Ethics and responsibility Toolkit

Ethics and social responsibility in the professions and disciplines

All professional associations have a Code of Ethics in place to guide and form practitioners' behaviour and enable them "to resolve ambiguous or contentious issues concerning ethical conduct."

ACS Code of Ethics.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 10 April, 2006.
http://www.acs.org.au/national/pospaper/acs131.htm#top

Computing and Information Technology

"Teaching ethics to Information Technology students is not like teaching computer programming. A program is either right or wrong, it works or it doesn't, and can be taught in a somewhat mechanistic way in which the principles and rules are outlined, the students are encouraged to understand and apply them and demonstrate their understating by writing a practice program.

Ethics involves significant ambiguity, where individual, cultural and contextual issues all combine to give rise to a problem for which there is no obvious or immediate solution.

Thus it is not sufficient to simply outline a prescribed set of conduct, and tell the students to read and understand it, then put it into practice. If the students are to internalise a set of codified principles, it is necessary for them to engage with the issues at a deeper level, to undertake deep learning of the abstract principles of philosophy that underpin ethics."

Mr David Tuffley, School of Computing and Information Technology, Griffith University.

Library and Information Services

".the role of library and information services professionals is 'to foster social, cultural and economic well-being in their communities. It is considered that it is their responsibility to 'create and provide access to information' whilst striving for the highest standards of service quality and levels of integrity." This is achieved by:

• "encouraging intellectual freedom and the free flow of information and ideas;
• exercising their responsibilities within the context of duty of care for the clients of the library and information services they offer;
• recognising and respecting the intellectual property of others;
• protecting their client's rights to privacy and confidentiality;
• distinguishing in their actions and statements between their personal viewpoints and those of the library and information service that employs them or those of the Australian Library and Information Association;
• maintaining and enhancing their professional knowledge and expertise, encouraging the professional development of their colleagues and fostering the aspirations of potential library and information service professionals; and
• avoiding situations in which personal interests might be, or be seen to be, in conflict with the interests of clients of library and information services, colleagues or employees."

ALIA. (2001). Statement of Professional Conduct.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.alia.org.au/policies/professional.conduct.html

Law

"Ethics [involves] the development of judgement, which is a very broad, deep and profound concept involving: knowledge of different sets of norms; different sets of interests; and one's personal morality. In Law, there are different ways of thinking and talking about ethics in terms of what legal practitioners may or may not do.

In any legal setting there are ethical dilemmas that arise almost constantly, depending on how one defines them. Because practitioners have discretion, they need to make choices all the time and many of these choices involve ethical considerations. Students are made aware that this is not something peculiar to Law, but that people in all walks of life need to develop the capacity to make ethical choices and be able to justify them. This is important, because judgement about matters involving an ethical dimension might involve considerations that go beyond the rules of professional responsibility.

The capacity for value judgement is enormously important as it applies to all the disciplines and people in all walks of life need to develop the capacity to make ethical choices and be able to justify them. It is a concept of judgement that is interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary and a concept that is important for the marketplace."

Associate Professor Mike Robertson, Griffith Law School, Griffith University.

Insurance and Finance

The Australian and New Zealand Institute of Insurance and Finance's Code of Ethics states that members should not undertake any activities that will bring the Institute into disrepute. Members of the Institute are also expected to comply with standards of professional conduct and those who breach the Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct may be subject to disciplinary action.

Australian and New Zealand Institute of Insurance and Finance, Code of Ethics.
Retrieved on the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.theinstitute.com.au/membership_cip/codeofconduct/index.cfm

Other sites of interest in relation to codes of ethics:

University of Alberta. Code of Student Behaviour.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.ualberta.ca/~unisecr/policy/sec30.html

Griffith University. Code of Conduct.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www62.gu.edu.au/policylibrary.nsf/0/dfa2347a8bf28c184a256be6006321b7?opendocument

National Health and Medical Research Council. The National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Research Involving Humans.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/publications/synopses/e35syn.htm

Securities Institute of Australia. Code of Ethics.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.securities.edu.au/members/members_code_of_ethics.asp

The Australian Medical Association. Code of Ethics.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.ama.com.au/web.nsf/doc/WEEN-5WW598

Australian Association of Social Workers. Code of Ethics.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.aasw.asn.au/adobe/about/AASW_Code_of_Ethics-2004.pdf

International Association of Chiefs of Police. Ethics Toolkit.
Retrieved from the World Wide Web on 24 October, 2006.
http://www.theiacp.org/profassist/ethics/public_image.htm

Print resources:

Author unknown. (2000). Ethics in social sciences and health research: Draft code of conduct. Economic and Political Weekly, 35(12), pp. 987-992.

Beran, R. G. (2000). The ethics of clinical research and the conduct of clinical trials: International comparisons and codes of conduct. Medicine and Law. 19(3), pp. 501-521.

Hussey, T. (1996). Nursing ethics and codes of professional conduct. Nursing Ethics, 3(3), pp. 250-258.