BUSINESS ETHICS CASE ASSIGNMENT

Slavery in the Chocolate Industry

Imanda Mulia Rahman 361168

1. This case about slavery in chocolate industry raised systematic,

corporate and individual ethical issues.
Systemic
Related to legal aspects, slavery is illegal in Ivory Coast and the law is
poorly enforced. Open borders, a shortage of enforcement officers,
and the willingness of local officials to accept bribes from people
trafficking in slaves, all contribute to the problem. In addition, prices
for cocoa beans in global markets have been declined since 1996. As
the prices declined, farmers turned to slavery to cut labor cost for the
survival in this situation.
Corporate
Farmers rely on middlemen to get their cocoa to market. Middlemen
are the one who grind and process cocoa beans they acquire from the
Ivory Coast and sell the product to manufacturers. So, middlemen
aware of the slavery labor problem. Later on, due to media attention
and antislavery group activities, U.S. Senator Tom Harkin and U.S.
Representative Eliot Engel, the members of the Chocolate
Manufacturers Association and the World Cocoa Foundation, together
with several human rights groups and the Ivory Coast agreed to
establish a system of verification. However they still cannot control
over anything because there are 1 million cocoa farms that located in
remote local regions.
Individual
First thing first, kidnapping kids and trafficking them as slavery and
making them work from sunrise to sunset as well as beating and
starving them are definitely immorally wrong and indeed illegal. And
also for anyone from companies to consumers, any individual who
knows the problem should not just walk away and ignore.
2. In my opinion, there is no way to accept any kind of slavery, especially
child slavery. To me, slavery was never ethical. Slavery involves the
ownership of a human being as a chattel. Slavery involves the loss of
freedom, for the most basic human needs, where to be, what to do, and
who to be and be with, and has often included many abuse activities. I
cannot imagine any circumstances of slavery, especially child slavery,
could be considered ethical.
3. There are some parties who should have taken moral responsibilities for
the slavery occurring in this case. First, the African farmers who are the
ones who use child slavery labor. Second, African government who is in
charge of rules and regulation. Third, American chocolate companies that
know and aware of the use of slavery labor and decide to continue to
work them. Last but not least, anyone who knows about this problem has
a responsible.
4. Laws are rules that are enacted by human beings with political agendas
and cultural views of acceptable behavior. However, laws may or may not
confirm to what is viewed as ethically acceptable. So basically, laws
reflect the views of those who have political power to make and enforce
rules and ethics is a subjective view of how one should treat other
people. It is wrong to perceive the laws and ethics as identical.