University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor Philosophy Books Department of Philosophy 11-1998 The thicE s of the New Economy Leo Groarke University of Windsor, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/philosophybooks Part of the Ethics and Political Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Groarke, Leo, "The thicE s of the New Economy" (1998). Philosophy Books. Book 1. http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/philosophybooks/1 This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Philosophy at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Books by an authorized administrator of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Ethics of the New Economy: Restructuring and Beyond "I downsized our staff so effectively, they promoted me to Executive Vice President. They also made me custodian, receptionist and parking garage attendant." The Ethics of the New Economy: Restructuring and Beyond Edited by Leo Groarke Wilfrid Laurier University Press This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program publishing activities. Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data The ethics of the new economy : restructuring and beyond Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-88920-311-3 1. Downsizing of organizations - Moral and ethical aspects. 2. Downsizing of organizations - Canada - Moral and ethical aspects. 3- Economic history — 1990- 4. Canada - Economic conditions — 1991- I. Groarke, Leo. HD58.85.E83 1998 174'.4 C98-932401-X Copyright 1998 WILFRID LAURIER UNIVERSITY PRESS Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3C5 Cover design by Leslie Macredie. Interlocking block construction by Scott Reaume, Jazz Groarke and Kate Reaume. Photograph by Sandra Woolfrey. Printed in Canada All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyrights here- on may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means—graphic, electronic, or mechanical—without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any request for photocopying, recording, taping, or repro- ducing in information storage and retrieval systems of any part of this book shall be directed in writing to the Canadian Reprography Collective, 214 King Street West, Suite 312, Toronto, Ontario M5H 3S6. Dedicated to my father, John Cuthbert Groarke, in the hope that the independent spirit that infused his work as the editor of small town newspapers is to some extent mirrored in the make up of this book. This page intentionally left blank Contents Acknowledgments ix Part I: Introduction 1 1. Editor's Introduction 3 Leo Groarke 2. What Are the University's Obligations in the New Economy? 9 A. Scott Carson 3. The Ethics of Restructuring 25 Barry Hoffmaster Part ll:The Case Against Restructuring 41 4. Restructuring the Welfare State: Leaner, Meaner, and Inequitable 43 Ken Hanly Part III: Responsible and Irresponsible Restructuring 59 5. Responsible Restructuring in the Private Sector 6l Wayne F. Cascio 6. Corporate Judo 75 ToddJ. Hostager, David T. Bastien, and Henry H. Miles Part IV: Methods of Restructuring 93 7. Cause-Related Marketing: A Restructuring Alternative? 95 Peggy Cunningham and Pamela}. Gushing 8. Realism, Restructuring, and Amalgamation: What Can We Learn from the Mega-mess in Toronto? Ill Leo Groarke 9- Ethics and Regional Health Boards 125 Michael Yeo, John R. Williams, and Wayne Hooper 10. Downsizing, Change, and Ownership 143 Vincent Di Norcia PartV:The Process of Restructuring 155 11. What Restructuring Can Learn from EBDM 157 Sharon Dewey and Leo Groarke 12. Discharging Employer Responsibilities to Employees during Major Organizational Change 167 David Drinkwalter 13. Fair Change: Employment Equity and Restructuring 179 Nor ma J. MacRae vii viii The Ethics of the New Economy Part VI: Pitfalls of Restructuring 187 14. Managing Risks in the Restructured Corporation: The Case of Dow Corning and Silicone Breast Implants 189 Conrad G. Brunk 15. De-Professionalization in Health Care: Flattening the Hierarchy 203 Andrea Baumann and Barbara Silverman PartVlhThe Restructuring Economy 211 16. Underemployment and the New Economy 213 Louis Groarke and Nebojsa Kujundzic 17. Losing Community 231 Robert C. Evans 18. Restructuring beyond the First World 239 Darryl Reed Part VIII: Case Studies 245 19- Rebuilding the Province of New Brunswick 247 The Honourable Edmond P. Blanchard, QC 20. Community Health at the Willett Hospital 255 Mary Sylver 21. Alberta Education: Retooling through Deschooling 26l J.L. Kachur and Derek Briton 22. Bell Canada—from the Bottom Up: An Employee's Perspective 273 Monica Collins 23. The Banking Sector: Avoiding the Pitfalls of Restructuring 279 Sylvia D. Chrominska Part IX: Overview 285 24. Ethics and Restructuring: Obstacles, Challenges, and Opportunities 287 Wesley Cragg List of Contributors 301 Notes 303 Bibliography 309 Index 329 Acknowledgments The present book is a collaborative project which has involved many authors over an extended period of time. As editor, I am grateful to the various contributors for their patience and their willingness to rewrite and rework their initial contributions in order to make this collection a unified whole. We are all grateful to the two anonymous academic ref- erees, whose comments and initial criticisms played an essential role in the reworking of the book. On behalf of all contributors, I would like to thank Sandra Woolfrey, our copy editor Windsor Viney, and the staff at WLU Press for their commitment to academic publishing. Both the book and the conference from which some of the papers are derived ("Ethics and Restructuring: The First Laurier Conference on Business and Professional Ethics," October 24-25, 1996) were possible thanks to the generous support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Research Office at Wilfrid Laurier University, and the Office of the Vice President Academic at Wilfrid Laurier. I speak for all contributors when I say that we are grateful for their support. -L.G. IX This page intentionally left blank PARTI Introduction This page intentionally left blank I Editor's Introduction Leo Groarke Restructuring and its effects surround us. The driver of the Airways Transit van on a recent trip from the airport told me that he had, one- and-a-half years earlier, been the CEO of a publishing company that employed sixty people. "For fourteen years I gave one hundred and fifty percent. I put on overalls and helped in the stockroom when they could not keep up with orders. I knew the families of all my workers." One day he was told the company was restructuring. He was replaced by a new CEO who had no experience in publishing and was given three months' salary as a severance package. During the six months that fol- lowed he tried to adjust to life without his six-figure salary. In the process, he lost his house, his wife divorced him, and he searched unsuccessfully for a new position. His participation in a government retraining plan was cancelled because of technicalities surrounding his eligibility. After a great deal of effort on his part the eligibility issue was resolved, but by then the program had ceased to operate. A year and a half after losing his position, he drives airport vans for minimum wage and lives in a condo which he shares with his twenty-two-year-old son—a young man trained in archi- tectural design who works as a manual labourer in two part-time jobs. This is a very personal snapshot of the negative side of a new econ- omy that is characterized by the restructuring of private and public enter- prise, by the consequences of this restructuring, and by the new eco- nomic order it creates. Within this new economy, decisions to downsize, lay-offs, government cutbacks, and the closing or merger of businesses, hospitals, boards of education, schools, and health care services are the order of the day. The fundamental changes this implies have been fuelled by many forces: most obviously, by technological "advances" which continually reduce the need for human workers, by government attempts to eliminate their budget deficits and reduce their debt load, 3 4 The Ethics of the New Economy and by the competitive pressures of a globalized economy. The new economy which results is characterized by change rather than stability, by continual restructuring, by ever-increasing competition in the mar- ketplace, and by a social safety net that is increasingly threadbare. Despite its human costs, opinions about restructuring and the econ- omy it produces are divided. Many argue that economic sacrifices are necessary—if bitter—medicine for an ailing economy that is behind the times and too frequently characterized by inefficiencies and outmoded modes of operation. This economy needs, such commentators argue, to be overhauled in order to create more responsible government, more competitive private enterprise, and a brighter future with more and bet- ter jobs. Their opponents answer by decrying restructuring and its effects, and by arguing that restructuring serves primarily as a way to widen the gap between the rich and poor. The radically divergent views of restructuring this debate implies have sparked many heated exchanges in the popular press but, peculiarly, rel- atively little discussion among those who study ethics and the ethical issues that arise in business, health,