Enhancing Ethics in Varied Communication Contexts through Dialogical Communication

Abstract

This chapter explores the crucial role of dialogical communication in enhancing ethics across diverse communication contexts. It synthesizes engaged scholarship with personal teaching, professional practice, and lived experiences to address the challenges organizations face in implementing successful change initiatives. Despite organizations’ substantial investments in change management, failure rates remain high, often attributed to communicative deficiencies. Methodologically, the chapter reviews select ethical traditions commonly broadly applied to communication and explore their ethical implications as applicable in varied select communication contexts. While underscoring ethical communication’s pivotal role in change leadership, the chapter advocates for strategic approaches prioritizing stakeholder welfare over instrumental goals. Ethical dilemmas like integrity, power dynamics, and compassionate relationships faced by institutional leaders are examined, highlighting the need for dialogic engagement to foster trust and inclusivity. Furthermore, the chapter delves into WhatsApp-mediated communication in select African countries and exposes the emergence of specific social-ethical issues in Africa. This is critical, considering that WhatsApp has no censorship over the kind of content shared. For solution, the study proposes a dialogic communication approach that encourages an authentic mutual exchange of ideas and concessions between a communication source and their audience to mitigate ethical challenges and facilitate successful organizational change.