received wisdom says that everybody works only for personal benefit or more particularly for money. You can move a donkey with the enticement of carrot. Either dangle the carrot before the donkey or take a stick to beat him in order to make him work. Only these two ways get work out of people. This simple rule, which is a common philosophy or possibly the only philosophical base according to some.
However, if this question is put to someone who has started a new venture, broken some new ground, the answer will be different, Some basic principles of ethics are followed even amongst the gangs of smugglers or thieves. In fact criminal gangs need a code of behaviour among themselves more than citizens. There are people who break away from the gang, who turn informers, and the punishment meted out to them by the gang is extreme. Even when engaged in anti-social activities, like theft or smuggling, when a task is performed by a group (and nothing these days can be done solo), fidelity to the gang is considered an essential behavioural trait. In this Trust is a cardinal principle. Honesty and loyalty to the gang are considered very necessary values. No society or group can survive without internal trust amongst its members. As breathing is necessary for life, trust is necessary for existence of the society. If you do not trust your Family members, can you ever sleep in your own house?
Itis a common sight to see Leaders surrounded by security guards. At places like Dhanbad in the coal belt of Bihar, the mafia leaders and trade union leaders cannot sleep in the same room or under the protection of the same guards for more than two hours at a stretch. They have to change rooms or guards. Even those people have to decide whom to trust: Wives and children? Other family members? Members of the same caste? What's the guarantee? The daily newspapers from these areas regularly report breach of this trust in these inner groups. Murders and cheating in such groups are commonplace. Most of us can sleep comfortably because most people in our society accept the principle of trust as a cardinal principle of social existence. We can live in the society of others only because of this assumption of trust.
In some cities in the affluent Western countries even in the cities like New York, the incidence of violent crime is alarming. Violent crimes take place all the time. With all the material comforts available, there is often an absence of mental peace. The reason for such a state of affairs is that the existence of trust in social life which was inculcated in the minds of the people by Christian religion is undermined by the impact of secularism and rationalism, which were accorded higher esteem than the religious teachings. The foundations once laid by religion are demolished and their place is taken over by a system of relative truth. Once all values become relative, then the individual freedom becomes a licence for behaviour
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