Anger and Whistleblowing
Some researchers[1]
have concluded that anger is a useful, and in some cases necessary, impetus to
whistleblowing. Others have pointed to
the dangers and destructive consequences of anger in the workplace[2]. I suggest that anger is not a significant
factor in the decision process of most whistleblowers.
Martha Nussbaum[3]
refers to Aristotle in identifying several elements involved in anger:
1.
Slighting or down-ranking
2.
Of the self or people close to the self
3.
Wrongfully or inappropriately done
4.
Accompanied by pain and
5.
Involving a desire for retribution
Nussbaum provides the example of a woman whose friend is
raped. The woman’s anger, Nussbaum
contends, can follow the road of status,
viewing the rape victim as humiliated and then calling for the humiliation of
the perpetrator, perhaps by ostracizing him and requiring him to register as a
sexual offender. Alternatively, the
woman may take the road of payback,
demanding retribution via prison and fines for the perpetrator. Finally, the woman may experience what
Nussbaum calls Transition-Anger,
which looks for steps that might diminish or prevent similar acts in the future.
It is easy to see how retaliation against the whistleblower
can generate anger, but how the act on which the whistle is blown might
generate anger in Nussbaum’s terms is less clear. The cases of Sandra
Black and Anthony
Tenny, for example, involved workplaces that endangered the eventual
whistleblowers and their colleagues. Black
and Tenny might understandably have been angered when management did not remove
the dangerous conditions. But the majority
of whistleblower
cases that find their way into public knowledge – and certainly the incidents
that I disclosed at HomeFirst – are not of that sort. Most whistleblower complaints relate to white-collar
crimes; even those that involve public safety seldom relate specifically to “people
close to the self.”
My journal entries during my whistleblowing days at HomeFirst
do not indicate a lot of anger or desire for retribution in response to the
wrongs that I alleged were done. They expressed
frustration at being ineffective in changing some company decisions, amazement that
the CEO remained in control given the company’s poor performance, and trepidation
about retaliation as I prepared to make my disclosures. But not anger exactly.
My newest
whistleblowing project about the violation of master lease requirements on
three contracts has little to do with anger as far as I can tell. My decision to gather documentation in
preparation for a complaint had more to do with completing what I had begun two
years earlier. It was excitement, not
anger, that I felt when I reviewed the County of Santa Clara documents I obtained:
they showed that the County had obtained reimbursement from HUD for $263,162 of
“leasing” expenditures that were really “rental assistance” payments, which were
ineligible for reimbursement, despite being warned of their ineligibility by
HomeFirst’s CEO. At work I always
enjoyed financial analysis that came together in a tidy package, and now here
was another.
While some whistleblower stories involve teams that
investigate the wrongdoing[4],
most tell of individuals who work alone, just doing their jobs. Nearly all who blow the whistle on
organizational wrongdoing first discuss the issue internally with supervisors
or through other reporting systems[5]. Most whistleblowers expect something to be
done to correct the wrong, and they report matters externally only when internal
powers resist action.
What motivates whistleblowers, I suggest, is less high-blown
ethics, although ethical justifications can certainly be found, than simply
being fed up with organizational resistance or inaction. They answer the organization with what
Nussman describes as Transition-Anger – a demand that things simply must
change. The whistleblower reacts,
primarily, to the practical problem of fixing something that is not right and
of dealing effectively with an economic power that would rather protect its
position than correct what is, in most cases, illegal or violation of contract.
Because whistleblowing is a practical response to
organizational dysfunction, those who argue for moral constraints on
whistleblowing activity – normally based on loyalty or the need to protect confidentiality – play into the hands of organizational wrongdoers. Whistleblowers should concern themselves instead
with the practical constraints on their actions – likely acts of retaliation by
the wrongdoers, their own compliance with laws, and what is necessary to obtain
legal protection for their actions.
While public admiration for the moral heroism of the
whistleblower is appealing, social energies would be better spent in reducing
the practical impediments to whistleblowing.
For example, the protections
of confidentiality should be reconsidered, legal requirements that
individuals must be correct in their allegations or they must report problems
internally first in order to obtain protection should be eliminated, and adequate
resources should be provided to investigate whistleblower complaints.
[1]
For example, Edwards,
Marissa S., Neal M. Ashkanasy and John Gardner. “Deciding to Speak Up or to
Remain Silent Following Observed Wrongdoing: The Role of Discrete Emotions and
Climate of Silence.” In Voice and Silence in Organizations.
Greenberg, J. and Edwards, M. (eds.). Bingley, UK: Emerald Group Publishing 2009: 83-109: Gundlach, Michael J., Mark J. Martinko, Scott C. Douglas. “A new
approach to examining whistle-blowing: the influence of cognitions and anger.” SAM Advanced Management Journal. 73.477 (Autumn, 2008): 40-50; Henik, Erika Gail. “Mad as Hell or Scared
Stiff? The Effects of Value Conflict and Emotions on Potential Whistle-Blowers.”
Journal of Business Ethics. 80 (2008): 111-119;
Hollings, James.
“Let
the Story Go: The Role of Emotion in the
Decision-Making Process of the Reluctant, Vulnerable Witness or Whistleblower.” Journal
of Business Ethics. 114 (2013): 501-512; and Lindebaum, Dirk, and Deanna Geddes.
“The
Place and Role of (Moral) Anger in Organizational Behavior Studies.” Journal of Organizational Behavior 37 (2016):
738-757
[2]
Lindebaum & Geddes.
[3] Nussbaum, Martha C. Anger
and Forgiveness: Resentment, Generosity, Justice. New York: Oxford University Press. 2016.
[4] For
example, Cooper, Cynthia. Extraordinary
Circumstances: The Journey of a Corporate Whistleblower. Hoboken, N.J.:
John Wiley & Sons. 2008; Joy, Amy Block. Whistleblower. Point Richmond, California: Bay Tree
Publishing, LLC. 2010; Ellsberg, Daniel. Secrets:
A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers. New York: Viking. 2002; and Schwartz, Mimi with
Sherron Watkins. Power Failure: The Inside Story of the
Collapse of Enron.
New York: Doubleday. 2003.
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