Toshi has a part-time job as an aide in the mayor’s office. Yesterday a large, beautifully wrapped box was delivered to the office. Inside the box were dozens of expensive watches, gifts to the mayor’s staff from the Tik-Tok Watch Corporation. A card attached to the box read, “Dear friends at City Hall: We at Tik-Tok are excited that we may soon be building a new factory in your community. We appreciate whatever help you can give us in getting the zoning laws changed. Please keep the watches as a token of our goodwill and friendship.”
Toshi knows that for the past few weeks, the city government had been debating a change in local zoning laws. Changing the laws would allow Tik-Tok to save millions of dollars when purchasing land for a new factory. Local officials, business leaders, and citizens are bitterly divided over the issue.
a. Whose rights are at stake in this situation?
b. How might Toshi’s actions violate another’s rights?
c. What moral duties does Toshi have that are relevant to this situation?
d. What action seems most consistent with those duties?
e. What moral virtues are relevant to Toshi’s situation?
f. What action by Toshi would seem to promote the most virtues?