February 27– Ethics – E10

Ethics and Institutional Corruption: Why Good People do Bad Things

Speaker: Carla Miller

 

This program will discuss the latest research on approaches to teaching and advising on ethics; new developments in ethics laws across the U.S.; and research on impediments to people applying conflict of interest laws.

Speaker Bio:

Carla Miller received her undergraduate degree from Florida State University in Criminology and her law degree from University of Florida. She has spent the last three decades working in the ethics and anti-corruption field. In Jacksonville, Florida, she has worked with the city's Ethics program for 18 years, initially as a volunteer.  She chaired the ethics commission, wrote the City's ethics Code and came in as an official part time employee in 2007.  In that capacity, she has built the program and run a confidential hotline, taking in and handling hundreds of calls and ethics complaints from citizens and employees. She gathered broad citizen support for ethics reform in Jacksonville, pulling in citizens ranging from the Tea Party to League of Women Voters. The work of this group eventually changed the city charter and created an independent ethics office in 2012 that does not report to the Mayor or the City Council.  She serves as the first director of that independent Ethics Office.

In 2002, Carla started a nonprofit organization, “City Ethics,” which is now the top online resource for municipal ethics programs in the U.S.   As founder and president of City Ethics, she has advised cities across the U.S. on their ethics programs.  She has also worked internationally on ethics programs: with the National Leadership Academy of China, the Commission on Public Integrity in Iraq, and with several African countries at the request of the State Department.

Last year and this coming academic year, (2013-5) she is a Fellow at the Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard.