This article began as a conference paper and was initially published in the Journal of Business and Technical Communication in 1993. Katz begins with a citation of Cicero, which points out the power of rhetoric and the importance of ethics as well as the danger when rhetoricians lack ethical conscience.
Next, Katz uses a real-life example of what happens when a writer of a technical document lacks any ethical conscience: he prints a memo that was written in 1945 by a SS soldier to his superior. The memo holds factual information about “load” capacity and transportation. Only a reader with supporting information would be able to find out that with “load” the author is referring to Jews, homosexuals and Gypsies being transported to a Concentration Camp (CC). The memo is written in a detached, sterile and cold way, describing the inhumane transportation conditions in a way that the reader might consider “load” being wood, rocks or anything without life. Shockingly, the recipient of the memo knew exactly what the author referred to with “load”. At no point within the memo, the author has to define that word, even though it is key to the memo’s functionality.
The Final Solution: An Ethical Problem in Rhetoric
In his article, Katz begins to provide necessary background information about the memo to the reader. He further evaluates the memo as a technical document for its clarity, format, argumentation and style. Katz points out that the memo is written in a concise technical format, with a clear purpose statement and ends with a proper recommendation of how to solve the issue at hand. This clearly demonstrates a logical layout of the document. However, the problem with the memo is that the writer shows little concern that his memo’s additional purpose is to transport humans to a CC for torture and death. While the document exhibits excellence in rhetoric, it is devoid of ethos. The expediency of the document becomes more important that the ethical aspect of its purpose. Katz calls it “the ethic of expediency”. The writer of the document didn’t question the need or purpose of the document; he merely functioned as a bureaucrat, fulfilling his duty.
Katz points out that each writer needs to adopt the ethos of the organization he/she works for in order to perform well (198). This theory would then explain the development in Nazi Germany, where the entire nation adopted the ethos of Nazi bureaucracy. Katz develops his theory further by arguing that the ethics of expediency are rooted in Aristotle’s Rhetoric and Nicomachean Ethics. Katz points out that there are dangers associated with rhetoric that is grounded solely on the ethics of expediency.
Ethics in Deliberative Discourse: Expediency
Objectivity in technical writing is a requirement; however, it becomes difficult when one adds the ethical aspect to it. Katz tries to define the role of ethical decision-making in technical communication by describing the role of ethos in rhetoric. Thus, ethics becomes an important component in deliberative rhetoric. Being objective as a technical writer should not equal being devoid of any human component while creating the document. Technical writing needs to be based “on deliberative rhetoric from the standpoint of both rhetoric and ethics” (199).
The definitions of “virtue”, “moral wrong /right” and “truth” are important for technical writers. However, if “right” and “wrong” is subject to interpretation, then the term becomes subjective and no longer fits the need of objectivity in technical writing. Applying this in the most extreme case, Aristotle’s “utility is a good thing” would support the ethics of expediency and put the functionality of the document above its content (200).
Hitler’s “Ethical” Program?
Katz further examines Hitler’s writings and his philosophy and points out the basis of Hitler’s successful application of his philosophies: “For Hitler, as for Aristotle- at least in his discussion of deliberative rhetoric-there seems to be no distinction between “practical wisdom” and “moral virtue”, between expediency and the good, as long as rhetoric serves its end, that is, the State.” (202). Hitler also used science and technology as moral expedients and created a “new philosophy” for an entire nation; he was able to create a sense of urgency as well as creating “common” goals “for the sake of technology”. Efficiency, excellence and elegance in killing became a goal for all followers.
The Technological Ethos and Nazi Rhetoric
Katz tried to define the ethos of technology; becoming part of the culture, technology also “becomes both a means and an end in itself.” (204). In industrial capitalism, value is measured in terms of technical criteria, use, efficiency, speed, productivity and usefulness while social customs, values and beliefs become less and less important. This may be because ethical values cannot be measured and are difficult to define.
Katz analyzes Hitler’s means of propaganda and explains its success: Hitler used rhetoric as a technological instrument to capture the masses and use them to execute his will. Furthermore, his propaganda also becomes a means of justifying his actions. Katz points out that the major reason for writing about this topic is to understand the essential relationship between rhetoric and ethics.(206)
Expediency in Technological Capitalism: the “Final Problem” For Us
What does this article mean for us in today’s culture? In order to prevent the history from repeating itself, people need to understand the importance of ethos and the dangers of pure economic expediency and personal happiness above wellbeing of others. Katz calls scholars, teachers and writers to contribute to a better understanding of the role of ethics and its importance in technical writing. He believes that the awareness for ethical decision-making can be taught and should become a state of mind that can be then utilized within society.
Final Question for Reader from Lance and Vanda:
We want to challenge you to think about and maybe even answer this question:
Can you think of other situations where expediency took precedence over ethics? (e.g. a company would rather pay legal penalties that resulted from a particular defect rather than fixing the problem in the first place).
Thank you for reading this summary! Lance and Vanda
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15 comments:
I don't recall having run across Katz's work while doing past research on the space shuttle Challenger disaster, but I wish I had. Researchers pointed this incident out as one when expediency was put before ethics. Of course, no one could really have known that faulty o-rings would lead to the loss of life, but some engineers did question whether the shuttle was launch-ready. With cost and politics taking the attention of NASA heads, however, the risk to life was ignored. I'm sure that's a rather simplistic analysis of the tragedy, but it's a high-profile example of how ethics was not considered with terrible results.
I have been thinking about your final question. I love Jane's example of the Challenger. Though I can't think of a specific incident, one example I would like to point out is tax evasion. I am sure that many companies have knowingly commited tax evasion, taking the chance on avoiding paying taxes, but getting caught and having to pay fines or possibly worse.
Thanks for the well-written summary. I am looking forward to this discussion in class.
I don't like to think that automobile mfg. send out vehicles that are defective, but it sure seems odd that after so many miles something goes wrong and there is a recall. It seems a few deaths or accidents calls for action.
I like reading about ethics, so I found this very interesting.
I've read this article before, and again I find myself struggling with whether or not I agree with Katz's assessment of expediency and its link to Aristotelian rhetoric. No doubt, he lays out a very nice piece of work that makes many subtle connections among complex cultural/ political/ technological divides. But when I read Aristotle, I see a strong ethical current in his work. He and Plato were essentially concerned with truth and what is "right"--it's what separates them from the sophists. I see what Katz says about how ethics is subservient to expediency in Rhetoric, but it still plays a prominent role. If we've lost that thread by defining happiness as "personal or corporate gain grounded in economic progress," then we are seriously to blame, but this might not be so directly attributable to Aristotle's treatment of deliberative rhetoric.
Nevertheless, the central point here is that our culture has left ethics on the side by focusing solely on technological/scientific expediency--technology and science purely for technology and science's sake. This seems irrefutable (especially in the 1950s through the 1980s, perhaps less so now as our culture begins to see the global damage that this ethic has caused). For making these connections, this is a truly seminal essay. We are lucky that it is our field that has been responsible for work like this.
Throughout the article and after reading Lance and Vanda's question posed at the end of the summary, I wonder how the Enron scandal may be an appropriate example. An accountant wrote internal memos regarding questionable accounting practices, but the warnings went unheeded by upper management. What information had been passed along to stockholders prior to the company's implosion? How many people had been led to believe the company was in sound financial standing only to discover the complete opposite was true? Ethos was certainly absent from public financial documents and annual reports distributed to internal and external stakeholders.
I think you did a great job summarizing this article--I read it last semester and it isn't the easiest read--your summary was clear and understandable.
I do believe that technical communication is a social act and needs to consider the societal, political, and ethical consequences of its communication. As Katz states “All deliberative rhetoric is concerned with decision and action. Technical writing, perhaps even more than other kinds of rhetorical discourses, always leads to action, and thus always impacts on human life” (p. 259). Since technical communication is a powerful discourse and impacts human life, ethics become a necessary consideration.
Thanks for the great summary! I thought it was interesting that the author decided to use Hitler as an example, but I think it illustrates his point very well, because everyone that reads this article is familiar with the consequences of his propaganda. Being a history lover, the first example that came to mind, although the connection may be a bit tenuous, is the preaching of the Crusades. Although communicated primarily by word of mouth using sermons, instead of written documents, the effect is similar to the example of Hitler: urging one group to fight against another, with disregard for human life and overriding concern with a goal outweighing concern for individual life. One needs to be a persuasive speaker (hence the connection to rhetoric) in order to persuade people to risk their lives for a cause that may or may not have otherwise personally affected them.
I thought this was an interesting and important article, and look forward to discussing it in class.
Ethics are indeed important in technical communication, which is supposed to communicate accurate, factual information to readers. But this is a difficult issue when it comes to personal convictions and the determination of right and wrong. If someone will be harmed because an important detail is ignored or buried, as in the Challenger disaster, then it is clearly a matter of ethics.
I wonder, when I read about the Nazi memo, whether the soldier chose to use the word "load" in his memo due to a lack of conscience or because this code was required of him by his superiors. Whichever it was, the rhetorical effect was the same: by choosing that word, the idea was perpetuated that the people being transported were less than human. And this idea made it easier for the soldier to live with the activities he was describing -- and to perpetuate them further.
I think your final question is a tough one to answer. I have read this memo/article before recently too, and was very interested in the article the first time, and was again this second time. I still find it hard to believe that someone can talk about people, who are real lives and thinking, feeling beings, as for lack of a better word, garbage.
I think that there are many things that are pushed out the door maybe a little bit too soon - I just think that since the repercussions aren't as great as millions of lives lost or damaged that we may not hear about them as much. One example I have is sort of firsthand - I used to work for a software company and we were always pushing to get things out the door, whether they were truly ready to go there or not...
Great post - thanks!
This essay was hard to read. Besides the theoretical underpinnings of the essay, it was the most unsettling to read the memo itself and realize it was a good technical document that led to the event of thousand of humans being killed.
As Amy just mentioned and many of you pointed out earlier, these days there are many areas in which “things” are not being properly completed and implemented. And if no real consequences for the company’s actions (loss of life, lawsuit etc) are executed, it seems many of us do not care to hear if the company(s) and its management/employees are being ethical or not. Katz makes the point in the conclusion of the essay that “concept of ethics and virtue itself have “deteriorated” under the pressure of individualism” (p. 206) and even further states that in “capitalistic culture, it is “economic expediency” that drives most behavior” (p. 207). The thinking that “Whatever is best for me, is ethical” is more common than not (for instance, students plagiarizing because they do not want to spend time writing the paper, but do not want to get a failing grade).
As to the question that Vanda and Lance posed I thought about the example of catastrophe at Chernobyl Nuclear Station in former Soviet Union. Communist Party was so concerned to complete the nuclear test before May 1 (expediency from the Party), that they disarmed the security system to do more testing. However the testers made a mistake as a result of which the nuclear explosion occurred. Without the activated security system, the nuclear waste leaked into the environment eventually killing many people in the area. For the Soviet Party, the testing was more important that the safety of the people that worked and lived around the nuclear plant.
Anna, we lived next to Chernobyl (about 100 km away) the day the accident happened. We found out a week later. Many friends and relatives are dying or are dead due to cancer.
I read this the first time last semester. I found his use of the Nazi technical manual as a metaphor for his message disturbing then, and I stll do. Katz did make his point about how technical writing must be objective. His contention that a writer must adapt the ethos of the organization to be successful is debatable. Especially if one worked for an unethical company like Enron or Worldcom. I like the challenge questions concerning expediency over ethics. That's how many companies over the years have lost their grip.
My comment comes after the excellent presentation and class discussion on the article. I found it very interesting. I beleive that we face moral dilemmas and choices on a regular basis, no matter what kind of work we do. By clever word choice or by a deceptive diagram, we can direct our readers in ways that may manipulate their responses. Graphs can be presented in ways that are techically correct but maybe not totally straightforward. I was thinking about information that was presented by the tobacco industry in a way that supported the (lie) that tobacco wasn't harmful and addictive. I think that kind of stuff is all around us-information that is written, spoken, or portrayed graphically, that misleads and manipulates us. Political campaigning and advertising also comes to mind.
I've enjoyed Katz's writing on ethics in Technical Communication. He seems to have a lot of examples of expediency that I've never even considered as such.
One thing I have been keeping my eye on is the high definition format war. For those not familiar with the war, there are two new formats in the home video market. These formats are HD DVD and Blu-ray. Blu-ray is a Sony created disc, and HD DVD was created by Toshiba. Both are discs that are the same size of regular DVDs. The difference, however, has to do with the software and the capacity of the discs. A dual-layer HD DVD holds 30 GB of data, while Blu-ray dual-layer discs hold 50 GB. There are clear differences between the two formats, and one of the biggest ones is that HD DVD will not play on a Blu-ray player, and vice versa. As a result, the formats have been "competing" for consumer dollars for near two years.
During the last few months, a lot has happened in the format war. There was a studio split, where most studios were exclusive to Blu-ray; yet, HD DVD still had two major studios exclusively. Warner Bros. recently decided to join Blu-ray exclusively, however, and since they produce more than 30% of the high definition discs, they made a huge impact on the war. Since then, more and more companies, stores, and studios have become Blu-ray exclusive; thus, in the last month, Toshiba has ended its production of HD DVD products. The war is "over."
Now, that was a lengthy explanation of the war, but honestly, it could have been much longer! As to how it relates to expediency, I am not 100% sure; however, it is interesting to see how public statements were changing throughout the last few months.
Michael Bay--director of Transformers and other blockbusters--has always had a very outspoken opinion regarding high definition. The studio that owns the rights to Transformers is Paramount. They were paid $150 million to become HD DVD exclusive a few months ago. Bay was furious about this and said that he was going to completely abandon making a sequel. He clearly stated on his own website that Blu-ray was the better format, and that Paramount's decision to take the money was low and pathetic.
Paramount decided to schedule a meeting with Bay that very day, and after meeting with the executives, Bay went back on his website and said that he understood why Paramount chose HD DVD.
The funny thing is that Bay again stated his disgust with the HD DVD move only a couple weeks after that meeting. His website once again displayed his disappointment.
Now that HD DVD is "dead," Bay issued another statement on his website that basically said, "I told you so!" What I find odd is the one statement where he said he was understanding of the Paramount move to HD DVD. To me, it appears that his public message was compromised due to some behind closed doors talks. I think that expediency and ethics played a part in this manner, but I don't know on which side they would have been placed. Clearly, Bay had a preference for Blu-ray, but was it unethical for him to be so outspoken when his movie's contract was held by Paramount?
Other things that have become interesting in this war involve retailers becoming Blu-ray exclusive. One reason most frequently given is, "The consumer has clearly chosen which format they want." This is somewhat misleading. The sales of high def discs were usually 80:20 in favor of Blu-ray. These numbers show that Blu-ray was certainly selling more, but it did not indicate that "the consumer" chose.
One of the things that many retailers/studios do not directly point to regarding the "consumer choice" is that they want mass adoption of the next generation format. So, since the sales have been in Blu-ray's favor, the retailers/studios probably think that one format would mean more consumers buying into high definition. In this scenario, I wonder if expediency also took precedence over ethics. Were the consumers really the focus of the studios/retailers, or were dollars the main focus? I would tend to think that money would be the first, but I do not know this for sure.
So that's my long explanation of a possible example of expediency over ethics.
Thanks for the great blog, you two!
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