Ethics Newsline®

Last week, when the Senate Intelligence Committee released its scathing report on the CIA’s intelligence failures concerning the Iraq war, it reinjected a dangerous and ethically complex attempt at explanation — the term groupthink — into the global political discourse.

Introducing the report at a July 9 press conference, Sen. Pat Roberts noted that “the intelligence community was suffering from what we call a collective groupthink, which led analysts and collectors and managers to … interpret ambiguous evidence … as conclusive evidence.”

Psychologist Irving Janis, who coined groupthink three decades ago, called it “a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action.” According to Janis and his followers, the characteristics of groupthink include:

• A conviction in the group’s inherent morality
• An assumption that everyone agrees with the group’s decision and that silence means consent
• An unwillingness to examine alternative views
• A deliberate refusal to gather information that could be contrary to the group’s predilections
• An illusion of invulnerability, producing overly optimistic views that overlook danger and downplay risk
• Pressure to conform, including negative stereotyping of those outside the group and the branding of opposition from within as “disloyalty”
• Collective rationalization, in which the group explains away warnings and failures contrary to its position

Some of these attributes fit the Central Intelligence Agency. It is “a cohesive in-group.” Its members have a strong “conviction [of] inherent morality” — fortunately, since no nation would tolerate an intelligence service convinced of its own immorality. And through professional activities that agents describe as their “tradecraft,” it creates a “pressure to conform” to rigorous standards and practices.

But like so many terms imported into political discourse from pop psychology, groupthink can appear to mean much more than it really conveys. That, of course, is the characteristic of cliché. Like all clichés, this one at first seems freighted with great significance. Those who use it get the heady sensation of having said something profound.

But did the CIA refuse to gather contrary information? There’s no evidence of that. Did it downplay danger and risk? It appears instead to have exaggerated the threat from Saddam. Did in engage in collective rationalization to explain away failures? Its agonizing over its failures has instead been a serious blow to its self-confidence.

In short, the Senate report simplifies a complex phenomenon: the ability of a collective will to manipulate the thinking of otherwise good people. In grabbing at this explanation, the report does exactly what it accuses the CIA of doing: adopting an assumption and fitting the evidence to it. For the CIA, that assumption was that Saddam has weapons of mass destruction. For the Senate, the assumption is that the CIA is riddled with groupthink. Were weapons an issue? Yes. Was groupthink a problem? Yes. But neither group got the analysis right.

Certainly groupthink was in operation, nationally and globally. The “strivings for unanimity” went far beyond the CIA. The Senate was guilty of groupthink in voting to go to war in Iraq. The voters were guilty of groupthink in lauding Congress after 9/11. Al Qaeda is guilty of groupthink in its views of Western culture. If groupthink is this widespread, what’s to be gained by singling out one group for accusation?

What makes the accusation especially suspect are the global parallels. The Senate report notes that other nations’ intelligence services arrived at the same conclusions as the CIA. That’s an astounding recognition. If the best professional systems in the world get the same results, then neither the CIA’s people nor its own systems were peculiarly wrong. Something larger is at work here.

We may be discovering that the entire post-Cold War intelligence profession has inherent limits. The pressure to insert political bias into the analysis (an issue deliberately avoided in this report, which focuses only on the intelligence itself rather than on how it was used by policymakers) may simply be too subtle and strong. In addition, the governance of intelligence functions may be too closely controlled by the end users, who find it tempting to blame the messenger when they don’t like the message. So the ability of the intelligence community to speak frankly and resist self-censorship — arising from the normal human desire to give those in charge what they want — may require an almost superhuman capacity for moral courage. For the Senate Intelligence Committee to give the appearance of explaining all of this with a single pop-psychology term is to give pretty thin gruel to a public in need of a far better analysis.

©2004 Institute for Global Ethics

“Jiang Yanyong, as a soldier, recently violated the relevant discipline of the military. Based on relevant regulations, the military has been helping and educating him.”

– The Chinese government, responding to a Washington Post inquiry about the recent detention of Jiang Yanyong, the “elderly physician who exposed the government’s cover-up of the SARS epidemic.” Jiang, a semi-retired surgeon in the People’s Liberation Army and a critic of the government’s killing of pro-democracy protestors at Tiananmen Square in 1989, is under 24-hour supervision until he “changes his thinking” and “raises his level of understanding” about the Tiananmen crackdown, sources told the Post. The government says Jiang has been detained for breaking military regulations; military officials at his hospital say he is being held for breaking party discipline. Jiang, who was detained on June 1, has not been formally arrested or charged with any crime. (“Chinese Pressure Dissident Physician,” Washington Post, July 5)

THE HAGUE
The United Nations’ highest court last week ruled that Israel’s West Bank barrier is illegal and should be removed, with reparations paid to Palestinians whose lives have been disrupted by the partition.

The decision from the World Court, formally known as the International Court of Justice at the Hague, criticized Israel’s 400-plus-mile barrier of walls, ditches, and fences for its effects on Palestinians, thousands of whom will be blocked from their jobs, families, and communities.

While Israel has a right to try and keep suicide bombers out of its lands, it does not have the right to construct its barrier at such a high cost to others, the 15-member panel concluded.

“The court is not convinced that the construction of the wall along the route chosen was the only means to safeguard the interests of Israel against the peril it invoked as justification,” the court concluded, according to a copy of the ruling obtained by the Reuters news agency.

The court also said the barrier was illegal because it intruded on disputed land seized by Israel in 1967, instead of following Israel’s border as outlined in the 1949 armistice, noted the Guardian.

The new wall “creates a ‘fait accompli’ on the ground that could well become permanent, in which case … it would be tantamount to de facto annexation,” the ruling said.

“The court is of the view that the United Nations, and especially the General Assembly and Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring an end to the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall,” the decision read.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Jonathan Peled last week said his country would ignore the World Court’s ruling, which is nonbinding, insisting that the matter was political, not legal.

“The International Court in the Hague has no authority to deal with disputes between Israel and the Palestinians,” Peled declared, according to a report from the Associated Press.

Only one judge, Thomas Buergenthal of the United States, dissented from the court’s decision. The Bush administration, which has veto power in the Security Council, later backed Buergenthal and Israel, saying the World Court lacked jurisdiction.

STRASBOURG, France
Saying the matter was not theirs to decide, the European Court of Human Rights last week rejected an appeal asking the court to declare that a human fetus should be given full legal rights.

The court, whose jurisdiction is recognized by 45 European countries, said that a lack of consensus about when life actually begins means that the matter should be weighed on a nation-by-nation basis.

The ruling comes in the case of a French national who was forced to have an abortion after her doctor made a mistake due to language differences and other complications, reported the Associated Press.

The woman sued her physician for involuntary manslaughter on behalf of her fetus. The doctor was first acquitted, then convicted on appeal. The case then moved to the European Court of Human Rights.

In its 14-to-2 decision last week, the court overturned the doctor’s conviction, saying “it was neither desirable, nor even possible … to answer in the abstract the question whether the unborn child was a person.”

Anne Weyman, head of the London-based Family Planning Association, said the case was “tragic,” but praised the ruling for safeguarding abortion laws and protecting “women’s rights to life, health, self-determination, and equality,” reported the AP.

WASHINGTON
A former government official who threatened to fire a subordinate if the worker provided Congress with realistic but unfavorable estimates of Medicare costs broke no laws, an internal report concluded last week.

The report from the Health and Human Services (HHS) inspector general clears former HHS administrator Thomas Scully, who ordered actuary Richard Foster to withhold information from Congress last year.

On five occasions in 2003, Scully blocked Foster from releasing estimates on a controversial Medicare bill to lawmakers who had asked for the numbers, reported Knight Ridder.

Foster’s figures put the cost of the proposed law between $500 billion and $600 billion, far higher than the $395 billion touted by the Bush administration as the bill’s uppermost limit.

Bush’s lower estimate was pivotal to pushing the bill past 13 Republican holdouts, who said they would not approve the law if it cost more than the promised limit. Two months after the bill passed, the Bush administration said the measure’s true cost would be $534 billion over the next 10 years.

Earlier this year, Foster blew the whistle, saying Scully had blocked him from giving his far more accurate numbers to Congress before the vote, depriving lawmakers of critical information.

In April, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) agreed, saying Scully likely violated a 1912 statute that says a federal employee’s right to provide information to Congress “may not be interfered with or impeded,” according to Knight Ridder.

Last week’s internal HHS report disagreed, concluding that although he blocked requested information from lawmakers and threatened to fire Foster if he disobeyed, Scully never acted illegally.

Scully had “the final authority to determine the flow of information to Congress,” and Foster “had no authority to disclose information independently to Congress” without facing penalties for insubordination, HHS inspector general Dara Corrigan wrote in the report.

In short, “no criminal violations” were found, she concluded.

The HHS report, which differs from the earlier investigation by the CRS, was forwarded to the General Accounting Office, which will consider the issue, according to the New York Times.

Last week, Foster again accused Scully of violating the ethics code by arbitrarily blocking the flow of information needed for a critical debate on a pending law.

“My perception remains that Mr. Scully withheld that information for political purposes,” Foster told Knight Ridder. “And regardless of his legal right to withhold it, I continue to believe that it’s wrong and unethical to withhold technical information from Congress.”

Scully, who left the Department of Health and Human Services last December, has since become a lobbyist for the healthcare industry and pharmaceutical companies, reported the Times.

PORTLAND, Oregon
The Catholic archdiocese in Portland last week declared bankruptcy, becoming the first archdiocese to seek U.S. court protection from expensive lawsuits accusing the church of complicity in hiding sex abuse by priests.

The church’s bid to get Chapter 11 protection came just as jury selection was to begin in the latest lawsuit against the Portland Archdiocese over alleged child molestation by the late Rev. Maurice Grammond.

While hundreds of lawsuits have been filed against the Catholic church across the United States, last week’s now-stalled trial would have been only the eighth to make it to opening arguments, reported the New York Times.

Skeptics last week accused the church of feigning bankruptcy in order to avoid both a damaging public trial and the financial liability that the $130 million suit posed to the Portland archdiocese, which already has paid more than $53 million to other plaintiffs.

Portland Archbishop John Vlazny countered that bankruptcy protection would change payouts from a first-come-first-served basis to a more equal footing under court orders.

“This is not an effort to avoid responsibility,” Archbishop Vlazny told the Times. “It is, in fact, the only way I can assure that other claimants can be offered fair compensation.”

Last week’s bankruptcy filing, in which the archdiocese claimed it has no more than $50 million in remaining assets, likely will pit the church’s canon law against the state’s secular law, noted the report.

The Portland Archdiocese tallied its figures by using church law to exclude all of the assets spread among the local parishes that it oversees. Secular law probably would agglomerate those assets, showing the church with roughly $500 million in assets.

“Canon law has absolutely nothing to do with the state of Oregon,” under whose laws the church’s alleged crimes are being prosecuted, plaintiffs’ lawyer David Slader told the Times.

Debate over the bankruptcy filing spread to the pews last week, forcing parishioners to weigh the cost of compensating victims with the cost to the entire church community and the social services it offers, according to the Times.

While recent reforms “would not have happened were it not for the brave people who brought this injustice to light,” the continuing costs might also cripple the church, noted Portland parishioner Susan Francois, who has a close friend who was the victim of abuse.

“In our society money talks, and if the initial dollar tags had not been so high I don’t know if a change would be happening,” she told the Times.

HOUSTON
Insisting on his innocence, former Enron chairman Kenneth Law last week pleaded not guilty to 11 criminal counts accusing him of helping mastermind the fraud that collapsed the high-flying, free-wheeling energy firm.

Lay is charged with conspiracy and commission of wire and securities fraud, bank fraud, and making false and misleading statements to employees, banks, securities analysts, and others, reported the Houston Chronicle.

Prosecutors allege that Lay lied to hide the corrupt practices and bogus balance sheets at Enron, saying he picked up the scam’s slack after Jeffrey Skilling resigned from the top post in August 2001.

The indictment accuses Lay of using “secret side deals, back-dated documents, disguised debt, material omissions, and outright false statements to further the scheme.”

Prosecutors point to a September 2001 online communication from Lay, who told nervous Enron workers that “the balance sheet is strong” and that he had boosted his stock holdings over the previous months. In truth, prosecutors say Lay knew that Enron was $7 billion in the red and that he had actually decreased his Enron stock holdings by $20 million, according to the Chronicle.

Lay, who faces a maximum penalty of 175 years in prison and a $5.75 million fine if convicted on all counts, insisted that he is innocent.

“I continue to grieve as does my family over the loss of the company, my failure to be able to save it,” Lay said at a news conference, reported the Washington Post. “But failure does not equate to a crime.”

Lay’s indictment marks the pinnacle of federal prosecutors’ efforts to pin the blame for Enron’s implosion on the company’s top executives, many of whom now face charges or have pleaded guilty in settlements.

According to a Chronicle compilation noted by Slate, federal prosecutions over the collapse of Enron have resulted in 31 indictments, 10 guilty pleas, one jury conviction, and 20 pending trials.

MANHATTAN
Adelphia Communications founder John Rigas and his son Timothy were convicted last week of conspiracy, securities fraud, and bank fraud.

Over the course of five decades, Rigas turned a $300 investment into the nation’s sixth-largest cable company, only to see the firm face bankruptcy in the spring of 2002, reported the New York Times.

Prosecutors alleged that the company’s near-collapse was caused by massive borrowing by the Rigas family, which was hidden from investors by bookkeeping fraud overseen by Timothy and others.

John Rigas, his sons, and others were accused of running up more than $2.3 billion in debt that was kept off the books through a series of orchestrated scams and outright lies.

Prosecutors alleged the family was a prime example of executive privilege run amok, with Adelphia planes used for personal business and company funds used for real estate purchases protecting the Rigas home’s scenic view.

Peter Felming, John Rigas’s lawyer, denied that his client had done wrong, insisting that his actions were being twisted to make them look abusive, according to the Associated Press.

A federal jury last week convicted John and Timothy Rigas on nearly all counts. Michael Rigas, Timothy’s brother, was acquitted of conspiracy, but the jury could not agree on the other counts and a mistrial was declared, reported the Washington Post.

A fourth man, former Adelphia assistant treasurer Michael Mulcahey, was acquitted on all counts.

WASHINGTON
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) last week said it will levy a large fine against DuPont, the nation’s No. 2 chemical firm, for failing to provide data on possible health threats posed by a chemical used in making Teflon.

The EPA has accused DuPont of ignoring a 1997 request for information on the chemical known as C-8, which has been linked to possible liver damage and reproductive problems.

C-8 is used to make a wide range of popular products, including stain-resistant carpet and nonstick cookware.

Traces of C-8 have been found in DuPont workers, including a pregnant employee’s fetus, and in the water supplies of towns near the West Virginia factory where DuPont uses C-8, reported the Reuters news agency.

The EPA says DuPont, which conducted studies on C-8 levels and their safety as early as the 1980s, failed to report the data to U.S. regulators as required by law, according to a report in the New York Times.

The EPA says its fine, which will probably reach millions of dollars, has nothing to do with safety issues, but instead is in response to DuPont’s failure to report the data. A separate investigation of C-8’s safety will be conducted, noted the Associated Press.

The company insists there is no danger from C-8, but has been targeted by a West Virginia class-action lawsuit accusing the company’s chemical of causing health and environmental damage.

BRUSSELS
U.S. cigarette maker Philip Morris last week agreed to pay $1.25 billion to ten European countries over the next 12 years to settle allegations that the company was complicit in cigarette smuggling.

The deal, drafted in April and finalized last week, ends all legal efforts by the countries to penalize Philip Morris over the alleged smuggling, which costs the countries hundreds of millions of dollars in lost taxes.

The settlement also bars Philip Morris from selling more cigarettes to a market than can be legitimately consumed, and requires the company to use identifiers on boxes so that product can be traced as it moves around the globe, reported the Reuters news agency.

The European Commission, which had sued Philip Morris over smuggling issues, said that while last week’s deal puts that company in the clear, other tobacco companies are still fair game, noted the Guardian.

The deal may soon find follow-up action on the other side of the pond, with U.S. lawmakers Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Tex.) and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) saying they would offer legislation aimed at fighting cigarette smuggling.

“Big Tobacco cannot justify doing less to reduce smuggling here than it has now committed to doing in Europe,” the men said in a statement last week, according to Reuters.

From the Gallup News Service:

“Gallup’s annual ‘Minority Rights and Relations’ survey … finds that the American public has mostly positive perceptions of relations between blacks and whites, as well as between other racial and ethnic groups in the country today. Specifically, 72 percent of Americans think relations between whites and blacks are either ‘very’ or ’somewhat’ good; only 26 percent say they are ‘very’ or ’somewhat’ bad. White-Hispanic relations receive a similar review, while white-Asian relations are rated slightly better and black-Hispanic relations are rated slightly worse.

“Ratings for each of the four racial/ethnic pairs measured are more positive than results from Gallup’s first polling on this in 2001. The perceptions of black-Hispanic relations have shown the greatest improvement, with a 13-point increase in the percentage calling relations very or somewhat good — from 49 percent in 2001 to 62 percent today. There has been a nine-point increase in positive ratings of white-black relations (from 63 percent to 72 percent), and an eight-point increase in positive ratings of white-Hispanic relations (66 percent to 74 percent). There has been a five-point increase in positive ratings of white-Asian relations (76 percent to 81 percent), but this is not a statistically significant change….

“Contrasted with these generally upbeat results about the state of race relations in the country, a different question pre-supposing problems exist between whites and blacks finds a majority of blacks pessimistic that the problems between the two races will ever be worked out. Whites, on the other hand, are slightly more optimistic.

“When asked, ‘Do you think that relations between blacks and whites will always be a problem for the United States, or that a solution will eventually be worked out?’, 57 percent of blacks say relations will always be a problem, compared with 44 percent of whites and 42 percent of Hispanics who feel this way. A slim majority of whites and Hispanics are optimistic that the problems will be worked out.

“The long-term trend on this question shows that Americans were most optimistic about resolving black-white tensions at the time the question was initiated in 1963. Attitudes were noticeably negative during much of the 1990s — a decade marked by the Rodney King incident, the Los Angeles riots, and O.J. Simpson murder trial — but have been more evenly split since 2001.”

“All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions.”

– George Bernard Shaw (British (Irish-born) author, 1856-1950)