Late on the night of December 2, 19841, massive amounts of methyl isocyanate gas (500 times more poisonous than cyanide) leaked from a pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, immediately killing at least 2,000 people1 and causing significant illness and premature death to many more. Union Carbide Corporation “UCC” immediately tried to distance itself from legal responsibility, in what would become the worst industrial accident in history at that time. Eventually it reached a settlement with the Indian Government and paid $470 million2 in compensation, a relatively very small amount, based on significant severity of the long-term health consequences of exposure and the number of people exposed. The disaster indicated a need for stricter international standards for environmental safety and industrial disaster preparedness. The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze the ethical issues raised with respect to the different active and passive agents who were involved in this disaster. …show more content…
During our class discussion, majority agreed that the Indian subsidiary (Union Carbide India Limited “UCIL”) and the Indian Government should be held accountable for the tragedy and have acted unethically.
A small portion of the students was of the opinion that the parent company UCC have not acted unethically as the day to day operations was managed by the Indian subsidiary. Dow Chemical since it purchased UCC after approx. 17 years3 from the tragedy was not legally accountable and some students were of the opinion that they should not be morally and ethically responsible too. I have a similar opinion with respect to UCIL and Indian Government, but I believe that UCC and Dow Chemical have also acted
unethically. The major active agents for the purpose of this paper are UCC, UCIL and Indian Government, whereas Dow Chemicals, plant workers and residents of Bhopal can be classified as Passive agents. Mapping the choices made by Active agents, UCC and UCIL choose to act towards increasing their organization’s profit over the value of human life. Indian Government choose India’s overall economic prosperity and drive towards industrialization over the wellbeing and safety of its citizens. Having mapped the agents and their respective choices, I have applied two different methods of moral reasoning to support my earlier stated opinion regarding the ethical issues raised. Applying the utilitarian theory, many principles exist which may be used to inform the morality of actions, if consequences are to favor most people overall. The argument here is that UCC and UCIL abandoned these principles, abused the utilitarian theory to suit their needs, stayed within the laws of the time, but behaved unethically. The ‘utilities' as a consequence, appeared to be money and monetary profits, and they used that to define the value of their needs against the value of human life. Instead of installing state-of-the-art technology UCC used inferior equipment and employed lax operating procedures, maintenance and safety standards to those used in its plants in US. The US Company through its intentional under-investment managed to retain a majority share of its Indian subsidiary UCIL. The parent company had strict control over the budgets, all major policies and issued technical directives for operating and maintenance of the plant. On the night of the disaster none of the plant’s six safety systems were operational4, and the plant siren was turned off. Following the tragedy, Bhopal became a test case for corporate accountability. The company used a strategy of delay, denial and disinformation. It claimed the gas was not ultra-hazardous. It blamed an unnamed saboteur. This strategy worked, Union Carbide and the government of India hatched an out-of-court settlement. This exemplifies the fact that Union Carbide Corporation took full advantage of lax legal laws and standards in India and tried to shift culpability to its Indian subsidiary (UCIL), was not held fully accountable for their involvement in the tragedy and acted unethically. UCIL was responsible for the day to day operations, maintenance and production of the plant. Before the tragedy, the Indian subsidiary was doing poorly, in effort to curtail the loses they had to initiate several cost-cutting measures such as number of equipment operators were reduced from twelve to five1; many operators quit and were replaced by workers whose education was below that required by the company1. In addition to these callus ways of operating the plant, the managers of the Indian subsidiary did not follow the measures suggested to them by their American counter-part. The negligence on UCIL’s part directly led to the poor maintenance and safety measures of the plant and gambled with the lives of the plant workers and residents of Bhopal. These circumstances cumulatively led to the gas explosion and the poor safety procedures intensified the aftermath of the explosion. UCIL acted irresponsibly and was unethical in its activities. The Indian Government, also abused the utilitarian theory to suit their needs, and behaved unethically. The ‘utilities' as a consequence, appeared to be economic prosperity of the country i.e. employment, supply and industrialization, and they used these to define the value of their needs against the value of human life and environmental harm. The Bhopal plant was built in 19691 with the blessings of the Indian government which wanted to increase the production of pesticides which it desperately needed to raise food for India’s huge population. U.S mangers wanted to close the plant down a year earlier than the disaster but the government asked the company remain open to preserve jobs of thousands of workers in the plant. If the plant was allowed to shut-down this tragedy could have been averted, the fault of which equally lies with the Indian government. In October 19845 then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated and her son Rajiv Gandhi took over as the Prime Minister. There are several reports which have suggested that Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was pressured by the U.S to let Anderson go6. This goes to suggest that the sudden and unfortunate change in government too aided Union Carbide Corporation, instead of bringing justice to the victims. Of the $470 million paid to the government by Union Carbide Corporation only a portion of that money was distributed, in many cases at $550 per recipient2. All these events goes on to show that the Indian government instead of doing their utmost to help its citizens has actually aided the tragedy, acted unethically and has not acted to stop the ongoing contamination of tens of thousands in Bhopal, a grim fact I feel is inhumane, unjust, and immoral. Dow Chemicals acquired UCC 17 years after the Bhopal gas tragedy, hence legally they are not accountable as a corporation. However as current owners of UCC assets and profiting from those assets, Dow Chemicals do have a moral responsibility to compensate the victims of the disaster and also to remediate the site of dangerous and poisonous chemicals, so that future generations are not affected by the contamination. The fact that they continue to distance themselves with this disaster and not take it as a moral responsibility is unethical. Under the Virtue-Based Moral reasoning model, one can seek to choose so as to be maximally honest, maximally transparent and maximally responsive. UCC and UCIL choose various cost-cutting methods without being transparent about the consequences. UCIL choose not to immediately act on the recommendations of their American counterpart with respect to flaws in safety equipment and procedures. The Indian Government choose not shut down the plant as suggested by UCC a year before the disaster, thereby endangering lives of many in Bhopal. The government has not compensated the victims appropriately and majority of the compensation fund given by UCC has been consumed by corruption in the government. Dow Chemical Hence by applying Virtue based method of reasoning we clearly deduce that UCC, UCIL and the Indian Government have acted unethically. In conclusion I feel that Union Carbide Corporation and its Indian subsidiary Union Carbide India Limited, were unethical in their actions. They could have shut down the plant earlier, absorbed the resulting losses and could have averted this disaster. The Indian Government too acted unethically. It could have put stricter laws and safety standards for UCC to follow and safeguard the lives of the plant workers and the residents of Bhopal. Last but not least Dow Chemical instead of shying away from its moral responsibilities should help the government, family of the survivors/victims and current residents who are exposed to the contamination caused by the leaked gas. Bhopal remains a test case for corporate accountability: a battle which is still continuing!
Due to political aspirations, government bureaucracy, and greed 111 men lost their lives and devastated the lives of loved ones and a community. While, I believe that it was collection of people who is to blame for the explosion one person who could have really avoided this situation was Robert M. Medill and his assistant Robert Weir. Robert Medill, Director of the Illinois of Bureau of Mines and Minerals, was a man filled with greed and power and did nearly nothing to fix the hazardous condition in Centralia. Medill department were very aware of the dangerous conditions at the mine but ignored requests to correct violations. Instead, Medill and Weir’s handling of the inspection reports and other communications were not conducive to clearing
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