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THE ETHICS OF A MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT AS A POLITICIAN: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

100%

Tokarczyk R.

Przegląd Sejmowy

2008

issue 4(87)

67-85

Apart from the entirely legal professions, there exist quasi-legal professions. They are performed by people who do not necessarily have legal academic education, but their subject includes the making, application and execution of law. Among them are undoubtedly, inter alia, the professions of a politician, parliamentarian, lobbyist, policeman, soldier, clergyman and ombudsman, who is in Poland called a commissioner for citizens rights. Due to key importance of law for regulation and arrangement of social relations, all these professions are so important that their ethical status (or professional ethics) should be regulated along with their legal status. A politician has broader range of activities than others. His position may be either partisan or non-partisan, parliamentary or non-parliamentary, incumbent or non-incumbent, lobbyist or non-lobbyist and he may hold an office of ombudsman or not. When characterising the ethics of a politician we also describe, to some extent, ethics of other above-mentioned professions. The ethics of a soldier and the ethics of a policeman reflect, in a typical way, specific nature of the professions consisting in faithful, accurate and literal application of the law. For these reasons, the ethics of a politician is at the same time an independent ethics for a professional politician and the background for ethics of representatives of other professions contributing in creation of public ethics. Most professional politicians, sit in parliament for at least one term, therefore they are called parliamentarians. A parliamentarian, in the performance of his or her duties, is under obligation in relation to many different persons, which results in moral dilemmas caused by conflicts of interests. Various group may consider him or her as a representative of interest: of the public, of the whole electorate of his or her constituency, of those who voted for him or her, of all members of his or her own party or those who are not members of a political party, of the party leadership, his or her professional community, municipality, district, county or region, a particular group of pressure, or his or her own personal interest. According all known regulations of the ethics of a politician, he or she should be able to distinguish public interests from private ones and should always put common good before private benefits. He or she should be driven by lawfulness and do not yield to corruption, venality, nepotism, clientelism and addiction to lobbyists. He or she should also show independence, veracity, honesty, diligence and accountability. The existing regulations of the ethics of a parliamentarian take two main forms: parliamentary codes of conduct and parliamentary ethics. The former are given a legal nature and the latter the ethical one.

THE ETHICS OF A MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT AND THE NATURE OF A REPRESENATATIVE MANDATE

80%

Szymanek J.

Przegląd Sejmowy

2008

issue 4(87)

87-102

The ethics of a parliamentarian is 'sui generis' a qualified form of political ethics. However, political ethics and the ethics of a parliamentarian differ in that political ethics is, at least to a degree, legally defined and regulated. The legal framework of ethics of a parliamentarian may be assessed at least from three points of view. The first of them is legal constitutional nature of parliamentary mandate which, in fact, determines specific obligations of its holder shaping his or her behavior, which - in turn - in confrontation with the principles relating to general construction of mandate, may be assessed as ethical or unethical. The second point of view, which is directly linked to the previous one, is the relation between a parliamentarian and his or her own political parties, or - speaking more broadly - his or her powerbase. This relation, firstly, may significantly modify theoretical foundations of the mandate and, secondly, is distinguished by its own system of ethics - used in a peculiar meaning - which may not only complement theoretical foundations of the mandate, but also - even potentially - collide (or, at least, do not harmonize) with them. Finally, the third legal approach to the manner of regulation of ethics of a parliamentarian is the question of relations between a parliamentarian and other extra-parliamentary communities and groups of lobbying character, i.e. all types of pressure groups which - more or less - exert influence on the parliamentarians and parliament and, as a consequence, affect the decisions of the legislature. These three dimensions of ethics of a parliamentarian constitute peculiarly understood subsystems which make up appropriate ethics of a parliamentarian seen as a spectrum of acts that are permitted, required or forbidden and which result from the fact of exercise of the representative mandate. The demand for ethical behavior should require from of a parliamentarian to conduct himself or herself in such a way that respects the constitutional construction of the representative mandate on the one hand, and reconciles the interest of the general public with particular interests (including those of political parties and lobbying groups) on the other, since only such a conduct may give an optimum decision (in a given socio-political circumstances) elaborated by the national representative body. The decisions made by parliamentarians, involved by nature in conflict of various interests, should always result from the choice of priorities and their hierarchy throughout the country, and - in case of a potential conflict or, at least, lack of synchronisation of particular and group interests, the decisive voice should belong to the interest of the nation exposed by the holder of the parliamentary mandate.

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2 Przegląd Sejmowy

1 Szymanek J.

1 Tokarczyk R.

2 2008

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THE ETHICS OF A MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT AS A POLITICIAN: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

THE ETHICS OF A MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT AND THE NATURE OF A REPRESENATATIVE MANDATE