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Eighteen rules for writing a code of professional ethics

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Abstract

Most professional societies, scientific associations, and the like that undertake to write a code of ethics do so using other codes as models but without much (practical) guidance about how to do the work. The existing literature on codes is much more concerned with content than procedure. This paper adds to guidance already in the literature what I learned from participating in the writing of an important code of ethics. The guidance is given in the form of “rules” each of which is explained and (insofar as possible) justified. The emphasis is on procedure.

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Notes

  1. See, for example, the codes of: American Physical Society, 1991; American Mathematical Society, 1994; American Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 1998; American Association of Clinical Chemistry, 2003.

  2. I have noted the following examples in engineering recently: the College of Engineers of Chile; the Royal Flemish Society of Engineers; and the Royal Academy of Engineering–Brazil.

  3. For a description of my part in the drafting (and my participation in some of the mistakes), see Davis [5]

  4. There seems to be no hard number for “software engineers” (though I have heard estimates as high as 3,000,000 world-wide). The 1,000,000 used here is merely my conservative guess based on the opinions of those who seemed to have the best chance of being right. We are unlikely to have a better estimate until we have some way to track software engineers, not only those who graduate with the appropriate degree but also (what are still far more numerous) those who “convert” from computer science, engineering, or some other discipline some time in their career.

  5. See, for example, Freidson [10], especially, Chapter 6 (“The Question of Professional Decline”). While I do not accept Freidson’s definition of profession, I think his debunking in this chapter of the independent-consultant model of professions (and, in general, of the single-line-of-development picture of professions) is quite useful for freeing up thinking about professions and their codes.

  6. This body, once known as “the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology” is now officially “ABET, Inc.” By historical accident, ABET, originally (and still) engineering’s chief accreditation agency in the U.S., has become responsible for developing, maintaining, and revising engineering’s most successful (or, at least, best known) code of ethics.

  7. Compare Association of American Medical Colleges [2]. This 42-page pamphlet has much to say about the substance of a code of research ethics, but only pp. 6–8 are about procedure.

  8. IEEE-CS/ACM Software Engineering Code of Ethics Archive, Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions, Illinois Institute of Technology, Gotterbarn\94–96 MISC\OPGUIDE.

  9. For an illustrative violation of this rule, see Anderson [1]. We too violated it—with almost disastrous consequences (the rejection of the code and the dissolution of the task force).

  10. The distinction between “aspirational” provisions and whatever the alternative is (“minimal” or “mandatory”) in fact proved unworkable for those drafting the Software Engineering Code of Ethics. The problem, I think, was that those involved in writing the code could agree on what could reasonably be asked of software engineers but not on what they should be told to think of doing beyond that minimum. The distinction between “enforceable” and “unenforceable” code also proved hard to maintain. There was no question that software engineers would informally enforce the code (for example, by pointing out to an erring member that she was violating a certain provision). The only kind of enforcement that was rejected was through formal disciplinary procedures, whether that of a professional association or a licensing body. The only distinction that seemed to make sense was that between ethical rules (enforceable by conscience or peer pressure) and law (or law-like rules) enforced by formal procedures.

  11. For a good summary of the present state of research on codes of business ethics, see Schwartz [21] There is no similar body of empirical research for codes of ethics for professions, academic societies, or research.

  12. There is some research on “heuristics” that might be relevant. (None of it considers codes of ethics as such.) Such research, though suggestive for design of codes of ethics generally, is far from definitive, especially for codes of professional ethics. Professionals are, in general, more educated than the average reader of a text. Yet, anyone claiming to know “what works” would, presumably, have to rely on “user research” with educationally appropriate users (or lack any empirical basis for claims about layout, structure, and vocabulary). For the current state of thinking on the language of codes (without any empirical testing), see Farrell and Farrell [7].

  13. Even when the question is the effectiveness of codes as such, we know very little (and what we know concerns codes of business ethics). See, especially, Weaver [25], Somers [23], Tucker et al. [24], and Weller [26]. In fact, most advice about codes concerns content. For a good sample of what is available, see Kultgen [19], Frankel [9], Fisher [8], Harris [12], Kapstein [15], and Schwartz [22]. The first four are concerned with professional codes; the last two, with business codes.

  14. For three notable examples of short-lived codes, consider the code of ethics of the American Medical Association adopted in 1903 and replaced in 1912; the code of ethics of the American Bar Association adopted in 1970 and replaced in 1980; and the code of ethics that the IEEE adopted in 1987 and replaced in 1990.

  15. The exact wording for the ACM is, “This Code and the supplemental Guidelines were developed by the Task Force for the Revision of the ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct [with the names following].” http://www.acm.org/constitution/ code.html (accessed July 30, 2006). The exact wording for the Software Engineering Code is much the same: “This Code was developed by the IEEE-CS/ACM joint task force on Software Engineering Ethics and Professional Practices (SEEPP) [with the names, including mine, following].” http://seeri.etsu.edu/Codes/TheSECode.htm (accessed July 30, 2006).

  16. Code of Ethics Archive, Email (Gotterbarn to Davis), October 27, 1999.

  17. Code of Ethics Archive, Email (Gotterbarn to Davis), October 27, 1999.

  18. For a good example of what experts can do, see Koehler and Pemberton [18].

  19. For some poor advice on writing codes of ethics, see Jamal and Bowie [14]. Some of the advice is simply unhelpful, for example, “To the extent possible the rules for professional conduct should protect, or at least not be inconsistent with, the public interest”. But some of the advice seems positively bad (because, for example, it seems to confuse a code with an academic paper), that is, “the code should reference the controversial nature of the rule either through footnotes or an extended commentary justifying the inclusion of the rule”. p. 713. The Jamal–Bowie article is but one in a whole issue devoted to codes of ethics. Among all these papers, I found only one that seems to me to offer good (practical) advice (for managers at least): Kapein and Wempe [16].

  20. For some interesting (if exotic) ideas for the review process, Goodpaster et al. [11].

  21. Hegel [13], p. 6.

  22. Hegel [13], p. 26: “The history of the world is not a theater of happiness. Periods of happiness are blank pages in it...” George Eliot said it better (as we might expect, but a bit later): “The happiest women, like the happiest nations, have no history.” The Mill on the Floss, bk. V, ch. 4. [6]

  23. For details on the importance of record keeping even in the early history of engineering, see Davis [4], esp. pp. 8–12. The past that engineering uses may well not count as “history” (strictly speaking) because it often does not take the form of a narrative. It is “history” only in the looser sense of “the recorded past”.

  24. Marx [20], p. 245: “Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.”

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Acknowledgements

Work on this paper was funded in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation (SES-0117471). I should like to thank the advisory board with which I worked under that grant for many helpful comments on early versions of this paper. I should also like to thank the reviewers for this journal.

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    Michael Davis

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Davis, M. Eighteen rules for writing a code of professional ethics. SCI ENG ETHICS 13, 171–189 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-007-9000-2

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