AUTHOR
Krystyna Górniak-Kocikowska

PUBLISHED IN
Science and Engineering Ethics (1996) 2, 2, pp 177-190

ABSTRACT

The author agrees with James Moor that computer technology, because it is ‘logically malleable’, is bringing about a genuine social revolution. Moor compares the computer revolution to the ‘industrial revolution’ of the late 18th and the 19th centuries; but it is argued here that a better comparison is with the ‘printing press revolution’ that occurred two centuries before that. Just as the major ethical theories of Bentham and Kant were developed in response to the printing press revolution, so a new ethical theory is likely to emerge from computer ethics in response to the computer revolution. The newly emerging field of information ethics, therefore, is much more important than even its founders and advocates believe.

AUTHOR
Andrzej Kocikowski

PUBLISHED IN
Science and Engineering Ethics (1996) 2, 2, pp 201-210

ABSTRACT

Several context-specific social and political factors in Eastern and Central Europe are described — factors that must be considered while developing strategies to introduce Computer Ethics. Poland is used as a primary example. GNP per capita, the cost of hardware and software, uneven and scant distribution of computing resources, and attitudes toward work and authority are discussed. Such “geographical factors” must be taken into account as the new field of Computer Ethics develops.

AUTHOR
Jacek Sojka

PUBLISHED IN
Science and Engineering Ethics (1996) 2, 2, pp 211-224

ABSTRACT

Several context-specific social and political factors in Eastern and Central Europe are described — factors that must be considered while developing strategies to introduce Computer Ethics. Poland is used as a primary example. GNP per capita, the cost of hardware and software, uneven and scant distribution of computing resources, and attitudes toward work and authority are discussed. Such “geographical factors” must be taken into account as the new field of Computer Ethics develops.

AUTHOR
Chris Brown Mahoney

ABSTRACT

Information technology currently available creates a plethora of choices for any researcher collecting and analyzing data. These choices present numerous ethical dilemmas for the researcher. Decision points where the ethical impact must be considered occur at different stages in planning and executing a research project. Careful attention to each of these decisions and the possible impact on both the outcome of the research and the use or application of the outcome are important considerations for the researcher.

The researcher needs to consider carefully the use of technologies that are avilable and how the choice of technology will impact the research. Researchers are constantly faced with decision that will have a major impact on the results of their studies. Choices regarding data sources and analysis techniques, as well as analysis packages utilized in the analysis, can drive the outcome of the research.

This paper will examine the impact that choices about technology use can have on meta-analyses. Technology choices may have more impact on meta-analyses that other thypes of research. The two major technology decision points that will be discussed are the choice of technology for literature search and the choice of technology for data analysis methodology. Research results comparing the execution of the different technology choices will be presented. The ethical impact application of the differing results will be discussed.

AUTHOR
Porfirio Barroso

PUBLISHED IN
ETHICOMP Journal – Vol 1 Issue 1

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this conference is to carry out a comparative analysis of the doctrinal aspects of existing codes of ethics or deontologies in the field of informatics, study in which I have been working for a number of years , and a brief outline of which has been published in the book “Deontologia Informatica”. This book has served me as a manual for this subject matter, as have the contents of a proposal for a Medical Data Protection Deontology Code in Greece. Undoubtedly, this code should also be of interest to other countries. The entire effort for the composition of this code is based on internationally-accepted norms,particularly those of the EC countries, on recent data acquired from Greek sources and on the experiences resulting from what is acceptable in Greece. Accordingly , policies and their influence on the protection of health data, as well as the major problems related to that protection, have been considered.

The composition of a Health Informaticians’ Deontology Code (HIDEC) in Greece is the main aim of the present paper. However, this HIDEC should also be of interest to other countries. The community for which the application of the HIDEC is designed is that of the informaticians, working in connection with the users of computers in the health sector. The HIDEC will refer to the practices and behaviour according to which health informaticians are expected to exercise their profession, offering their services, and also to the practice and behaviour expected from the users. The whole effort for the composition of the HIDEC will be based on:

1. Internationally-accepted norms, particularly those applied in the EC countries.
2. The data acquired very recently from Greek sources.
3. The experience resulting from what is socially and scientifically acceptable in Greece.

We will deal with the HIDEC article by article, comparing them with the results obtained in our research.

AUTHOR
M W J Spual

PUBLISHED IN
ETHICOMP Journal – Vol 1 Issue 1

ABSTRACT

The participatory design of information systems, like all participatory methods, is associated with strong ethical claims; ethical claims which derive their appeal from western democratic institutions. But, as with democratic politics, we are often hardpressed to articulate the source of the ethical and practical appeal of such methods. The recent expansion of interest in the participatory desogn of information systems (evidenced by recent collections such as Schuler and Namioka 1993, Schuler 1993) has largely been focused on the pragmatic issues of organising participation in specific contexts; in this respect it has mirrored a trend noted by Kiloh (1986) for wider discussions of workplace democracy, which are conducted at the level of management and industrial relations rather than at the level of political philosophy. This paper is concerned with the examination of one sustained theoretical attempt to articulate the ethical and political basis of participatory design, that of the social action theory of Jurgen Habermas (1984, 1987a, 1990).

Habermas’ theory of communicative action and its associated ethical stance, discourse ethics, provides a comprehensive and relevant framework within which to discuss the participatory design of information systems. Habermas, and the critical tradition of Western Marxism of which he is a representative, has exerted an influence at key points in the participatory design tradition: in the political foundations of the Scandinavian workplace democracy movement )Ehn 1988), in the epistemological underpinnings of computer supported cooperative work (Winograd and Flores 1986), and in the development of design frameworks for office automation (Hirschheim 1985, Lyytinen, Klein and Hirschheim 1991). Habermas’ theory also promises to accommodate the three main areas in which justifications for participatory design have been formulated: the epistemological, the ethical/political and the pragmatic (Greengaum 1993). The encyclopedic scope of Habermas’ work also provides an intellectual marshalling yard for contemporay debate in radical democracy, with the concerns of most major participatory democratic theorists (for a survey, see Pateman 1970) being represented.

Habermas provides a focus for quite another form of discussion relevant to workplace participation. As a representative of high modernism and the liberal belief in forums for debate and problem resolution based on reason and procedural neutrality, Habermas has been the subject of a sustained communitarian critique (see, e.g., Borgmann 1993 section 4. below), questioning the validity of a democratic ideal based on universal reason. The purpose of this paper is to survey the claims made by Habermas, to consider the major weaknesses exposed by communitarians and feminists, and speculate on the possible implications for an ethically sound participatory design practice.