Social Responsibility and Ethics Halo Corp Case Study
INSTRUCTIONS
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- You will use only material indicated in this paper to answer two questions.
- You are NOT allowed to use additional sources.
- Both questions are compulsory.
- Each question is weighting 50% of the final mark for this assessment.
- The paper is maximum 2,000 words submitted via e-submissions on the module
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CASE STUDY: HALO CORP
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Overview
The management consultancy firm you work for has recently received an important briefing document from Halo Corp, a bio-engineering corporation seeking advice on the release of a consumer product they are currently innovating based on near-future technology – the Halo Chip. With a market release date of approx. 5-7 years, the product’s Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is to enable users to voluntarily enhance their tendencies towards sustainability (e.g. by reducing levels of unnecessary consumption, avoiding meat, increasing recycling behaviour, turning off lights and other waste-reducing behaviours).
Whilst the purpose of the product is potentially beneficial from an environmental viewpoint, elements of the product’s usage (an ‘intelligent chip’ planted under the skin that manipulates behavioural tendencies) are likely to be regarded as ethically controversial by some key public stakeholder groups. For example, whilst Halo Chip is aimed at enhancing sustainability behaviours the product’s core technology (genome reprogramming) could potentially have a variety of behavioural applications such as the lowering or suppressing of emotions (e.g. guilt, remorse, sadness, fear, insecurity etc). There is, therefore, substantial uncertainty around the commercialisation of this unique game-changing product and Halo Corp are keenly interested in knowing how key stakeholder groups might respond to the new product.
Halo Corp has selected your management consultancy to advise them on this issue because of proven expertise of their consultancy team on business ethics.
The document below contains all the information you need to complete the task. The document takes the form of a detailed letter from Halo Corp in which they have:
- Highlighted potential ethical issues that may be of concern to stakeholders.
- Emphasised the need to understand how key stakeholders are likely to respond to the release of the new product.
- Identified the key stakeholders they want you to consider.
- Provided a general description of the product – Halo Chip – and its intended application (without compromising intellectual property).
- Provided links to key websites and documents that your team must use exclusively.
Letter from the Commercial Development Team, Halo Corp
Dear Sir/ Madam,
The last 20 years have seen a number of unprecedented global trends that present a potentially significant level of risk to public security. At the centre of concerns over population explosion, resource shortages and poverty are the profoundly damaging effects of climatic instability. Amidst growing concern, several governments have funded a variety of private sector projects whose principal aim is to develop radical solutions to manage the threat of climate change. In addition to the more well-known research into renewable energy technologies (solar, wind etc.) a vast amount of money has been channelled into bio-technologies (genetic modification). The first wave of such funding culminated in the genetic modification of food crops (e.g. wheat), enabling new strains of plants that could tolerate and even prosper in the event of harsh climatic conditions, lowering the risk of crop failure and global food shortages. A second, less known stream of funding was poured into research into human bio-engineering solutions. Our company Halo Corp was a key recipient of this funding, and has successfully developed a portfolio of bio-technologies that, with no side effects, modify the behaviour of humans in environmentally friendly ways (which will be outlined further below). The principal USP of our technology is to address climate change by reducing negative human impacts on the environment.
Currently, we anticipate that our flagship product – the Halo Chip – is around 5-7 years from commercialisation, subject to the mandatory screening procedures and regulatory approval. In anticipation of this, we are soliciting your expertise in evaluating risks and threats we may face in commercialising the Halo Chip. We are specifically concerned about the reaction of key stakeholder interest groups who are thought to be crucial in galvanizing public opinion, either for or against, the Halo Chip.
The Halo Chip
The Halo Chip is an unobtrusive intelligent microchip implant that moderates human behaviours via genome reprogramming. The core USP of the Halo Chip is to enhance behavioural tendencies in the user that, over time, lower their negative impact on the natural environment. Examples of this range from; enhancing the propensity to exercise daily, thus reducing use of private transport; developing good eating habits which, aside personal health benefits, may de-pressurise food systems; enhance toleration of low light and low heat levels which may reduce demands on energy consumption; stabilize the fluctuations in our desire states – which often result in wasteful forms of consumption such as ‘binge eating’, ‘impulse buying’ and ‘status competition’ (i.e. ‘keeping up with the Joneses’). It is often cited that the human desire for happiness fuels excessive levels of material consumption. The Halo Chip can be programmed (within acceptable boundaries) to produce and even prolong human satisfaction at lower levels of material consumption, disrupting the connection between more consumption and greater happiness. In addition to this, again within predefined limits, the Halo Chip can be programmed by the user to encourage particular behavioural traits such as heightened and/or prolonged empathy with others (e.g. humans, animals and ecosystems), so that we are more able to act in ways that don’t cause them harm.
It is important to note that the chip only enhances and stabilises tendencies that are already ‘engineered-in’ by Mother Nature. In this sense it is not re-wiring the users’ DNA code but channelling it in ways that promote pro-sustainability outcomes. Moreover, the Halo Chip, much like a mobile phone, is voluntarily purchased and can be switched on and off at the discretion of the user. There is no element of coercion to use the product and it is highly customisable such that each user retains full autonomy. One additional aspect of the Chip – which we are yet to decide on- is whether we enable it to collect user-driven content over its lifetime. We would not envisage the product to be employed as a passive monitoring device but a user driven platform for individuals to interpret their own data. For example, users could download the information in the chip to a PC/Mac and observe trends in their behaviours over time. They could, for example, compare behaviours at times when the chip is active and inactive. However, due to inevitable concerns over consumer privacy we are, as yet, uncertain about this as a product feature.
Assessing Stakeholder Reactions
Whilst the sole purpose of the chip itself is to minimise the Global Risk of Climate Change to the maintenance of human systems, the nature of the product and its core technology (genome reprogramming) is likely to be considered by some groups as controversial and thus a public risk. For instance, there may be concern if it could be manipulated and/or used to achieve behavioural advantages in other applications (e.g. warfare, sports, education etc.). There is a historical precedent for heightened public concern when it comes to bio-technologies. Genetically modified (GM) food crops, despite enhancing global food security, were initially met by huge resistance from key stakeholders in the global public domain who successfully leveraged the media to mobilize negative public reactions (e.g. ‘Frankenstein Food’). If the public and media thought of GM crops as ‘Franken-Food’, might they see the Halo Chip as creating actual ‘Frankenstein Monsters’!?!
Because of some of these concerns, we anticipate mixed reactions to the Halo Chip from a set of key stakeholders [listed below], each of them representing a specific set of public interests. They are also powerful influencers of public opinion and have strong connections with other public interest groups and regularly attempt to influence media and government. It is absolutely crucial to the successful commercialisation of the Halo Chip, and thus the alleviation of climate instability, that we begin to develop an understanding of how these key stakeholders are likely to respond.
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QUESTIONS
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Using ONLY the case description and the sources indicated on the last page of this paper, evaluate the possible reactions of two key stakeholders from the list provided below. In particular, address the following questions:
Q1. Using the concepts and theories provided in lecture 4 (‘Normative Ethical Theories’) briefly explain why the Halo Chip presents an ethical issue to each stakeholder.
Q2. Using Mitchell et al.’s stakeholder salience model evaluate and synthesize the nature and intensity of stakeholder reactions.
Use evidence from the materials recommended on the last page to support your responses and to identify some limitations of the theory you have applied.
Stakeholders
Choose only two Civil Society Organisation (CSO) stakeholders from the list below that you consider most important and use their website as the primary source for your analysis:
Animal Aid www.animalaid.org.uk
Friends of the Earth www.friendsoftheearth.uk
Human Rights Watch www.hrw.org
Open Rights Group www.openrightsgroup.org
The Climate Group www.theclimategroup.org
Advice
When analysing these websites you should consider that these stakeholders:
- a) may be focussed on a particular ethical issue (e.g. protecting the environment, people’s civil rights or animal rights);
- b) may represent the interests of others who are somehow involved in a particular ethical issue.
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SOURCES
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Academic Sources
- Mitchell, R. K., Agle, B. R., and Wood, D. J. (1997). ‘Toward a theory of stakeholder identification and salience: Defining the principle of who and what really matters’, Academy of Management Review, 22(4): 853-886.
This article is the primary academic source for this assessment. You should use it to analyse stakeholders’ reactions to the Halo Chip (Q2).This article is available on Canvas in Units > Week 3 > Essential Sources.
- The lecture about ‘Normative Ethical Theories’ (available on Canvas in Units > Week 4) is useful to address Q1.
Other Sources
- The Guardian, 14 March 2012: “Bioengineer humans to tackle climate change, say philosophers” available at
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2012/mar/14/human-engineering-climate-change-philosophy
- The stakeholders websites (‘Animal Aid’, ‘Friends of Earth’, ‘Human Right Watch’, ‘Open Rights Group’, ‘The Climate Group’; choose only two stakeholders).
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