In Harmonium

Posted By Marc on September 24, 2008

In much of the debate over the past several years on the potential ethical dangers of the relationship between Anthropology and the Military, the vast majority of the ethical concerns that have been raised have, to my mind, been based on a collectivist model of ethics (aka “morality”).  I’ve noted this in a several posts (here and here), and expressed concern over it, in its various forms, in others (here and here).  Given my own starting point when it comes to ethics, I thought that it would be appropriate for me to pull out why I believe that ethics are important for individuals and not some nebulous “collective”.

As I noted in my last post, I believe that the purpose of social institutions should be to serve individuals and not the reverse.  I am enough of a realist and pragmatist to realize that this is an extremely idealistic belief and one that must be tempered with limits placed on individual actions by colectives.  That is merely an extrapolation of the old Free Will-Predestination debates and the simple observation that all action is dependant upon perception.  One acts within the realiy that one perceives and social structures provide a leverage point for actions; they both limit and enable action and perceptions.

There is, however, to my mind a subtle line between a social institution enabling actions and perception and one that overtly and artificially constrains action and perceptions.  While this “line” (actually, it should be described as a fuzzy set boundary) is constantly being negotiated, I would suggest that it has clearly been crossed when an institution demands that individuals “believe” some perception of reality that does not accord with the evidence of sensory data if that belief cannot later be proven by extended sensory data and culturally coherent explanations.

This position is not contradictory to an individualistic stance but, rather, has been inspired by, amongst others, Wilhelm Dilthey’s work in his Introduction to the Human Sciences and, especially, his observation that

All science is experiential; but all experience must be related back to and derives its its validity from the conditions and context of consciousness in which it arises, i.e., the totality of our nature.

and his distinctions between verstehen (understanding) and erkennen (explanation) (NB: a similar model is used by Charlie Laughlin in his examination of the Cycle of Meaning). Thus, I would argue that an institution whose members become increasingly constrained and limited in their perceptions and actions as they move “deeper” into the institutional weltanschuung are being limited rather than enabled by that institution.

This, then, is my touchstone for the value of institutional “ethics” – does the discipline of the institution enable or limit the growth and potential of individuals involved with it? – a “by their fruit ye shall know them” (Matthew 7:20) type of test.  And, please note, that this test has nothing to do with analyzing formal codes of ethics.  Formal (institutional) codes of ethics are, to my mind, the chrystallization of adapted institutional techniques and proceedures; “rationalizations” and attempts to systematize how an institution should operate.  They are secondary to the actual effects of the instituion on individuals in that institution.

This is not to say that institutional codes of ethics are not useful – they may well be.  They provide the structure – the “ground rules” – of operating within that institution.  Their danger lies in two areas: being required to “believe” something which is unsupportable by experience and/or becoming the primary touchstone of ethical behaviour as opposed to it being the collective experiences that stand behind the construction of those codes.  This observation of the dangers inherent in formal codes of ethics is, actually, an analog of the debate surrounding iconoclasm: does the icon (e.g. code of ethics) become a vehicle to aprehend what it stands for or is it in danger of becoming an object of veneration?

I would suggest that, for some parts of academia over the past 20 years, the “icon” (code of ethics) has indeed become an object of veneration to the increasing detriment of both individuals and their disciplines.  From various discussions I have had over the past 20 years, I believe that this has happened as a result of the increasing focus on the rote teaching and presentation of professional codes of ethics combined with the increased “professionalization” of “ethics” (e.g. independant IRBs with little or no disciplinary knowledge).

Thus, for example, we as teachers are increasingly told that our students cannot do fieldwork without “ethics aproval”.  But what is “fieldwork”?  At its heart, it is perceiving patterns of interaction amongst people – something that everyone does every day!  We are increasingly saying that people can’t use their brains in everyday situations without an imprimateur from an “ethics board”; a situation that is as insane as requiring people to fill out forms in triplicate in order to use a washroom.  Is it any wonder that our students increasingly wonder about the “relevance” of our disciplines?

Now, lest someone think that I am against ethics review processes, let me point out that I am not – I am merely against the mindless application of such a process as a ritualized requirement when the process of such approval has no “value add” (in terms of perceiving potential effects of the research) to the project.  I believe that an ethics approval process should be a learning experience for the individual where they learn to extend their perceptions of the effects and possible dangers and/or benefits of their research.  If all someone “learns” is how to “fox the system”, then that is, IMO, both useless and detrimental to both the individual and the discipline.

Which brings me back to my touchstone – “by their fruit ye shall know them”.  As with politics, ethics are personal.  Institutional codes of ethics are merely proxies, rationalizations of the conscience collectif, of a collective body of individuals who make up that instituion, and these proxies (icons) may either enhance or stultify individual ethics.

Postscript:

This was well timed – I just finished reading the revised AAA Code of Ethics that was just circulated.  I have to say that, for a formal document, they have done a good job of describing the fluidity and situation context of many ethical problems in the field.  What will be interesting to see is whether or not the debate centres on hat aspect or on formal pre-scriptions and interpretive parsing.

The proposed changes, and a place to comment on them, are available here.

Category: Ethics
Tags: AAA Code of Ethics