Case Studies
What the official syllabus says
Main Written Examination, Paper VI: General Studies-IV (Ethics, Integrity and Aptitude).
This paper will include questions to test the candidates’ attitude and approach to issues relating to integrity, probity in public life and his problem solving approach to various issues and conflicts faced by him in dealing with society. Questions may utilise the case study approach to determine these aspects.
- Case Studies on above issues.
Topics in detail
A case study can draw on any area of the paper. The points below are what an aspirant should be able to do, and the kinds of situation to practise.
Reading a case
- Identifying the facts, the decision-maker and the decision to be taken
- Listing the stakeholders and what each stands to gain or lose
- Naming the ethical issues and values in conflict (for example honesty against loyalty, rules against compassion)
- Separating legal, administrative and ethical questions
Working out options
- Listing all realistic options, including doing nothing
- Merits and demerits of each option for each stakeholder
- Testing options against law, rules, conscience and public interest
- Using ethical approaches: consequences, duty, virtue, fairness (Rawls), Gandhi’s talisman
- Choosing a course of action and justifying it; short-term and long-term steps
Writing the answer
- Brief, structured answers: issues, stakeholders, options, chosen course, justification
- Being practical and lawful; avoiding extreme or unrealistic answers
- Showing empathy for affected people and firmness on integrity
- Suggesting systemic or preventive reforms where relevant
- Answering in the role given (for example district officer, police officer, company manager), within that role’s powers
- Keeping to the question actually asked and to any word limit it sets
Useful tests and tools
- Public scrutiny test: would the decision stand if reported in the press?
- Gandhi’s talisman: the effect on the poorest and weakest
- Reversibility: would one accept the decision if one were on the receiving end?
- Rules, rights, results and relationships as four checks on a decision
- Constitutional values as the final reference for a public servant
Common types of situation
- Pressure from superiors or politicians to bend rules
- Offer of a bribe or a gift; conflict of interest involving a relative or friend
- Whistle-blowing on wrongdoing in one’s own office
- Disaster or emergency response with limited resources
- Law and order: protests, communal tension, mob violence
- Welfare delivery: excluded beneficiaries, fake beneficiaries, leakages
- Environment against development: projects, displacement, pollution
- Gender issues: harassment at the workplace, safety of women
- Private sector cases: unsafe products, fraud, layoffs, corporate social responsibility
- Personal dilemmas: duty against family obligations
- Use of technology: data privacy, social media conduct of public servants, artificial intelligence in decisions
Overlaps
Case studies apply every other area of the paper; see in particular Aptitude and Foundational Values for Civil Service, Public Service Values and Ethics in Public Administration and Probity in Governance.