$30.7b endowment has faced calls to use its clout to do good
By Todd Wallack
The Boston Globe
Originally published February 19, 2013
Harvard University, which often faces pressure from students and alumni to shed controversial investments, has agreed to create a senior position at its investment management arm to consider the environmental, social, and corporate governance aspects of its holdings.
Harvard Management Co. recently began searching for a vice president for “sustainable investing,” a relatively novel position in the world of university endowments.
“We think this is a positive step,” said Harvard College senior Michael Danto, one of the leaders of Responsible Investment at Harvard, which has pushed Harvard to adopt policies to ensure its investments are consistent with the university’s values.
The entire story is here.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Indictment Of Manhattan Doctor Who Sold Oxycodone Prescriptions To Drug Dealers
Attorney General of New York Press Release
Originally released on February 13, 2013
Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman today announced a 55-count indictment against Dr. David Brizer on charges he sold prescriptions for oxycodone and other powerful pain medications to drug dealers from his Rockland County and Midtown Manhattan offices. The indictment also charges Brizer with illegally possessing controlled substances and underreporting his income by at least $500,000 on his New York State personal tax returns in 2010 and 2011.
Brizer, a psychiatrist, was arraigned in Rockland County Court today on two top counts of Criminal Tax Fraud; 34 counts of Criminal Sale of a Prescription for a Controlled Substance; 15 counts of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance; 2 counts of Offering a False Instrument for Filing; along with Scheme to Defraud and Conspiracy charges. All are felony counts. He faces up to seven years behind bars.
“Instead of saving lives, Dr. Brizer used his position to supply drug dealers and feed a prescription drug epidemic that is devastating families across our state. The message is clear – whether you are a doctor or a criminal on the street, my office will prosecute those profiting off the cycle of abuse,” Attorney General Schneiderman said. “This office will use every tool at our disposal to bring criminal charges against those who line their own pockets by fueling dangerous addictions and illegally trafficking in prescription narcotics.”
The entire news release is here.
Originally released on February 13, 2013
Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman today announced a 55-count indictment against Dr. David Brizer on charges he sold prescriptions for oxycodone and other powerful pain medications to drug dealers from his Rockland County and Midtown Manhattan offices. The indictment also charges Brizer with illegally possessing controlled substances and underreporting his income by at least $500,000 on his New York State personal tax returns in 2010 and 2011.
Brizer, a psychiatrist, was arraigned in Rockland County Court today on two top counts of Criminal Tax Fraud; 34 counts of Criminal Sale of a Prescription for a Controlled Substance; 15 counts of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance; 2 counts of Offering a False Instrument for Filing; along with Scheme to Defraud and Conspiracy charges. All are felony counts. He faces up to seven years behind bars.
“Instead of saving lives, Dr. Brizer used his position to supply drug dealers and feed a prescription drug epidemic that is devastating families across our state. The message is clear – whether you are a doctor or a criminal on the street, my office will prosecute those profiting off the cycle of abuse,” Attorney General Schneiderman said. “This office will use every tool at our disposal to bring criminal charges against those who line their own pockets by fueling dangerous addictions and illegally trafficking in prescription narcotics.”
The entire news release is here.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
UChicago Professor Helps Uncover Lost Lectures by French Philosopher Foucault
University of Chicago News Release
Originally released on February 7, 2013
More than 30 years ago, French philosopher Michel Foucault gave a landmark series of seven lectures at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium In them, Foucault linked his early and late work—exploring the role of confession in the determination of truth and justice from the time of the Greeks forward to the 1970s.
While the lectures had been mythic among Foucault scholars, only a partial, poorly transcribed account had survived. Recently rediscovered, details of the lectures have been published in a new book co-edited by Prof. Bernard E. Harcourt.
“These 1981 lectures form a crucial link between Foucault’s earlier work on surveillance in society, the prison and neoliberal governmentality during the 1970s, and his later work on subjectivity and the care of the self in the 1980s,” said Harcourt, co-editor of Mal faire, dire vrai: La fonction de l’aveu en justice [Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling: The Function of Avowal in Justice], which Louvain and the University of Chicago Press recently released in French.
“A lot of people still cling to the idea that there was a fundamental transition in his interests, but one can identify all his later themes much earlier on, as illustrated by the continuity revealed in these lectures,” added Harcourt, chair and professor of Political Science and the Julius Kreeger Professor of Law and Criminology.
Foucault particularly delved into how the process of confession affects the way we think about ourselves, and who we are, according to Arnold Davidson, renowned Foucault scholar and the Robert O. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor.
The entire story is here.
Originally released on February 7, 2013
More than 30 years ago, French philosopher Michel Foucault gave a landmark series of seven lectures at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium In them, Foucault linked his early and late work—exploring the role of confession in the determination of truth and justice from the time of the Greeks forward to the 1970s.
While the lectures had been mythic among Foucault scholars, only a partial, poorly transcribed account had survived. Recently rediscovered, details of the lectures have been published in a new book co-edited by Prof. Bernard E. Harcourt.
“These 1981 lectures form a crucial link between Foucault’s earlier work on surveillance in society, the prison and neoliberal governmentality during the 1970s, and his later work on subjectivity and the care of the self in the 1980s,” said Harcourt, co-editor of Mal faire, dire vrai: La fonction de l’aveu en justice [Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling: The Function of Avowal in Justice], which Louvain and the University of Chicago Press recently released in French.
“A lot of people still cling to the idea that there was a fundamental transition in his interests, but one can identify all his later themes much earlier on, as illustrated by the continuity revealed in these lectures,” added Harcourt, chair and professor of Political Science and the Julius Kreeger Professor of Law and Criminology.
Foucault particularly delved into how the process of confession affects the way we think about ourselves, and who we are, according to Arnold Davidson, renowned Foucault scholar and the Robert O. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor.
The entire story is here.
House Republican aims to repeal Medicare doctor pay cuts
Reuters
Originally published on February 13, 2013
Republicans in the House of Representatives will seek a permanent solution to scheduled steep cuts in physician payments from the federal Medicare health insurance plan for retirees and disabled people, a House committee chairman said on Wednesday.
Rep. Fred Upton, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told doctors he hopes to send so-called "Doc Fix" legislation to the House floor this summer that would repeal payment reductions enacted in 1997 as part of a law to balance the federal budget.
The 16-year-old "sustainable growth rate" (SGR) provision calls for reductions in doctor pay as a way to control spending by Medicare. Congress has prevented the SGR from taking effect through temporary measures, but that has run up the fiscal and political costs of finding a permanent solution.
The entire article is here.
Originally published on February 13, 2013
Republicans in the House of Representatives will seek a permanent solution to scheduled steep cuts in physician payments from the federal Medicare health insurance plan for retirees and disabled people, a House committee chairman said on Wednesday.
Rep. Fred Upton, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told doctors he hopes to send so-called "Doc Fix" legislation to the House floor this summer that would repeal payment reductions enacted in 1997 as part of a law to balance the federal budget.
The 16-year-old "sustainable growth rate" (SGR) provision calls for reductions in doctor pay as a way to control spending by Medicare. Congress has prevented the SGR from taking effect through temporary measures, but that has run up the fiscal and political costs of finding a permanent solution.
The entire article is here.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
The Shredder Ate My Culture Report: Five Questions the Barclays Board Should Have Asked
By Donna Boehme
Corporate Compliance Insights
Originally published on February 13, 2013
It’s been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad few weeks for Barclays. Despite tough talk last month by new CEO Antony Jenkins about “Five New Values” (inviting any of its 140,000 employees who don’t want to sign up to head for the exits), the bad news just keeps on coming for the embattled firm. And the latest round involves a shredder.
Last week’s headlines of “Shreddergate” and “Qatargate” spelled out the bank’s latest troubles. In the former, Andrew Tinney, the chief operating officer of the bank’s high-end investment division, commissioned a “workplace culture report” from an outside consultancy, but was so horrified by its contents that he shredded the report on the spot at his Surrey estate and then, according to media reports, “denied all knowledge of it ever having existed.” Neat trick, until an anonymous internal whistleblower emailed Jenkins a hint about the mysterious culture report. Add to this the latest revelations about a Qatari cash injection at the height of the financial crisis that may have been funded by the bank itself, which means the bank may have lied to UK regulators.
Mind you, this is after an annus horribilis in which Barclays was hit by a half a billion dollar fine for its part in manipulating LIBOR, lost its Chairman, CEO and COO in quick succession, and saw its credit rating lowered by Moody’s from “stable” to “negative.” The scandal ripples from that debacle continues, as the firm has just announced the exit of two more top execs: its finance chief and general counsel.
The entire article is here.
Corporate Compliance Insights
Originally published on February 13, 2013
It’s been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad few weeks for Barclays. Despite tough talk last month by new CEO Antony Jenkins about “Five New Values” (inviting any of its 140,000 employees who don’t want to sign up to head for the exits), the bad news just keeps on coming for the embattled firm. And the latest round involves a shredder.
Last week’s headlines of “Shreddergate” and “Qatargate” spelled out the bank’s latest troubles. In the former, Andrew Tinney, the chief operating officer of the bank’s high-end investment division, commissioned a “workplace culture report” from an outside consultancy, but was so horrified by its contents that he shredded the report on the spot at his Surrey estate and then, according to media reports, “denied all knowledge of it ever having existed.” Neat trick, until an anonymous internal whistleblower emailed Jenkins a hint about the mysterious culture report. Add to this the latest revelations about a Qatari cash injection at the height of the financial crisis that may have been funded by the bank itself, which means the bank may have lied to UK regulators.
Mind you, this is after an annus horribilis in which Barclays was hit by a half a billion dollar fine for its part in manipulating LIBOR, lost its Chairman, CEO and COO in quick succession, and saw its credit rating lowered by Moody’s from “stable” to “negative.” The scandal ripples from that debacle continues, as the firm has just announced the exit of two more top execs: its finance chief and general counsel.
The entire article is here.
The Ethics of Innovation
By Chris MacDonald
The Business Ethics Blog
Originally published February 21, 2013
Innovation is a hot topic these days. It’s been the subject of studies and reports and news reports. In fact, I spent the entire day this past Monday at the Conference Board of Canada’s “Business Innovation Summit,” listening to business leaders and civil servants talk about how Canada is lagging on innovation, and how much is left to be done to promote and manage innovation. And certainly technological innovations like Google’s new glasses and 3D printing make for compelling headlines.
So sure, hot topic. But how is it connected to ethics? What is an ethics professor like me doing at an event dedicated to innovation?
If you understand the domain of ethics properly, the connection is clear. In point of fact, innovation is an ethical matter through and through, because ethics is fundamentally concerned with anything that can promote or hinder human wellbeing. So ethics is relevant to assessing the goals of innovation, to the process by which it is carried out, and to evaluating its outcomes.
Let’s start with goals. Innovation is generally a good thing, ethically, because it is aimed at allowing us to do new and desirable things. Most typically, that gets expressed in the painfully vague ambition to ‘raise productivity.’ Accelerating our rate of innovation is a worthy policy objective because we want to be more productive as a society, to increase our social ‘wealth’ in the broadest sense.
The entire blog post is here.
The Business Ethics Blog
Originally published February 21, 2013
Innovation is a hot topic these days. It’s been the subject of studies and reports and news reports. In fact, I spent the entire day this past Monday at the Conference Board of Canada’s “Business Innovation Summit,” listening to business leaders and civil servants talk about how Canada is lagging on innovation, and how much is left to be done to promote and manage innovation. And certainly technological innovations like Google’s new glasses and 3D printing make for compelling headlines.
So sure, hot topic. But how is it connected to ethics? What is an ethics professor like me doing at an event dedicated to innovation?
If you understand the domain of ethics properly, the connection is clear. In point of fact, innovation is an ethical matter through and through, because ethics is fundamentally concerned with anything that can promote or hinder human wellbeing. So ethics is relevant to assessing the goals of innovation, to the process by which it is carried out, and to evaluating its outcomes.
Let’s start with goals. Innovation is generally a good thing, ethically, because it is aimed at allowing us to do new and desirable things. Most typically, that gets expressed in the painfully vague ambition to ‘raise productivity.’ Accelerating our rate of innovation is a worthy policy objective because we want to be more productive as a society, to increase our social ‘wealth’ in the broadest sense.
The entire blog post is here.
Monday, February 25, 2013
New Federal Rule Requires Insurers to Offer Mental Health Coverage
By ROBERT PEAR
The New York Times
Published: February 20, 2013
The Obama administration issued a final rule on Wednesday defining “essential health benefits” that must be offered by most health insurance plans next year, and it said that 32 million people would gain access to coverage of mental health care as a result.
The federal rule requires insurers to cover treatment of mental illnesses, behavioral disorders, drug addiction and alcohol abuse, and other conditions.
Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, said that in addition to the millions who would gain access to mental health care, 30 million people who already have some mental health coverage will see improvements in benefits.
White House officials described the rule as a major expansion of coverage. In the past, they said, nearly 20 percent of people buying insurance on their own did not have coverage for mental health services, and nearly one-third had no coverage for treatment of substance abuse.
The entire story is here.
The New York Times
Published: February 20, 2013
The Obama administration issued a final rule on Wednesday defining “essential health benefits” that must be offered by most health insurance plans next year, and it said that 32 million people would gain access to coverage of mental health care as a result.
The federal rule requires insurers to cover treatment of mental illnesses, behavioral disorders, drug addiction and alcohol abuse, and other conditions.
Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, said that in addition to the millions who would gain access to mental health care, 30 million people who already have some mental health coverage will see improvements in benefits.
White House officials described the rule as a major expansion of coverage. In the past, they said, nearly 20 percent of people buying insurance on their own did not have coverage for mental health services, and nearly one-third had no coverage for treatment of substance abuse.
The entire story is here.
U.S. proposes scrapping some obsolete Medicare regulations
By Reuters
Originally published February 13, 2013
The Obama administration on Monday proposed eliminating certain obsolete Medicare regulations, a move it said would save hospitals and other healthcare providers an estimated $676 million a year, or $3.4 billion over five years.
The Department of Health and Human Services described the targeted regulations as unnecessary or excessively burdensome and said their proposed elimination would allow greater efficiency without jeopardizing safety for the Medicare program's elderly and disabled beneficiaries.
"We are committed to cutting the red tape for healthcare facilities, including rural providers," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement.
"By eliminating outdated or overly burdensome requirements, hospitals and health care professionals can focus on treating patients," she added.
Industry representatives largely welcomed the changes, saying the proposed rule would help hospitals free up more resources for patient care.
"There are a number of particularly meaningful provisions in the proposed rule," said Chip Kahn of the Federation of American Hospitals.
The American Hospital Association, though, said it was disappointed the administration did not allow "hospitals in multi-hospital systems" to have single integrated medical staff structures.
"Hospitals are delivering more coordinated, patient-centered care and (the administration) should not let antiquated organizational structures stand in the way," AHA President Rich Umbdenstock said in a statement.
The entire article is here.
Originally published February 13, 2013
The Obama administration on Monday proposed eliminating certain obsolete Medicare regulations, a move it said would save hospitals and other healthcare providers an estimated $676 million a year, or $3.4 billion over five years.
The Department of Health and Human Services described the targeted regulations as unnecessary or excessively burdensome and said their proposed elimination would allow greater efficiency without jeopardizing safety for the Medicare program's elderly and disabled beneficiaries.
"We are committed to cutting the red tape for healthcare facilities, including rural providers," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement.
"By eliminating outdated or overly burdensome requirements, hospitals and health care professionals can focus on treating patients," she added.
Industry representatives largely welcomed the changes, saying the proposed rule would help hospitals free up more resources for patient care.
"There are a number of particularly meaningful provisions in the proposed rule," said Chip Kahn of the Federation of American Hospitals.
The American Hospital Association, though, said it was disappointed the administration did not allow "hospitals in multi-hospital systems" to have single integrated medical staff structures.
"Hospitals are delivering more coordinated, patient-centered care and (the administration) should not let antiquated organizational structures stand in the way," AHA President Rich Umbdenstock said in a statement.
The entire article is here.
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Situationism and Confucian Virtue Ethics
By Deborah S. Mower
Ethical Theory and Moral Practice
February 2013, Volume 16, Issue 1, pp 113-137
Abstract
Situationist research in social psychology focuses on the situational factors that influence behavior. Doris and Harman argue that this research has powerful implications for ethics, and virtue ethics in particular. First, they claim that situationist research presents an empirical challenge to the moral psychology presumed within virtue ethics. Second, they argue that situationist research supports a theoretical challenge to virtue ethics as a foundation for ethical behavior and moral development. I offer a response from moral psychology using an interpretation of Xunzi—a Confucian virtue ethicist from the Classical period. This Confucian account serves as a foil to the situationist critique in that it uncovers many problematic ontological and normative assumptions at work in this debate regarding the prediction and explanation of behavior, psychological posits, moral development, and moral education. Xunzi’s account of virtue ethics not only responds to the situationist empirical challenge by uncovering problematic assumptions about moral psychology, but also demonstrates that it is not a separate empirical hypothesis. Further, Xunzi’s virtue ethic responds to the theoretical challenge by offering a new account of moral development and a ground for ethical norms that fully attends to situational features while upholding robust character traits.
The entire article is here.
Ethical Theory and Moral Practice
February 2013, Volume 16, Issue 1, pp 113-137
Abstract
Situationist research in social psychology focuses on the situational factors that influence behavior. Doris and Harman argue that this research has powerful implications for ethics, and virtue ethics in particular. First, they claim that situationist research presents an empirical challenge to the moral psychology presumed within virtue ethics. Second, they argue that situationist research supports a theoretical challenge to virtue ethics as a foundation for ethical behavior and moral development. I offer a response from moral psychology using an interpretation of Xunzi—a Confucian virtue ethicist from the Classical period. This Confucian account serves as a foil to the situationist critique in that it uncovers many problematic ontological and normative assumptions at work in this debate regarding the prediction and explanation of behavior, psychological posits, moral development, and moral education. Xunzi’s account of virtue ethics not only responds to the situationist empirical challenge by uncovering problematic assumptions about moral psychology, but also demonstrates that it is not a separate empirical hypothesis. Further, Xunzi’s virtue ethic responds to the theoretical challenge by offering a new account of moral development and a ground for ethical norms that fully attends to situational features while upholding robust character traits.
The entire article is here.
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