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In this presentation, and believing in necessity-driven technological solutions, we present a few guidelines for the creation of a Code Of Conduct for people interested in socially-responsible engineering and science. The motivation for this Code Of Conduct is derived from work done with minorities and endangered communities in Mexico. Introduction of new technology must first consider the cultural and environmental surroundings, as well as the actual needs that drive its implementation. These guidelines are divided into three sections on how to interact with: Individuals, Communities and Technology.
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Creating a Code Of Conduct For Socially-Responsible Engineering For
Appropriate And Appropriable Technologies
Hector Dominguez and Joaquin RosalesTalleres Libres de Artes y Tecnologias. Mexico.
< InterSymp 2008 > 20th International Conference on
Systems Research, Informatics and Cybernetics (Baden-Baden, Germany, July 24-30, 2008)
HOPE
WITH THIS EXPOSITION, WE WANT TO ENCOURAGE PEOPLE IN SCIENCE AND
ENGINEERING TO GET INVOLVED IN PROJECTS WITH PEOPLE LIVING IN
DIFFICULT SITUATIONS AND MARGINATED FROM MAIN STREAM RESOURCES AND
TALENT.
SHARING IS THE BEST HUMANE WAY TO PROGRESS
Technology impact
Technology can be defined as the collection of techniques used to solve problems.
A major goal of Technology is to improve social life; however, technology may have negative effects.
COMPLEX SOCIAL LIFE
We are all interconnected to each other in different and, sometimes, unexpected ways.
Our society is the result of an evolutive process, not only biological but cultural as well.
HOW DO WE MEASURE PROGRESS?
Using indexes:Wealth
Measuring Macro Economic Parameterslife expectancy
Corporative indexesCultural parameters
(Many global parameters equalize the worst and best cases, forgetting about middle
points)
HOW DO WE GET REAL PROGRESS?
By localizing development and evaluations.
Considering local contextBeing more humanistic instead of pure
mechanistic evaluationsUnderstanding local Cultural background
What is Social Responsibility
Social responsibility (Social Accountability International, 1997) can be interpreted as working along sustainable, technological, and cultural development of communities, driven by local situations, culture and environment.
It implies recognizing, protection and, defense of human rights for individuals, and collectives. This does not mean to act based on prejudice, but on clear analysis, and fundamental humane principles.
Social Responsibility
Social responsibility considers the environment as a whole ecological system, where living beings are connected to each other. Every action has to be evaluated according to the impact on the environment due to actions or inactions of human activity.
Social responsibility means a deep respect towards the human cultural activity, local traditions and beliefs.
What do we do?
BE RESPONSIBLE AS INDIVIDUALS IN OUR OWN
FIELD, SEEKING AND PROMOTING AWARENESS OF
LOCAL SITUATIONS IN A HUMANE AND REALISTIC
APPROACH.
CODE OF CONDUCT ON TECHNOLOGY: AN APPROACH
We started thinking about a set of statements to represent our thoughts and experience on our
work on Technology.
The following statements derived from a constant exercise of reflexion and self
evaluation.
We need to mention that these statements are constantly in change and adaptation and do not
represent a static set of content.
CODE OF CONDUCT
Each individual is a human being with same rights as any other. Every individual has the fundamental right to pursue his or her own happiness without negatively affecting others. Mutual respect and communication is fundamental to build a community, and, therefore, a society.
All individuals working on technology must look after safety, health, and public wealth as their main priority. In their constant deployment of their work, individuals in technology must work in a objective and truthful way, as well as to be ethically and legally responsible of their actions, honoring their reputation, and profession.
SOCIAL RESPONSIBLE ENGINEERS AND SCIENTIST
Socially responsible engineers and scientists need to avoid and report any abuse, lack of respect, exploitation of people or resource.
Be promoters of non-violence, tolerance to other cultures, understanding among people, and women's participation in technology development projects.
Any self promotion by using or abusing of the integrity of others is also considered as a form of corruption.
SOCIAL RESPONSIBLE E&Sc
A fundamental Principle when working with communities, is the respect towards cultural integrity, spiritual, artistic, religious, and scientific traditions based on human rights.
Therefore, Engineers may require assistance of local experts. When a foreign element is introduced into a community, it might create negative consequences.
It is mandatory to understand the cultural and natural context and, based on that, forecast as much as possible any consequence and impacts in the community due to the engineers actions and presence or their Technology.
APPROPIATE TECHNOLOGY
Socially Responsible Engineers have the responsibility for ethically managing community resources and knowledge, minimizing the negative effects of their activities to others and the environment.
Developing appropriate technology for a community is not an easy task. The use of native languages for accessing and developing technology is fundamental.
Appropriate technology solves real needs, based on understanding of the problem and local resources.
APPROPRIABLE TECHNOLOGY
Appropriable Technology is such that local communities can afford it, be trained in it, and understand its principles in the right amount of time in order to allow good results.
For instance, Socially Responsible Engineers need to consider easy access to technical support, preventive and corrective maintenance and have a local set of experts with proper training.
It is important to include local community experts during the planning phase in order to assure a better understanding of the needs, and desired results, as well as keeping alive further local work.
FAIR TRADE
In order to achieve self-sustainability, it is important to motivate commercialization of products developed of the community projects; such commercial use must be authorized by the community itself and follow the rules on fair trade.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
All Socially Responsible Engineers must recognize the community intellectual property (IP) contained in their knowledge and existing expertise.
They should facilitate any legal protection of local IP and secure sensitive information that may expose private information of individuals, or that may affect negatively the whole community.
Socially Responsible Engineers respect the privacy and confidentiality of any member of the community.
FREE EXCHANGE OF IDEAS
The spirit of free exchange of ideas is a mean for common growth, we recommend the use of opentechnologies and explore different ways to protect legally community knowledge and expertise, as well as any development coming from the collaborative work done for these projects.
So far, Creative Commons licenses offer a range of options for the authors and communities to choose. This is not the only option around, people can pick from other types of license like GNU, for instance.
CONCLUSIONSThis paper is only a compilation of thoughts and ideas by us and many other people, and adapted to our local reality. Our final goal is to motivate others to think about ways to keep our world, a beautiful and diverse place to live in.
We use all these ideas to create our Code of Conduct which dictates our principles for interaction inside our organization
with communities and others. It is also a document for institutional self-awareness and education.
Engineers and scientists are part of an elite that must confront their responsibilities, and, far from maintaining the status quo, the new millennium represents an opportunity to use that talent
to understand ourselves better as a society.
THANK YOU
Talleres Libres de Artes y Tecnologias
http://julius.dnsdojo.orghttps://julius.org.mx
