The ethics field lost a giant last week when Rushworth Kidder, President and Founder of the Institute for Global Ethics in Rockport, Maine passed way in Naples Florida.
While I am sorry to say that I never personally met Rush, I was an avid reader of his publications and works and I often cited a quote from his writings. My favorite Rushworth Kidder quote was:
“…because nonprofits have an obligation to do the right things-often wrenching choices among competing priorities, and having to ask what choice best fits their mission-they must develop methodologies for analyzing and resolving right-versus-right dilemmas.”
Rushworth Kidder in Leading with Values, 2003
The right versus right decisions that nonprofits wrestle with day in and day out definitely support the idea that nonprofits should invest in creating tools and educating their staff and volunteers on ways to make positive ethical decisions.
Over the course of nearly 40 years, Dr. Kidder authored 12 books, including:
- “Good Kids, Tough Choices: How Parents Can Help Their Children Do the Right Thing” (2010);
- “The Ethics Recession: Reflections on the Moral Underpinnings of the Current Economic Crisis” (2009);
- “Moral Courage: Taking Action When Your Values are Put to the Test” (2005);
- “How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemmas of Ethical Living” (1995);
- “Shared Values for a Troubled World: Conversations with Men and Women of Conscience” (1994);
- “Heartland Ethics: Voices from the American Midwest” (as editor) (1992);
- “In the Backyards of Our Lives and Other Essays” (1992);
- “Global Ethics: A Quartet of Interviews” (1992);
- “Reinventing the Future: Global Goals for the 21st Century” (1989); “An Agenda for the Twenty-First Century” (1987);
- “E.E. Cummings: An Introduction to the Poetry” (Columbia Introductions to Twentieth-Century American Poetry) (1979); and
- “Dylan Thomas: The Country of the Spirit” (1973).
For more information on the life and work of Rushworth Kidder, please visit the Institute for Global Ethics tribute website.
