Cal's authority to control how he uses his
free time.
Suppose Don confirms his suspicions about the workplace
chemical. In that event, he should initiate whatever steps are
necessary to obtain company and OSHA review. This may not be
easy, or even possible, but Don's responsibilities don't go any
further than putting the problem on the way to solution. Don is
not himself responsible for seeing that the problem is
resolved; there are labor unions, government regulations, law
courts and all the rest for that. As an engineer, his
responsibility goes no further than to see to it that these
other channels are activated.
However Don might not want to do any of this in order not to
antagonize his superior. He then obviously has a bit of a
dilemma. If he's really afraid of Cal, he might be justified in
dropping the investigation, or at least dropping it after
discretely putting someone less exposed onto it, for example,
the employee's labor union. He won't like this, but if he
doesn't comply, he may have a fight coming, and may be
disciplined or lose his job. This doesn't affect his ethical
position, but he's entitled to temper ethics with prudence.