Introduction: 

Ethics can be defined as the principle of the conduct governing an individual or a profession. On the other hand ethics is considered as a branch of philosophy which deals with morality. In philosophy, ethics is the study and evaluation of human conduct in a light of moral principles. Having said this, we have to understand that moral principles may be viewed either as the standard of the conduct that individuals have constructed for themselves or as the body of obligations and duties that a particular society requires of its members. 

Media centric ethics 

Media ethics is the branch of philosophy seeking to help the media professionals to determine how to behave in their work. Media ethics can also be considered as the guidelines for journalists and other media professionals. Having said that ethics is not any fixed set of rules or laws. Rather it is a process that evolves with the world in which the media operates and on which the media report. Media ethics concerns right and wrong , good and bad , better and worse actions taken by the people working for the media . Media themselves cannot be ethical and unethical. When we deal with the media we have to be concerned with the ethical standards of media workers and what kind of actions they take.   Media ethicists have compiled a list of five duties of mass media practitioners and they are : 

Duty to self 

Duty to audiences 

Duty to employer 

Duty to profession 

Duty to society 

But again there may be conflict during the practice.  

Media centric approaches can further be discussed under the following mentioned sub heading: 

The virtue approaches : The virtue approach to ethics assumes that there are certain ideals toward which we should strive, which provide for the full development of our humanity. These ideals are discovered through thoughtful reflection on what kind of people we have the potential to become. Virtues are like habits, that is, once acquired, they become characteristic of a person. Moreover, a person who has developed virtues will be naturally disposed to act in ways consistent with moral principles.

The Fairness or Justice Approach

The basic moral question in this approach is, How fair is an action? Does it treat everyone in the same way, or does it show favoritism and discrimination? The principle states: “Treat people the same unless there are morally relevant differences between them.”

The Common Good Approach

This approach to ethics assumes a society comprising individuals whose own good is inextricably linked to the good of the community. Community members are bound by the pursuit of common values and goals. In this approach, we focus on ensuring that the social policies, social systems, institutions, and environments on which we depend are beneficial to all.

 

Furthermore ethic centric approaches can be understood under the following mentioned sub-heading : 

Ethic-centric approaches

The Rights Approach

It answers the question: ‘Does the action respect the moral rights of everyone?’. Actions are wrong to the extent that they violate the rights of individuals; the more serious the violation, the more wrongful the action. The principle states: “An action or policy is morally right only if those persons affected by the decision are not used merely as instruments for advancing some goal, but are fully informed and treated only as they have freely and knowingly consented to be treated.”

The Utilitarian Approach

To analyze an issue using the utilitarian approach, we first identify the various courses of action available to us. Second, we ask who will be affected by each action and what benefits or harms will be derived from each. And third, we choose the action that will produce the greatest benefits and the least harm. The principle states: “Of any two actions, the most ethical one will produce the greatest balance of benefits over harm.”

Ethical principles from the east :

The ethical concern of human civilization dates back to the origin of the human civilization and the Vedic society is the oldest civilization of the world and has incorporated a well developed set of ethics. In Vedic Hindu system ethics is closely related to the dharma . A person of hindu society is obligated to follow the guidelines given by dharmashastra. Vedic hindu philosophy incorporates various views from extreme spiritual to extreme materialistic. The main classical school of the hindu thought can be classified as 

The mainstream school : It is the philosophical school that directly follow the Vedic tradition and it includes following mentioned six philosophies 

Mimamasa 

Vedanata 

Vaisheshika 

Nyaya

Samkhya 

Yoga 

The alternative school: 

The alternative school keep the critical view to the Veda 

Buddhism

Jainism 

Charvaka 

Are classified under this. 

The latter-day school : The philosophies that are under the Vedic Hindu Tradition but evolved relatively later are classified under this. Some of them have belief in Veda and some of them are attached with other Hindu dharmashastra.   

Ethics in Hindu society is not detached from the dharma and hence some so called Modernist and Marxist are confused it with the religious associations however the fact is hindu ethics consists of a highly refined moral sensibility visualized with the standards of character and conduct. 

Ethics in the west : 

The Greek philosophers, beginning about the 6th century BC theorized intensively about moral behaviour which further led to the development of philosophical ethics in the west. 

In Europe, the French philosopher and novelist Jean Jacques Rousseauin his Social Contract , accepted Hobbes’s theory of the social contract. His novel Emile and other work however attributed evil to social maladjustment and held that humans were by nature good. The British anarchist , philosopher, novelist and political economist William Godwin developed this idea to its logical extreme in his Enquiry Concerning Political Justice , which rejected all social institutions, including that of the state, on the ground that their mere existence is the source of evil. 

The ethical and political doctrine known as Utilitarianism was formulated by the British philosopher Jeremy Bentham toward the end of the 18th century and later expounded by the british philosopher James Mill and his Son, John Stuart Mill . In his introduction to the principles of Morals and Legislation, Bentham explained the priciple of the utility as the means of augmenting the happiness of the community. He believed that all human action are motivated by a desire to obtain pleasure and avoid paina. Because utilitarianism is a universal hedonism not an egoistic hedonism like Epicureanism, its highest good is the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people.