Strengthening ethical and moral values in governance

Story hook

In April 1997, T. N. Seshan, halfway through his term as Chief Election Commissioner, walked into the Election Commission office in Nirvachan Sadan with a bundle of files. Within six months, he had cancelled four state elections for malpractice, disqualified 1,488 candidates for inflated election expenses, and issued the Model Code of Conduct — a moral charter that had existed on paper since 1968 but had never been enforced. "I have not banned anything," he liked to say. "I have simply used the powers the Constitution already gave the Commission." In two years, Seshan changed the moral atmosphere of Indian elections. The institution had not changed; only the will to enforce had.

That single-officer reformation was a dramatic but unsustainable model. Three thousand miles to the west, in Singapore (1959- 2015), Lee Kuan Yew built a different model — systemic rather than individual. He established the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) in 1960 with sweeping powers, paid civil servants comparable to private-sector executives, mandated public asset disclosure, and prosecuted ministers without exception. By 2020, Singapore ranked 3rd on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index. India ranked 86th.

The lesson: strengthening ethics in governance is a systems design problem, not a moral exhortation problem. The 2nd ARC's Ethics in Governance report (2007) said exactly that. This unit explores how — through training, structures, institutions, and culture — governments can build ethical behaviour into the bureaucratic DNA.

Why this matters for UPSC

This is a GS-IV evergreen — tested in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021, 2023. Mains questions often combine it with corruption, transparency, accountability, or specific institutions (Lokpal, CVC, CIC). Interview boards probe the 2nd ARC recommendations and recent reforms. Prelims occasionally tests anchor documents (2nd ARC Vol IV, ARC chair, Lokpal Act year). The unit is the answer-key the examiner expects to many other GS-IV questions.