DP4

DecisionPoint
http://proethica.org/ontology/cases#DecisionPoint

DP4

If Engineer A cannot make direct payments to foreign officials, may he instead route payments through Engineer B as a local intermediary, or does the NSPE Code's prohibition extend with equal force to indirect corrupt arrangements regardless of the transactional structure?

Engineer A is considering whether to route payments to Country A government officials through Engineer B as a local intermediary rather than making them directly, reasoning that indirect facilitation through a local agent may be ethically distinguishable from direct payment. The question is whether the NSPE Code's prohibition extends to indirect arrangements and whether Engineer A bears due-diligence obligations regarding how fees paid to local agents are ultimately used.

Decline to engage Engineer B in any arrangement where payments to local agents are intended or likely to be passed through to foreign officials, and apply affirmative due-diligence review to any local agent fee structures to ensure they do not function as corrupt pass-through mechanisms, treating indirect arrangements as ethically equivalent to direct payments.

Pay Engineer B standard local consulting or facilitation fees without inquiring into how those fees are ultimately used, reasoning that Engineer A's ethical responsibility extends only to his own direct conduct and that Engineer B's independent decisions about how to use legitimately paid fees are outside Engineer A's ethical control.

Engage Engineer B as a local agent under a contractual agreement that explicitly prohibits the use of Engineer A's fees for payments to government officials, relying on that contractual prohibition to satisfy Engineer A's ethical due-diligence obligation while permitting the local agent relationship to continue for legitimate facilitation purposes.

Engineer A Non-US NSPE Member International Engineer