In Defence of Governance: Ethics and Social Research

In Defence of Governance: Ethics and Social Research

Dr. Mark SheehanDr. Michael Dunn

The Ethox CentreUniversity of Oxford

Overview

The context: arguments against research ethics governance in

social research

Three challenges:

1. How do we account for the relationship between social research and society?

2. Does any account ground a general claim for a system of research ethics governance that can be applied validly across all forms of social research?

3. What form of governance arrangements would follow from, and be justified by, this account?

Against research ethics governance

A. Ethical

1. An appeal to authority by RECs Expertise claim Ethical authority and legitimacy claim

2. The right to research“There are few other areas of life in which adult citizens are subjected to such a severe form of ethical regulation.” (Hammersley, 2009, 217)

Against research ethics governance

3. Lack of harm in social research

“HSS researchers do nothing that begins to compare with injecting someone with potentially toxic green stuff that cannot be neutralised or rapidly eliminated from their body if something goes wrong. At most there is a potential for causing minor and reversible emotional distress or some measure of reputational damage.” (Dingwall, 2008, 3)

Against research ethics governance

B. ‘Practical’

1. Bad consequences of regulation: the costs of governance

2. Application of the Medical Model

• Lack of attunement to the methodological conventions of social research

• Implications for consent processes; harm identification; the assessment of social value etc.

Responding to these arguments

1. How might we account for the relationship between social research and society?

• If we can develop an account of what kind of stake society has in social research, and why it has such a stake, then we will be in a position to make a normative claim about research ethics governance, and say something useful about the form that it should take

• Five accounts:– Libertarian– Accountability for resources– Welfare and protection from harm– Research as a democratic requirement– Research as constitutive of human social life

Responding to these arguments

2. Do any of these five accounts ground a general claim for governance?

• The first four accounts fail to ground a general claim for governance in social research

• However, these four accounts do raise relevant considerations that are reasonably contested

• The ‘research as constitutive of human social life’ account grounds a general claim for governance in all social research

1. The ‘Libertarian’ account

Liberty without liberty harms to others• The state on this kind of view is a vehicle of

society and should only provide the resources that enable freedom of choice and that some individuals choose to engage in research

• Individual rights and freedoms are vital:– Right to privacy– Freedom of speech

Response: Inclusion of unrepresented voices– Ownership and representation

2. Accountability for resources

• Society provides the resources for the research to take place and so is entitled to have a say in the direction that such research takes

Response: i. it doesn’t alwaysii. when it does it is not clear whether it pays

for individual research or for a systemiii. where society does not pay, we may have

residual intuitions about the relationship between science and society

3. Welfare and protection from harm

• The state has an obligation both to protect the members of society and promote their welfare and so should supervise research to ensure benefit and avoidance of harm

Social research risks and benefits: • Perhaps easily underestimated (or inflated)• Spectrum of harms and benefits

Responses:• ‘Millian’ – harms/benefits align with freedoms• ‘Utilitarianisation’ of research

4. Research as a democratic requirement

• Citizens in a democracy must be able to inquire and learn about the society in which they live in order to be fully functional citizens– “Democracy requires a citizenry informed about any

number of topics… If citizens were not free to conduct such inquiries, then fundamental political activities—the act of voting, for example—would be rendered as useless as if there were only one candidate on the ballot.” (Brown and Guston, 2009, 361)

Response: • Dependent on a particular political arrangement

– What about non-democratic societies?

• Research is more fundamental than simply being a product of democratic government

5. Research as constitutive of human social life

• An account of inquiry conceived as integral to human social life

Inquiry and human life are intertwined and interdependent– Being curious; asking questions; engaging in reflection

The fundamental nature of:i. inquiry being social; ii.social practices emerging out of, and being

transformed by, inquiryiii.social changes themselves shaping further inquiry

Research can be understood as the institutionalisation of inquiry over time with formalised traditions and conventions

5. Research as constitutive of human social life

• Society has a stake in social research precisely because the nature of the relationship between inquiry and social life shows us something important about how humans flourish

• Humans cannot flourish without inquiry

• Society should be concerned with human flourishing

• Governance in social research is grounded on the basis of this claim

Responses to the ‘research as constitutive of human social life’ account

Is there a relevant distinction between research and other forms of activity that are constitutive of human social life?

Research as institutionalised inquiry brings:• Status• Validity of certain forms of knowledge and

modes of knowledge generation• Consider: autobiography vs.

autoethnography

Where are we to this point?

• Only the constitutive understanding of the relationship between social research and society provides a general grounding for a system of governance in social research

• However, a number of relevant considerations remain in contest in social research:

Liberty and the right to researchAccountability for resourcesWelfare and protection from harm

Developing a specific system of governance

How might we take these considerations into account in developing a specific system of governance?

Two key points:•Orientation: Participation vs. regulation•Residual conflict about what research is done: conditions of reasonable disagreement

Developing a specific system of governance

Fair process:• legitimacy and fairness is achieved by putting

in place a just procedure• i.e. one that would be agreed upon by

reasonable persons appropriately disposed to decide

Accountability for reasonableness:PublicityRelevanceRevision and Appeal

Developing a specific system of governance

Payoffs/Consequences:

i. Content decisions Balancing conflicting considerations

in particular research proposals

ii.System/structures Able to devolve responsibility

• Proportionality• Sub-committees, Peer support

Summary

• We have defended a general claim for a system of research ethics governance in social research on the grounds that research is constitutive of human social life

• Society has a stake in social research as social research will have something to say about individual members of society flourish

• Identifying this stake does not settle questions about the extent and nature of the involvement of society in research

• The ‘accountability for reasonableness’ model helps structure the overall way in which research ethics governance might be organised

• This argument lies at the heart of a larger project examining research ethics governance arrangements in different areas of research

Thank you