RESPECT Professional and Ethical Guidelines for Socio-Economic Research in the Information Society An introduction by Professor Ursula Huws, RESPECT Project Director Budapest, June 12, 2003
Why now? New EU legislation on copyright and data protection Development of European Research Area EU expansion Need to understand global processes Increasing inter-disciplinarity and multidisciplinarity Increasing international collaboration Traditional self-regulating communities of researchers are losing their force
What is the relevance of ISTs? ISTs effect both the way that research is carried out and research content New IST-based research tools and multiplication of information sources and delivery media make verification difficult Digitisation of information facilitates new forms of plagiarism and blurs the boundaries between ‘published’ and non-published research Speed of change may render traditional peer review processes too slow Changing role of socio-economic research in EC technology policy development
Evolution of Information Society Technologies discrete products/ processes systems and networks an ‘information Society’
Discrete products/processes Typical roles of socio-economic research ergonomics human/machine interface market research cost-benefit analysis facilitators/barriers to uptake ‘social shaping’
Systems and networks Typical roles of socio-economic research organisational impacts interoperability/harmonisation skill requirements legal and regulatory issues prevalence and distribution environmental impacts ‘socio-technical systems’
An Information Society Typical roles of socio-economic research Paradigm shift across all socio-economic disciplines multidisciplinarity and inter-disciplinarity critical re-evaluation of existing models across-the-board review of existing regulatory frameworks qualitative methodologies to investigate (e.g.) impacts on identity, family, quality of life Development of new indicators
RESPECT’S GUIDING PRINCIPLES Respect for Intellectual Property Respect for Research Ethics Respect for Privacy and Data Security Respect for Professional Qualifications and Standards Respect for Research Users
RESPECT partners The Institute for Employment Studies (IES) UK Social Research Association (SRA) UK Centre de Recherches Informatique et Droit (CRID) Belgium Hoger Instituut voor de Arbeid - K. U. Leuven (HIVA) Belgium Institute of Sociology, Hungarian Academy of Sciences (ISB) Hungary Forschungs- und Beratungsstelle Arbeitswelt (FORBA) Austria Institut fuer Informations-, Telekommunikations- und Medienrecht - Zivilrechtliche Abeteilung (ITM) Germany
Where we are today Draft codes of practice (and background reports) on Data protection issues Intellectual property issues Ethical issues Professional Issues A functional map of a multidisciplinary socio-economic EU research project
Where we go next This conference marks the launch of a wide consultation process on the draft codes Taking account of feedback they will be consolidated into a single code of practice Open debate about how to encourage takeup and enforcement Publish a User’s Guide to Socio-Economic Research Widely disseminate the code itself
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