Professional ethics
The primary aim of this page of resources is to support the course Professional ethics (PHIL2023 and PHIL3023) offered by the Philosophy Department at the University of Adelaide. Information about the course, including contact hours, eligibility and pre-requisites, is available in the University Calendar.
Enquiries about enrolling in Profesional ethics may be directed to the course coordinator: Professor Garrett Cullity (e-mail garrett.cullity@adelaide.edu.au).
The course is designed to give undergraduates and graduates in any field a familiarity with the the ethical principles governing a range of different professional fields, while also allowing them to work in their own area in greater depth and detail.
General Professional ethics resources
- Applied ethics resources on WWW
- An excellent starting point for the topic is this website maintained by the Centre for Applied Ethics at the University of British Columbia.
Of particular interest to us are links to separate pages of resources on ethics in the fields of Health, Business, Media, Science & technology and Professional ethics.
There is a separate page Professional ethics with links to codes of ethics, online publications and various relevant topics such as ethics in policing, legal ethics, and so on.
The site has, understandably, a slight Canadian bias, but this does not detract from its overall usefulness.
- Ethics updates
- Provides updates on current literature, both popular and professional, relating to ethical theory and applied ethics. A wide range of topics is covered and for each one there is a link to Internet resources, a bibliography and discussion topics.
An inbuilt search engine is a useful way to find out what is available on a particular ethics topic.
Glossary of ethics terminology
- Glossary
- A handy list of definitions issued by the publishers of Ethics Updates
Professional ethics associations
- Association for Practical and Professional Ethics
- The Association for Practical and Professional Ethics is committed to encouraging high quality interdisciplinary scholarship and teaching in practical and professional ethics by educators and practitioners who appreciate the theoretical and practical impacts of
their subjects.
- International Institute for Public Ethics
- The International Institute for Public Ethics is an international professional association for practitioners and scholars working in the field of public sector ethics. Its prime objective is to develop an international and professional community of public sector ethicists, and to offer support for scholars and practitioners in the field.
- Institute for Global Ethics
- The Institute seks to promote ethical behavior in individuals, institutions, and nations through research, public discourse, and practical action. It divides its efforts into three primary areas of concern: Corporate Services, Education Programs, and Public Policy Programs.
- Institute for Applied Professional Ethics
- The Institute for Applied and Professional Ethics at Ohio University is dedicated to promoting the application of fundamental ethical techniques to decision-making in an ever-changing world.
Australian associations
- Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics
- The purpose of CAPPE is to conduct ground-breaking research, provide policy input and promote community discussion and professional dialogue in relation to these and other important and pressing matters of public and political concern. It constitutes the largest concentration of philosophers working on applied philosophy and public ethics in Australia, and one of the largest such concentrations in the international philosophical community.
- Australian Association for Professional and Applied Ethics (AAPAE)
- The broad purpose of the AAPAE is to encourage awareness of applied or professional ethics as a significant area of concern, and to foster discussion of issues.
- St James Ethics Centre
- St James Ethics Centre is a not-for-profit organisation based in Sydney which provides a forum for the promotion and exploration of ethics. The Centre seeks to encourage individuals and organisations to include the ethical dimension in their daily lives. It is independent of any religious or political affiliations. Their website provides a large number of ethics-related articles and information produced by the Centre, along with a discussion forum, links page, etc.
An example of the goodies you can find is this page of articles on health and the medical profession.
Codes of ethics
- Codes of ethics online
- A very useful compilation of codes of ethics of professional societies, corporations, government, and academic institutions by the Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions at the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Business ethics
Before you go zooming off to these websites, bear in mind that the Barr Smith Library has a good collection of books on business ethics. Have a look under subject headings such as Business ethics, and its subheadings, and Social responsibility of business, in the Library Catalogue.
- Business ethics resources on WWW
- Part of the invaluable Centre for Applied Ethics site, you'll find this page provides links to many useful business ethics resources, including codes of ethics, online publications and pages of links to specific topics such as advertising and whistle-blowing.
- Business ethics
- A comprehensive article with multiple hyperlinks to related topics. From Wikipedia: therefore treat all statements with caution.
- Yahoo! Directory: Business Ethics and Responsibility
- Links to general sites as well as sites in various categories such as Corporate Acciuntability, Sweatshops, Whistleblowing and so on. Lots to explore from here!
- Center for Ethics and Business
- The Center for Ethics and Business at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles aims to provide an environment for discussing issues related to the necessity, difficulty, costs and rewards of conducting business ethically. There's a useful toolbox of ethical issues in business as well as a pretty comprehensive list of links to other business ethics sites.
- Business ethics
- A long listing of websites arranged under headings such as Articles and Publications; Case Studies; Corporate Codes of Ethics, and so on.
Well maintained and kept up to date by University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign librarian, Sharon Stoerger.
- Institute of Business Ethics
- A British organisation: 'The aims of the Institute are to emphasize the essentially ethical nature of wealth creation, to encourage the highest standards of behaviour by companies and to publicise the best ethical practices.'
- Better Business Bureau
- A voluntary self-regulation and consumer education-focused organisation, based in The U.S.A. Useful information on topics such as truth in advertisingand consumer and business education.
- International Business Ethics Institute
- The Institute aims to increase public awareness and dialogue about international business ethics issues and works closely with companies to assist them in establishing effective international ethics programs.
- Carol and Lawrence Zicklin Center for Business Ethics Research
- The mission of the Center is to sponsor and disseminate leading edge research on critical topics in business ethics. The Center's broad research focus includes global business ethics, corporate governance, social contracts, deception, disclosure, bribery and corruption. They publish working papers on business ethics topics on their site.
Media ethics
- Media Ethics resources on WWW
- Produced by University of British Columbia's Centre for Applied Ethics, this page has links to media-related institutions and organisations, to online journals and to specific media ethics topics.
- Yahoo! Media Ethics and Accountability
- Search engine Yahoo! has a good number of useful links in its Media Ethics and Accountability directory.
- EthicNet
- EthicNet is a pretty comprehensive databank offering basic information on media ethics for journalism students and teachers in the form of a collection of codes of journalism ethics from most of the European countries, translated into English.
- Media Ethics Bibliography
- Links to online resources and a bibliography of books published on the topic.
- FAIR: Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting
- 'FAIR, the national media watch group, has been offering well-documented criticism of media bias and censorship since 1986. We work to invigorate the First Amendment by advocating for greater diversity in the press and by scrutinizing media practices that marginalize public interest, minority and dissenting viewpoints. As an anti-censorship organization, we expose neglected news stories and defend working journalists when they are muzzled. As a progressive group, FAIR believes that structural reform is ultimately needed to break up the dominant media conglomerates, establish independent public broadcasting and promote strong non-profit sources of information.'
- Institute for Public Accuracy
- 'As a nationwide consortium of policy researchers, the Institute for Public Accuracy seeks to broaden public discourse by gaining media access for those whose perspectives are commonly drowned out by corporate-backed think tanks and other influential institutions.'
From the site you can access IPA articles and news releases.
- Ethics in Journalism
- Hosted by the Society of Professional Journalists, this site has their Code of Ethics and other resources such as a news service and news archives.
- Poynter Online: Ethics
- The Poynter Institute is a school for journalists, future journalists, and teachers of journalists. The ethics page has many useful resources such as the Tip sheets.
- Accuracy in media
- 'Accuracy In Media: for fairness, balance and accuracy in news reporting, is a non-profit, grassroots citizens watchdog of the news media that critiques botched and bungled news stories and sets the record straight on important issues that have received slanted coverage.'
- Advertising Standards Authority
- 'The ASA is the independent, self-regulatory body for non-broadcast advertisements in the UK. We administer the British Codes of Advertising and Sales Promotion to ensure that ads are legal, decent, honest and truthful'.
- Ofcom
- Ofcom is the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries, with responsibilities across television, radio, telecommunications and wireless communications services.
Media ethics in Australia
- Advertising Federation of Australia Code of Ethics
- Standards of behaviour for people working in the advertising industry, including complaints procedures. From this site you can download the complete code Ethics at work in .pdf format.
- Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA)
- ACMA is a statutory authority within the federal government portfolio of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. ACMA is responsible for the regulation of: broadcasting; the internet; radiocommunications; and telecommunications.
ACMA was established on 1 July 2005 by the merger of the Australian Broadcasting Authority and the Australian Communications Authority.
ACMA works closely with relevant industries to achieve active self-regulation, while ensuring industry compliance with licence conditions, codes and standards. ACMA monitors the effect of regulations to ensure they are responsive to the community's needs.
- Australian Press Council
- The Australian Press Council is the self-regulatory body of the print media. It was established in 1976 with two main aims: to help preserve the traditional freedom of the press within Australia and ensure that the free press acts responsibly and ethically.
To carry out its latter function, it serves as a forum to which anyone may take a complaint concerning the press.
- Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance
- MEAA is the trade union of the Australian Journalists' Association. Their website has lots to offer, for example, the Media Alliance Code of Ethics.
Police ethics
- Police Ethics
- A good starting point is this site hosted by the Institute for Criminal Justice Ethics, at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. There are links to useful websites, online reports and articles relevant to the topic, and police codes of ethics from a number of international organisations.
- Police ethics and accountability
- The Freedom to Care (the UK's first whistleblower support group) site has oodles of useful links to human rights in policing, codes of ethics in policing, and so on. There is also a useful (if a little dated) publications list of books on police ethics.
- European Code of Police Ethics
- Recommendation (2001) 10 adopted by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on 19 September 2001 and Explanatory memorandum.
- Australasian Centre for Policing Research
- The Centre was established by way of an Intergovernmental Agreement between Police Ministers to coordinate, stimulate, sponsor and undertake research on behalf of policing agencies. The Centre closed in March 2007 and will be replaced by The Australia and New Zealand Policing Support Agency (ANZPSA).
Legal ethics
- Legal ethics
- An excellent Australian site from the Law Institute of Victoria.
The Links page includes pdf files of the Rules of professional conduct for all States, including South Australia.
- Legal Ethics
- A good starting point is this site hosted by the Institute for Criminal Justice Ethics, at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. There are links to useful websites, online reports and articles relevant to the topic, and legal codes of ethics from a number of international organisations.
- Texas Center for Legal Ethics and Professionalism
- One of the primary functions of the Center is to furnish resources and materials which assist in malpractice and grievance prevention. The Center serves lawyers and the public by being a clearinghouse for information and a learning center. The Center maintains an extensive online library of resources related to legal ethics and professionalism. Among the materials available are publications of the Center and bar journal and law review articles.
- American Bar Association: Center for Professional Responsibility
- Links to codes of conduct and other useful documents, but heavily oriented, as you would expect, to American practice.
Medical ethics
- BioethicsWeb
- BioethicsWeb offers free access to a searchable catalogue of Internet sites and resources covering biomedical ethics.
- Health care ethics resources on WWW
- An excellent source from the Center for Applied Ethics at the University of British Columbia.
- Australian Health Ethics Committee
- AHEC is a principal committee of the National Health and Medical Research Council. AHEC's functions are to advise NHMRC on ethical issues relating to health and developing guidelines for the conduct of medical research involving humans, the promotion of community debate on health ethics issues, monitoring the work of human research ethics committees (HRECs) and monitoring and advising on international developments in health ethics.
- American Medical Association: Medical ethics
- A page of resources, including the AMA Code of Medical Ethics. The AMA's Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs (CEJA) provide the substance of the Code of Medical Ethics and represent official ethics policy of the AMA.
- World Medical Association: International Code of Medical Ethics
- Adopted by the 3rd, and amended by the 22nd World Medical Assembly, Sydney, Australia, August 1968 and the 35th World Medical Assembly Venice, Italy, October 1983.
There are many more useful links to explore on the Bioethics page of my colleague, Maureen Bell's Public Health Resources website.
Research ethics
- National Research Ethics Service
- The National Research Ethics Service works with colleagues in the UK to maintain a UK-wide system of ethical review that protects the safety, dignity and well being of research participants, whilst facilitating and promoting ethical research within the NHS.
- Do No Harm: the coalition of Americans for research ethics
- A national coalition of researchers, health care professionals, bioethicists, legal professionals, and others dedicated to the promotion of scientific research and health care which does no harm to human life. The emphasis is on stem cell research.
- National Health and Medical Research Council: Ethics
- The NHMRC provides support and advice on health and human research ethics, including information for Human Research Ethics Committees.
Reference collection resources
There are several very useful published titles for professional ethics researchers. I've listed a few of the major works and their call numbers. Find them in the Barr Smith Library's Reference collection on Level 3 South.
International encyclopedia of ethics Ed. John K. Roth. London, Fitzroy Dearborn, 1995.
Reference collection 170.3 R845i
The Encyclopedia of ethics, 2nd edn. Ed. Lawrence C. Becker and Charlotte B. Becker. London, Routledge, 2001. 4 vols.
Reference collection 170.3 B395e.2
Encyclopedia of applied ethics. Ed. Ruth Chadwick. San Diego, Calif., Academic Press, 1998. 4 vols.
Reference collection 170.3 C432e
Cooper, Thomas W Television & ethics: a bibliography. Boston, G.K. Hall, 1988.
Reference collection 174.97914016 C778t
Encyclopedia of bioethics. 3rd edition, ed. Stephen G. Post. N.Y., Macmillan, 2003. 5 vols.
Reference collection 174.203 E563.3
Dictionary of medical ethics, revised and enlarged edition. Ed. A.S.Duncan, G.R.Dunstan and R.B.Welbourn. London, Darton, Longman & Todd, 1981.
Reference collection 174.203 D554.2
Hedges, Richard Bioethics, health care, and the law: a dictionary. Santa Barbara, Calif. ; Oxford,ABC-CLIO, 1999.
Reference collection 174.203 H453b
Books on professional ethics
The Library has a good collection of books on the topic of professional ethics. To see what is available do a Subject Heading search for Professional ethics.
For specific areas of this topic you can search under Subject Headings such as:
The last word
This page was created and is maintained by Alan Keig
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