2. Proximity : Proximity is less a function of distance and more a function of awareness. We hold a person blameworthy if she knows of a crisis or a potential crisis and does not do what she can to prevent it. "When we become aware of a wrong doing or a social injury, we take on obligations that we did not have while ignorant." Greater responsibility exists in situations where one would expect a heightened awareness of need as a consequence of civic duty, duties to one's family. and so on. In other words, we would hold a family member more blameworthy than a stranger for not being aware of a person's critical plight.
Proximity becomes important in the case of workplace drug abuse because the network of social relationships involved in a daily, cooperative setting, combined with the social and legal perception that an employer is responsible for the activities of her employees, entail a high degree of expectation that the employer not only will learn of a potential harm caused by drug abuse, but should learn of it. A corporation delegates its employees to act on its behalf and in fact, acts only through its employees. This integral and intimate relationship whereby the employees act on behalf of the corporation obligates the corporation to become aware of potential dangers which could result from drug abuse.
While a variety of measures can and have been used that locate and address the problem of workplace drug abuse (such as direct observation of employees, hidden cameras, mandatory educational programs in dealing with drug abuse, and basic dexterity/reflexivity/judgment testing), none of these programs has the same certainty of screening out drug abusers as does drug testing. Direct observation and dexterity tests can be beaten (and are, routinely). While education is an effective counter preventative, it does not screen out users who are resistant to receiving help the individuals most likely to place others at risk. On the other hand, it can be argued that drug testing also is falsifiable. If given advance notice of testing, drug users can abstain long enough to pass the test. Or, they can procure a sample of "clean" urine from another individual and substitute it for their own.
At most, these examples argue against regularly scheduled testings not against random, unannounced testings. These examples also overlook the fact that the time necessary for drug metabolites to become absent from the urine varies from individual to individual and from use to use. Serious and habitual users (who are the most likely to commit harms) would probably be unable to abstain from use long enough even to pass an announced test. And while drug testing is not unfalsifiable, it is more difficult to falsify than other options for testing. Consequently while not a perfect instrument for the detection of drug abuse, drug testing has an effectiveness and specificity that remain unparalleled.
Since drug testing is the most effective technology currently available to make the employer aware of potential dangers by locating habitual users, and without which many such users will likely not be identified, use of drug testing is obligatory as a measure of last resort. Since no one other than the employer is more aware of the potential for an employee committing work related harms, a significant moral responsibility to prevent such harms follows.
This responsibility could be mitigated if the employer has a reasonable certainty that an employee (or all employees) does not abuse drugs. Thus, drug testing is not only essential to the employer's obligation to come to know of potential harms, but it reduces a corporation's moral responsibility for harms committed by ruling out drug abuse as a contributing factor