INTRODUCTION

In the West in recent years, there has been a discursive explosion around ethics. On the political front, the newly elected Labour government in Britain in 1997 stated that it would pursue an ‘ethical’ foreign policy, a claim which rapidly became the butt of jokes by political commentators as being more honoured in the breach than the observance. It was reported that the ‘ethical’ policies of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office were regularly undermined by the Department of Trade and Industry, whose own priorities were to support British exports, while the Ministry of Defence ‘promoted arms sales without adequate safeguards’ (Guardian Weekly, 4 October 1998). Economic interests appeared largely to prevail over ethical and even, in some cases, longer-term political interests.