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Edward Snowden case study
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Our country was built on the underdog story, of standing strong in the face of hopelessness against Great Britain. Nearly 250 years later, this mentality still stands. The “American Dream” is alive and well, or so we like to believe. If the little guy works just a little bit harder, one day he can ascend through the ranks and become president. This is our mythology, our creed, the beliefs that we as a people have adopted in the place of religion. It is easy to see, then, why we as a people believe in the whistleblower, the powerless man taking a stand against injustice in an organization. He is, in many ways, another embodiment of the American Dream.
According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, more than 30 states have some sort of legal protection for whistleblowers; additionally, there are many federal laws that further protect whistleblowers. In this essay, a “whistleblower” will be defined as any person who exposes an organization involved in a contraband activity. “Success” or “effectiveness” will be measured by the outcome of the whistleblowing. If the forbidden activity stopped, the whistleblowing will be considered a success; if it continued, the whistleblowing was not. When analyzed with these metrics, whistleblowing is not nearly as effective as the public would like to believe. Its success depends heavily upon the strength of the organization under scrutiny, the receptiveness of the public to the issue, and the magnitude of the offense.
The most glaring instance of whistleblowing is the Edward Snowden case. This instance can be classified as an “individual vs. government” type of accusation. In recent years, this type of whistleblowing has seen very little success. Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning, the...
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Chen, Adrian. "After 30 Years of Silence, the Original NSA Whistleblower Looks Back." Gawker. N.p., 12 Nov. 2013. Web. 8 Feb. 2014. .
Harris, Gardiner, and Duff Wilson. "Glaxo to Pay $750 Million for Sale of Bad Products." New York Times. N.p., 26 Oct. 2010. Web. 8 Feb. 2014. .
Near, Janet, and Marcia Miceli. "Effective Whistle-Blowing." The Academy of Management Review 20.3 (1995): 679-708. JSTOR. Web. 7 Feb. 2014.
Osterhaus, Anja, John Devitt, Giorgio Fraschini, and Eliska Cisarova. "Whistleblowing: an effective tool in the fight against corruption." Transparency International. N.p., n.d. Web. 8 Feb. 2014.
Corruption is a persistent problem that plagues the world and it knows no boundaries. Transparency International defines it as the “abuse of entrusted power for private gain” (2013). For the purposes of this thread, ‘corruption’ is defined as any individual, collective, or structural act or process that permits the use of public authority or position for private gain. This definition captures the broad and many ways individuals and institutions abuse power and the public trust. In regard to whistleblowing, much conflict stems from the context in which the whistleblower is viewed.
McCraw, David, and Stephen Gikow. “The End to a Unspoken Bargain? National Security and Leaks in a Post-Pentagon Papers World.” Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review 48.2 (2013): 473-509. Academic OneFile. Web. 5 Dec. 2013.
Kevin M. Gallagher. 2013. Freedom of the Press Foundation. Glenn Greenwald, NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden: 'I don't want to live in a society that does these sort of things'. Video file posted on YouTube on June 9, 2013.
Cassidy, John. "Why Edward Snowden Is a Hero." The New Yorker. N.p., 10 June 2013. Web. 15 Feb.
In early June 2013, Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former defense contractor who had access to NSA database while working for an intelligence consulting company, leaked classified documents reports that the National Security Agency (NSA) is recording phone calls of millions of Americans along with gathering private data and spying foreign Internet activity. The Washington Post later broke the news disclosed PRISM, a program can collect data on Internet users. The leaked documents publicly stated a vast objection. Many people were shocked by the scale of the programs, even elected representatives were unaware of the surveillance range. A nationwide debate over privacy rights have been sparked. Although supporters claim that the NSA only does its best to protect the United States from terrorists as well as respecting Americans' rights and privacy, many civil rights advocates feel that the government failed to be clear about the limit of the surveillance programs, threatening Americans' civil...
Whistle blowing is a controversial topic in the professional industry. Whistle blowing is the act of speaking out against a fellow colleague or even a friend that has done something non-ethical or illegal in the workplace. A whistleblower raises concerns about the wrongdoing inside of the workplace. Employees hesitate to become a whistleblower because of the idea of becoming a snitch on fellow employees and having a bad rep around the office. This concern was lowered in 1989 with a law called the Whistleblower Protection Act that protects federal government employees in the United States from retaliatory action for voluntarily disclosing information about dishonest or illegal activities occurring at a government organization (whistleblowers.gov).
The term Whistleblower means “An employee who discloses information that s/he reasonably believes is evidence of illegality, gross waste or fraud, mismanagement, abuse of power, general wrongdoing, or a substantial and specific danger to public health and safety. When information is classified or otherwise restricted by Congress or Executive Order, disclosures only are protected as whistleblowing if made through designated, secure channels. (What is a Whistleblower?)” The idea behind whistleblowers is that they believe trying to inform the public of illegal acts within their businesses has the potential to protect the public from wrongdoing. The following studies analyze scholar’s findings on different factors related to whistle blowing as
Board, The Editorial. “Edward Snowden, Whistle-Blower.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 18 May. 2014
Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (N.S.A) subcontractor turned whistle-blower is nothing short of a hero. His controversial decision to release information detailing the highly illegal ‘data mining’ practices of the N.S.A have caused shockwaves throughout the world and have raised important questions concerning how much the government actually monitors its people without their consent or knowledge. Comparable to Mark Felt in the Watergate scandals, Daniel Ellsberg with the Pentagon Papers, Edward Snowden joins the rank of infamous whistleblowers who gave up their jobs, livelihood, and forever will live under scrutiny of the public all in the service to the American people. Edward Snowden released information detailing the extent of the N.S.A breaches of American privacy and in doing so, became ostracized by the media and barred from freely reentering America, his home country.
Many other businesses may not want to do business as the company was involved with immoral behavior. The unethical business practices of the company will also gain exposure in the media and to the public (Nicol, 2015, n.p). Employees no longer keep unethical activities of the company to themselves. As a whistleblower, they may be perceived as a traitor, but in this case the senior executives are being traitors. They are taking money from immoral behavior and tarnishing the name of the company (Nicol, 2015, n.p).
I want to learn more about the whistleblowing in the country that I am studying, so I looked up the journey of whistleblowing in the America. U.S. has a long history on whistleblowing. The first whistleblower is Benjamin Franklin in 1773, which
Edward Snowden. This is a name that will be in the history books for ages. He will be branded a traitor or a whistleblower depending on where you look. Many Americans feel that Edward Snowden is a traitor who sold the United States’ secrets aiming to harm the nation. Others believe that he was simply a citizen of the United States who exercised his right to expose the government for their unconstitutional actions. It is important to not only know the two sides to the argument of friend or foe, but to also know the facts as well. My goal in this paper is to present the facts without bias and to adequately portray the two sides of the argument.
It is likely to consider Edward Snowden as a whistle blower because he wanted the people to decide what the government can or can not do. According to the article, Man behind NSA Leaks Says He Did It to Safeguard Privacy, Liberty, Edward Snowden's believes that, “the public needs to decide whether these programs or policies are right or wrong.” (Barbara, Yan). M...
By inducting ethical business practices, the need for whistleblowers will not be needed, but there is always someone that crosses the line. Therefore, by encouraging whistleblowing and supervised departmental and corporate performance concerning ethical questions. Whistleblowing is an ethical procedure when there is clear evidence of serious evidence, that will harm the public and the blower has tried to find an internal solution to effect change. The whistleblower who is associated with the unethical activity has a moral responsibility to do the right thing. Companies always know there is a possibility that the whistle will be blown, in this case the obstacle is created by knowledge that their employees stand to gain an advantage from uncovering corporate misbehaviour and thus they may be proactively looking for other people outside the organization to inform the authorities.
Whistle blowing is an attempt of an employee or former employee of a company to reveal what he or she believes to be a wrongdoing in or by a company or organization. Whistle blowing tries to make others aware of practices that are considered illegal or immoral. If the wrongdoing is reported to someone in the company it is said to be internal. Internal whistle blowing tends to do less damage to the company. There is also external whistle blowing. This is where the wrongdoing is reported to the media and brought to the attention of the public. This type of whistle blowing tends to affect the company in a negative way because of bad publicity. It is said that whistle blowing is personal if the wrongdoing affects the whistle blower alone (like sexual harassment), and said to be impersonal if the wrongdoing affects other people. Many people whistle blow for two main reasons: morality and revenge.