Maria and Julie are friends who are working in a finance company. Julie comes to know that her boss Arunachalam is planning a fraud to dupe the depositors of their money. She tells Maria about it. Julie is loyal to Arunachalam, and is reluctant to make his plans public. Maria is alarmed that if Arunachalam goes through his plan, the company’s financial stability will be threatened and will endanger the jobs of the employees besides ruining the depositors. She gathers courage and tips off the chief financial officer (CFO). Thereafter, the story ends happily with the CFO foiling the designs of Arunachalam.
What could be the most appropriate reaction to what Maria did?
1. Maria should have kept quiet about the whole matter.
2. Maria’s action is totally justified.
3. Maria has been disloyal to her friend.
4. Maria should not have become privy to the story or left it to Julie to act in whatever way she likes.
If Maria kept quiet about the matters, CFO could not have taken the remedial actions. Many people would have been financially ruined. Hence, this alternative cannot be accepted.
Maria, as a friend of Julie, has a duty or is under an implicit promise to keep confidences or not to divulge the secrets which Julie tells her. But she is also under an obligation, according to the principle of beneficence, to prevent harm to depositors and fellow employees. So, her dilemma can be seen as a conflict between the principles of promise-keeping and beneficence. In such situations, the moral agent has to follow that moral principle which avoids or minimises possible harm. Hence, Maria’s action is fullyjustified.
The view expressed in (3) cannot be justified. Maria had to sacrifice her obligation of keeping Julie’s confidences to a higher obligation of avoiding harm to people.
Mariacannotpossiblycontrolthe conversationor preventJuliefromsayingwhatevershewants. She can, of course, tell Julie to immediately apprise CFO about the matter. But we cannot predict what Julie would have done. Once Maria became aware of the risk, she has a responsibility to act, irrespective whatever Julie may do.