Scandals

Contemporary society is always portrayed as a civilized society, in which the sense of democracy has come to woven throughout the fabric of our lives. Thanks to the mass media, the public has become more informed about what is happening in the world, from the political field such as the state and national government to the business area such as the international stock market. At the same time, people are paying more attention to the leaders. Some insist that since the major mission of the leaders is to lead the whole group to succeed in the intense competition, a leader should try every means to achieve his goal rather than care much about the ethic and morality. Those from the other camp hold a strong belief that to be an effective leader, a public official must maintain the highest ethical and moral standards. As far as I am concerned, I prefer the latter point of view. In the following discussion, I would like to present several evidences to support my standpoint.

First and foremost, a public official with high ethical and moral standards will set a good example for the society as a whole which does good to the improvement of the morality of the public. From ancient times to the present world, the public leaders always serve as a focus of the ordinary that treat the words and actions of the leaders as a sign of right. So what and how the leaders say and do would produce a far-reaching effect on the public. A case in point is Gandhi, the greatest leader in Indian history. He led a simple and hard way of living all his life and never wasted even one coin, , and this encouraged all citizens of India to spare no effort to work hard for a better further of their country and no one pursued a luxury material life. This illustrates that a leader with high ethical and moral standards promote a good ethos in the society.

Meanwhile, high ethical and moral standards embodied in the words and actions of a public official would help him or her to gain the trust and support of the public especially of his or her subordinates which make his or her policy to be implemented more effectively and efficiently. Take Mao Zedong, the founder of our new China for example: in the period of hardship, he advocated that all Chinese should tie up their