ISSN: 2222-6990
Open access
Unethical practices that lead to defects in the construction industry are widespread and widely discussed globally. Drainage defects are expensive issues that hinder the free flow of water and increase the harms to structures, people and the environment. This raises the legal liabilities that construction players face for each project they embark on. The aim of this article is to enhance understanding of ethical issues, particularly those related to the construction of an open drainage system and its relationship to legal liabilities. The data was collected mainly from a naturalistic on-site observation, unstructured interviews and documents analysis. They were analysed using thematic analysis. The findings indicate how the contractor has been recognised as presenting a risk of behaving illegally and can be liable for damages or at risk of legal charges. Missing elements and improper construction of the drainage system had caused drainage failure, which ultimately had adverse financial consequences for both contractor and client. The study also shed light on the notions of ethical blindness and unethical pro-organisations, which will be useful in future empirical studies. Moreover, a greater emphasis on joint Fraud Triangle and Teleology may yield insightful results that are relevant to the attention and behaviour of various parties at the sites, including the client and the contractor, because client behaviour can put pressure on contractors to behave fraudulently and client cost-cutting can provide a rationalisation for the contractor. The study promotes the significance of ethical values in the construction industry and its players in order to protect the stakeholders from dealing with the aftereffects, financially or legally. More research focusing on the combined fraud and teleology theoretical conditions of defects may yield intriguing discoveries that explain for various parties' attentions and behaviours at the sites.
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In-Text Citation: (Latif et al., 2022)
To Cite this Article: Latif, H. M., Mohamed, N., Schachler, M. H., & Jalaludin, A. (2022). Ethical Aspects and Legal Liabilities of Drainage Defects in Construction. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 12(5), 685 – 706.
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