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MORALITY, ETHICS AND COMMITMENT TO THE LAW

By Mary Doolan Coonabarabran High School

The extent to which law reflects moral and ethical standards

Morality relates to the roles of right conduct and ethics is a system of moral principles. Morality can be private or public. The law tends to reflect public morality. The law can never encompass the morality of each individual citizen but it does aim to reflect widely held notions of right and wrong.

Public morality changes over time and so the challenge for our law makers is that they too stay in touch with changing social attitudes to ensure that laws are just. A good example of changing morality leading to law reform is in the area of sexual conduct. For example, sex between consenting homosexual adults was decriminalised in NSW in 1984.

Because Australia is founded on the notion of separation of church and state, there is no direct link between religious law and the law of the state. However, moral positions embodied in many religious laws e.g. thou shalt not kill, are also reflected in our secular criminal laws as respect for life is a widely held attitude. Other issues such as abortion on demand and euthanasia can prove difficult for individuals if their private morality is in conflict with public morality as reflected in our criminal law.

Commitment to the law – the issue of compliance and non-compliance

As discussed previously (factors affecting the definition of crime and criminal behaviour and creating social order through education, regulation and coercion), people obey and disobey the criminal law for many reasons. The majority of individuals do obey the law and in return receive the protection that it offers.

There are people however, who do not feel that they are benefitting from living in society, who feel alienated from it and not a valued member of it. They may be impoverished and feel powerless to change their situation. Such people may not have the same commitment to complying with society’s laws. There are other people who generally do follow the law except for where it does not reflect their own morality or ethics.

Crime prevention strategies which are focused upon dealing with the “root” causes of criminal behaviour (e.g. bad parenting, poverty, addiction) aim to break the cycle of crime by supporting and encouraging people to remain compliant with the law.

One of the reasons we live in a society in which we are usually safe each day is due to the fact that most people are willing to obey the law. We also know that those that break the society’s laws are likely to be detained and punished.