In recent public administration literature, much attention is paid to changes in public service values, including ethical values, that guide public service. This paper reports on the results of an empirical survey conducted among a group of Turkish governors and district governors (including those in service and retired) who are from different generations. By focusing on the transformation of value preferences of Turkish governors and district governors, this study tries to identify variations (...) in values, particularly about public service ethics, in accordance with the age and the length of tenure in public service. The findings of the research show a traditional and more or less consistent value pattern for Turkish governors and district governors. The most important public service values expressed by the respondents are consistent with often-mentioned crucial public service values in the literature. New or emerging values have not been present enough among the most important public service values. In brief, the results do not lend support to the often-assumed hypothesis that traditional public service values are devaluated or degraded by the emergence of businesslike values. In other words, new emerging values could not sneak into the public service culture in any convincing manner in spite of many years of NPM rhetoric and recipes. (shrink)

Chiara Cordelli’s The Privatized State is a book that should be widely read for many reasons.1 In the first place, it engages with an important set of issues in governance and public administration...

In the post-broadcast era, public service media (PSM) organizations have to innovate, stay up-to-date with new ways of consuming content, and experiment with the manifold opportunities that interactivity offers for audience engagement. At the same time, they are still obligated to achieve their public service remit and guarantee that services comply with values such as universality, diversity, creativity, and innovation. This article analyzes the innovation policies and strategies of PSM to understand if these are shifting (...) from a technology-centric to a user-centric approach. It evaluates what areas of innovation are prioritized by both policy-makers and public broadcasters and whether these areas correspond with the innovation goals entrusted to PSM organizations by scholars. To this end, we adopted a multi-case study approach. The focus is on three public broadcasters of varying size and situated in different political, cultural, and economic backgrounds: RTVE (Spain), RTÉ (Ireland), and VRT (Belgium). Based on a qualitative document analysis, we conclude that innovation remains largely technology-centric. Strategies are oriented to the implementation of new technologies, the digital distribution of the content, and the collaboration with external partners. However, these public broadcasters have not yet promoted concrete actions to encourage the participation of their audiences. (shrink)

This essay reviews the place and role of Public Service Media (PSM) in promoting social justice in the changing digital media landscape through the ethos of diversity. Media diversity – the value and practice of including varied viewpoints, social groups, voices, and channels or outlets in media – has long been a declared pillar of PSM organizations worldwide. However, current changes in the digital media landscape and the growing extension of PSM organizations to digital platforms require re-reading the (...) premise of promoting media diversity as a tool for social justice. This essay identifies a paradox. On one hand, online media appear to accommodate a greater range of diverse voices and players, particularly in the PSM ecosystem. At the same time, these very same online spaces jeopardize diversity, as the increasing practices of personalization, algorithmic curation, and platformization often reduce diversity of representations, voices, and exposure to content, thereby hindering opportunities for social justice and equality. This essay shines a spotlight on this nexus of conflicting mechanisms. The essay begins with in-depth definitions of the two somewhat convoluted terms diversity and social justice. This section includes a review of global perspectives on PSM organizations, and the long-standing value of diversity promoted through them for decades. We then review the impact and changes identified in PSM platforms worldwide in light of the digital turn in the media field. This is followed by an in-depth discussion of the inherent tension between mechanisms that promote and hinder diversity online. Throughout this discussion, we raise questions about the practical dimensions of using online media to promote social justice through diversity. It provides a useful starting point for considering the intersection of Public Service Media, online platforms, diversity, and social justice. Thus, the essay will serve academic scholars studying social justice on a conceptual level as well as practitioners and stakeholders in the media industry at large, and PSM in particular, seeking to practically promote social justice. (shrink)

The article analyzes approaches to the ethicalization of officialdom in the realities of digitalization. The author believe that demonstrative behavior harms the authority of public service. Administrative ethics should be based on traditional values, the main of which are deemed to be integrity and loyalty to the Motherland. В статье анализируются подходы к этизации чиновничества в реалиях цифровизации. Автор полагает, что демонстративность поведения вредит авторитету государственной службы. Административная этика должна базироваться на традиционных ценностях, главными из которых почитаются (...) принципиальность и верность Отечеству. (shrink)

Souzy Dracopoulou , Ethics and values in health care management.

The problem this paper addresses is that scientists have to take normatively charged decisions which can have a significant impact on individual members of the public or the public as a whole. And yet mechanisms to exercise democratic control over them are often absent. Given the normative nature of these choices, this is often perceived to be at odds with basic democratic principles. I show that this problem applies in similar ways to civil service institutions and draw (...) on political philosophy literature on the civil service (e.g. Rosanvallon, 2011; Heath, 2022) to discuss when such normative judgements can nevertheless be said to be democratically legitimate. Concretely, I seek to show that normative judgements in research need not be democratically legitimated in order for science to be democratically legitimate. Indeed, it can be democratically legitimate for scientists to go against the expressed views of the public or political representatives if this is justified in light of, firstly, the role science has been asked to fulfil and, secondly, when it is in line with public institutions’ key principles. This is a counter-position to views currently held in the values in science debate (e.g. by Kitcher, 2011; Intemann, 2015; Schroeder, 2021; Lusk, 2021) which argue that value-laden judgements in science are legitimate if they are aligned with the public’s views or directly decided by public. (shrink)

Abstract. This article argues that a primary, contemporary product of four moments in the history of faith-based social services has been a highly selective and inconsistent use of the notion of human rights by churches and church leaders. Churches still occasionally reference a communitarian sense of human rights and public good but now more commonly use the rhetoric of individual rights to contest specific political positions and social policies in the arena of the social service agencies these churches (...) sponsor. Changing church views of human nature are not sweeping changes, but small changes of degree that still have the power to powerfully reorient social relations. In this sense, churches that sponsor social services increasingly espouse a privatized, economic, and individualistic “Civil Society” in sharp contrast to communitarian notions of social citizenship that formerly better reflected churches’ operating ontology. (shrink)

Information technologies (IT) play a criticalrole in transforming public administration andredefining the role of bureaucracy in ademocratic society. New applications of ITbring great promises for government, but at thesame time raise concerns about administrativepower and its abuse. Using GeographicInformation Systems (GIS) as the centralexample, this paper provides the philosophicalunderpinnings of the role of technology anddiscusses the importance of an ethicaldiscourse in IT for public serviceprofessionals. Such ethical discourse must bebased on upholding the democratic values andpreserving the institutional (...) integrity of ITprofessionals in public office. (shrink)

Many practices available for use in health service psychology are ineffective or harmful. How we describe these practices is important to scientific discourse and science communication with policy-makers and the general public. The label “pseudoscience” is typically applied in these cases, though the meaning of pseudoscience varies widely creating a quagmire for transparent and accurate communication. To clarify this issue, we review several prominent definitions of pseudoscience as well as consider how the term is used amongst psychology scholars (...) and science-communicators. We define two additional terms adapted from the medical literature, contemporary and alternative psychotherapies and low-value practices, and discuss their strengths and limitations. Finally, we recommend the broader category of low-value practices for use due to its definitional clarity, lack of competing definitions, and potential for clarifying research programs. (shrink)

Toward concordia: Dialogue and Poetry. – The question whether the governance and autonomy of medieval and early modern cities and the participation of their citizens in communal affairs may gesture toward a form of communal self-governance or it is yet another form of the rule of the privileged has re-emerged with new answers in recent scholarship. It was also one of the topics of the lecture series, Urban Governance and Civic Participation in Words and Stone, as part of which Prof. (...) Ferenc Hörcher also gave a talk. Although the following interview is based primarily on Prof. Hörcher’s lecture, the discussion joyfully meandered through a number of other, fascinating topics, like the value of philosophical dialogue vis-a-vis debate, the literary figure of the flaneur, the political ideas of Dante and the philosophical potential of poetry. (shrink)

Public values failure occurs when the market and the public sector fail to provide goods and services required to achieve the core values of society such as equity (Bozeman 2007). That public policy for emerging health technologies should address intrinsic societal values such as equity is not a novel concept. However, the ways that the public values discourse of stakeholders is structured is less clear and rarely studied through the lens of (...) class='Hi'>public interests. This is especially true in the health sciences discourse. Using the public value mapping (PVM) model I present a case study of the intrinsic value of equity in nanomedicine for cancer and the imperatives for translational research, an instrumental value to achieve equity. After reviewing and coding nearly 700 value statements from several hundred public documents, I find that that the discourse on values varies between documents that address basic research and documents that address the application of the knowledge produced in basic research, with some especially notable disconnections. This paper demonstrates the importance of further refinement of methods for testing the PVM framework if the societal goal is to improve consistency of the public value discussion by those involved in developing and applying new technologies. The paper also demonstrates the value of a PVM approach for complex science policy analysis, especially for emerging technologies like nanomedicine. (shrink)

Objective: Governments consistently aim to enhance services and establish online connections to efficiently deliver necessary information. This study aims to evaluate the future potential of digital libraries in public libraries in Pakistan by examining various projects that have introduced innovative approaches to foster the development of digital library services. Methodology: The analysis utilized the Amos 24 version, employing the Structural Equation Model (SEM) for assessing model fit indices and validating hypotheses. Additionally, Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 24 (...) was employed for Pearson correlation and factor analysis. Findings: The results suggest the appropriateness of discussing three out of the seven elements/factors used to assess competence improvement. The study reveals that public library managers can offer both physical and online workshops to community members, addressing emotional management for customers, including children and adults, during post-crisis information retrieval. Practical Implications: The study on public library user literacy skills, user behavior, and digital resources and services integrates the exploration and development of online databases to address challenges faced by public library management and users amidst the information explosion in academic and research activities. This contributes to enhancing the satisfaction levels of public library users. Originality/Value: Librarians are encouraged to conduct online workshops to address challenges faced by research students in information-seeking scenarios, focusing on improving reading and literacy skills, understanding user behavior, and optimizing digital resources and services through a study of online databases. (shrink)

An important factor that leads governments to engage in public service contracts with nonprofit organizations is the belief that they share similar ethical and value orientations that will allow governments to reduce monitoring costs. However the notion of the existence of similarities in ethical climate has not been systematically examined. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ethical climate in government and nonprofit sectors and to determine the extent to which similarities (and differences) exist in ethical (...) climate dimensions. Using survey data and structural equation modeling technique, the factor structure equivalence and measurement invariance of the ethical climate in the two sectors are tested. Results indicate that while there is a significant overlap in shared perception of ethical climate dimensions, there are also key differences between the two sectors. The outcome of this research provides important preliminary insights for public policy makers in government to better understand the implications of using the nonprofit sector for service delivery. (shrink)

Offers a historical-cultural context for the ethos of service in libraries and critically examines this professional value as it intersects with gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity, class, and (dis)ability"--Provided by publisher.

This paper shows how institutional values influence the design and evaluation of arguments in funding proposals for research. We characterize a general argument made within proposals and several kinds of subarguments that contribute to it. We indicate that funders’ values inform the kinds of proposal documents funders require and their relative weighting of them. We illustrate these points by showing how a program office in the U.S. federal agency NOAA uses its public service mission to require (...) and heavily weigh arguments to transition new knowledge to NOAA service providers. We suggest conceptual questions raised by the use of transition knowledge. (shrink)

General practice (community) pharmacy as a healthcare profession is largely devoted to therapeutic treatment of individual patients whether in dispensing medically authorised prescriptions or by providing members of the public with over-the-counter advice and service for a variety of common ailments. Recently, community pharmacy has been identified as an untapped resource available to undertake important aspects of public health and in particular health promotion. In contrast to therapeutic treatment, public health primarily concerns the health of the (...) entire population, rather than the health of individuals (Childress et al. in J Law Med Ethics 30:170–178, 2002). Thus, an important question for the profession is whether those moral and professional values that are appropriate to the therapeutic care of individual patients are relevant and adequate to support the additional public health role. (shrink)

An important factor that leads governments to engage in public service contracts with nonprofit organizations is the belief that they share similar ethical and value orientations that will allow governments to reduce monitoring costs. However the notion of the existence of similarities in ethical climate has not been systematically examined. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ethical climate in government and nonprofit sectors and to determine the extent to which similarities (and differences) exist in ethical (...) climate dimensions. Using survey data and structural equation modeling technique, the factor structure equivalence and measurement invariance of the ethical climate in the two sectors are tested. Results indicate that while there is a significant overlap in shared perception of ethical climate dimensions, there are also key differences between the two sectors. The outcome of this research provides important preliminary insights for public policy makers in government to better understand the implications of using the nonprofit sector for service delivery. (shrink)

Under the framework of smart city, starting from the demand for urban public tourism information services, drawing on the new public service theory, customer perceived value theory, and basic information service theory, combined with previous research results, using literature analysis, questionnaire survey, and other methods, and starting from the carrier level of the public tourism information service system, this study analyzed the public tourism information services in detail. This study combed the current status (...) quo and problems of the public tourism information service system for qualitative analysis and summed up some common shortcomings and deficiencies. Along with the results of the questionnaire, this paper analyzed the existing problems in the current public tourism information service system and identified the demands of tourists for public tourism information services. Based on this, the research puts forward the idea of constructing the public tourism information service system under the background of smart city, including the system framework, characteristics, service media and mode, operation mode, management mechanism, and other aspects. The study concluded that there is a need to construct theoretical and research models of the impact of public tourism services on the quality of destination from the perspective of smart city, to use the structural equation model for quantitative analysis, to verify the model hypothesis, and to consider that public tourism services have a significant positive impact on the behavioral and psychological responses of tourists. On the basis of combing the literature and starting from the overall situation, this study puts forward a systematic integration idea, which is of theoretical significance. (shrink)

There has been a recent spate of publications on how we should evaluate change to ecological systems, some of which have introduced the concept of ‘relational values’. Environmental ethicists have, with a few exceptions, not engaged with this debate. We survey the literature on relational values, noting that most advocates of the concept introduce relational values as an additional type of value, in addition to ‘instrumental’ and ‘intrinsic’ values. In this paper, we explore the idea that (...) all environmental values are ultimately relational. We explore how such an approach can be articulated, and discuss the implications of this concept for the future of environmental ethics and value studies. One key implication is to suggest a stronger role for empirical ethnography. (shrink)

The emergence of Big Data has added a new aspect to conceptualizing the use of digital technologies in the delivery of public services and for realizing digital governance. This article explores, via the ‘value-chain’ approach, the evolution of digital governance research, and aligns it with current developments associated with data analytics, often referred to as ‘Big Data’. In many ways, the current discourse around Big Data reiterates and repeats established commentaries within the eGovernment research community. This body of knowledge (...) provides an opportunity to reflect on the ‘promise’ of Big Data, both in relation to service delivery and policy formulation. This includes, issues associated with the quality and reliability of data, from mixing public and private sector data, issues associated with the ownership of raw and manipulated data, and ethical issues concerning surveillance and privacy. These insights and the issues raised help assess the value of Big Data in government and smart city environments. (shrink)

In traditional sectors, the intervention of private parties in the regulatory system tends to be justified by their enhanced expertise, government cuts or efficiency gains. In the sharing economy (e.g., home-sharing services offered by Airbnb), quality control and regulatory tasks (e.g., inspections) are to, a great extent, informally delegated to online platforms and peer-to-peer communities that rate and review performance. These communities consist of users that do not have more than their personal experience and the guidance of online platforms to (...) underpin their assessments. Existing literature has extensively criticized the reliability of these online reputational mechanisms, but it has overlooked other far-reaching effects of outsourcing regulatory tasks to private parties. This Article offers a more complete analysis of the regulatory value of online reputation. I argue that reputational mechanisms have the potential of creating democratic spaces where users can provide unique, regular, and first-hand insights that would otherwise be disregarded in a traditional regulatory system. Nevertheless, in their current form, these mechanisms still offer inadequate protection to the public values that typically underlie the regulation of certain services. This Article explains this problem by comparing the protection of public values in the sharing economy to that of traditional regulated sectors. This Article contributes to the literature by reflecting on whether the sharing economy is inviting us to rethink the broader involvement of citizens in the protection of public values and the challenges thereof. It suggests a framework to improve online reputational mechanisms and a better dialogue between traditional regulation and online reputation. (shrink)

Dialectic IV convenes contributions with new takes on the long held proposition that architects are providers of design services. They service everyone from the status quo all the way to the subaltern. We know well how architects have historically fashioned themselves to be able to procure the most valued building commissions a people have to offer. There are temples, churches, and shrines, palaces and private villas, and surely monuments, state institutions, and corporate headquarters. But how have the members of (...) the same profession managed to fashion themselves as the custodians of the public good? (shrink)

Public benefit corporations are National Health Service, that is, state, entities whose function to provide healthcare in discharge of public duties. If we regardvalue as the output of such organisations, it seems logical to connect the values of the organisation to thevalue produced by such organisations. But, on closer examination there are competing underlying logics in play: (1) those based on promoting organisational efficiency and efficacy; and (2) those based on the idea of building service (...) provision around the clinician–patient relationship. Underlying these logics are differing value sets. These clash. Because of the clashing of underlying moral frameworks the connection between values andvalue becomes hard, if not impossible. This paper argues that (1) the clash in these moral frameworks must be addressed by the organisation rather than between individuals or groups of individuals within the organisation; (2) alloying duties within hybrid professionals submerges but does not resolve these conflicts; (3) one approach could be to impose on the organisation itself an ethical imperative to promote, enhance and protect from deterioration the welfare of the patients; (4) a board ethics committee is a possible organisational structure that could transparently and fairly balance clashes within the competing moral frameworks in a way that could reconcile the competing logics and (5) if such conflicts can be better resolved at the organisational level what the organisation must do to achieve its objectives will become clearer because what needs to be valued would naturally emerge connecting values,value and what is valued. (shrink)

Purpose This study aims to examine the individuals’ perceived usefulness and ease of use of the government’s electronic services. It also explores the effect of the social influences, as well as of the facilitating conditions, on the individuals’ intentions to use the government’s digital and mobile services. Design/methodology/approach The researcher has adapted various measuring items from the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology and from the theory of acceptance model to investigate the participants’ utilitarian motivations to engage with (...) the government’s online services. The analysis involved a two-step, structural equation modeling approach that included a confirmatory factor analysis that verified the constructs’ validity and reliability. Findings There was a satisfactory fit for this study’s research model. The findings revealed that there were direct and indirect effects that predicted the individuals’ readiness to use the e-government services. The results suggest that the respondents’ perceived usefulness and ease of use of this digital technology were significant antecedents for their behavioral intention to use it. The strength of these relationships was affected by the moderating variables, including, age, gender and experience. Yet, these demographic variables did not have a significant effect on the link between social influences and behavioral intention. Originality/value This study reported that the citizens felt that the e-government systems were useful and easy to use for them. The research participants indicated that they will continue accessing their government’s online services. Therefore, this research implies that the public services should continue improving the facilitating conditions, including the provision of service quality and capability; as well as secure the accessibility to their e-government systems via digital and mobile technologies. In conclusion, this contribution identifies possible research avenues to academia. (shrink)

Organisational restructuring involving cost-cutting, downsizing, and the acquisition and divestment of different functions is an increasingly normalised aspect of employment in both the private and public sectors. This article takes up the question of the effects of restructuring on workers through a study based on in-depth, semi-structured interviews of long-term workers in Finland’s state-owned postal service, using the concept of dignity as an analytical lens. The article distinguishes between everyday, organisational, and social dignity, using this distinction to capture (...) how workers strove to sustain dignity in a process of organisational restructuring that generated dignity threats related to occupational devaluation. The study shows how dignity in postal work has been dependent on a particular historical configuration of public service work involving the employer organisation, employment relations, and occupational values. Cost-driven restructuring has destabilised this configuration, producing a stark separation between dignity in everyday work and the organisational indignities of restructuring in postal workers’ experiences. Feeling unable to affect organisational changes in their work, postal workers have been left to sustain dignity through everyday relationality, and by drawing intra-organisational boundaries to temporary workers and upper managers based on an occupational hierarchy of commitment and competence. The study highlights the significance of organisational support for dignity at work, particularly in relation to the dignity threats generated by prolonged processes of restructuring. (shrink)

For the past five years at the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver a community service or service learning component has been included in the Values in Action class (now Values-Based Leadership), a core MBA course that integrates ethics, law, and public policy perspectives on business issues. This paper summarizes the educational philosophy and the mechanics of this required component. Few empirical studies have been conducted to gauge the perceived value and impact (...) of a service learning requirement on students. Thus, several surveys were conducted to understand better the choices made by students as well as the impact of the requirement on students. Preliminary results reveal generally a positive effect on students, including some evidence that such a service learning requirement may influence students to make a greater lifetime commitment to community service. (shrink)

COVID-19 continues to dominate 2020 and is likely to be a feature of our lives for some time to come. Given this, how should health systems respond ethically to the persistent challenges of responding to the ongoing impact of the pandemic? Relatedly, what ethical values should underpin the resetting of health services after the initial wave, knowing that local spikes and further waves now seem inevitable? In this editorial, we outline some of the ethical challenges confronting those running health (...) services as they try to resume non-COVID-related services, and the downstream ethical implications these have for healthcare professionals’ day-to-day decision making. This is a phase of recovery, resumption and renewal; a form of reset for health services.1 This reset phase will define the ‘new normal' for healthcare delivery, and it offers an opportunity to reimagine and change services for the better. There are difficulties, however, healthcare systems are already weakened by austerity and the first wave of COVID-19 and remain under stress as the pandemic continues. The reset period is operating alongside, rather than at the end, of the pandemic and this creates difficult ethical choices. ### Balancing the greater good with individual care Pandemics—and public health emergencies more generally—reinforce approaches to ethics that emphasise or derive from the interests of communities, rather than those grounded in the claims of the autonomous individual. The response has been to draw on more public health focused ethics, ‘if demand outstrips the ability to deliver to existing standards, more strictly utilitarian considerations will have to be applied, and decisions about how to meet the individual's need will give way to decisions about how to maximise overall benefit’.2 Alongside this, effective …. (shrink)

The study examines whether (a) personal and organizational values differ in private and public sectors, and (b) personal values and value congruence -the extent of matching between personal and organizational values -influence unethical practices and work behavior. Three hundred and forty middle-level managers from four manufacturing organizations rated 22 values as guiding principles to them to identify their personal values. In order to index organizational values, 56 top-level managers of the same organizations rated (...) how important such values were to the organization. Results revealed that the important shared values among managers of private and public sectors are product quality and customer service. Congruence between personal and organizational values is found to be higher in the private sector compared to the public sector. Middle-level managers in the private sector shared the organizational values more than the managers in the public sector. Irrespective of the type of organizations and age of managers, personal values more potently and consistently decreased unethical practices and increased work behavior compared to value congruence. Hiring managers emphasizing personal values can demote unethical practices and promote work behavior. (shrink)

This paper reports on a relationship between the University of Toronto and a non-profit, non-governmental (“third party”) certifying organization called Local Flavour Plus (LFP). The University as of August 2006 requires its corporate caterers to use local and sustainable farm products for a small but increasing portion of meals for most of its 60,000 students. LFP is the certifying body, whose officers and consultants have strong relations of trust with sustainable farmers. It redefines standards and verification to create ladders for (...) farmers, Aramark and Chartwells (the corporations that won the bid), and the University, to continuously raise standards of sustainability. After years of frustrated efforts, other Ontario institutions are expressing interest, opening the possibility that a virtuous circle could lead to rapid growth in local, sustainable supply chains. The paper examines the specificities of the LFP approach and of the Toronto and Canadian context. Individuals in LFP acquired crucial skills, insights, experience, resources, and relationships of trust over 20 years within the Toronto “community of food practice,” located in a supportive municipal, NGO and social movement context. (shrink)

Historical re-enactment is an emerging social practice in the knowledge society, and it helps us better understand aspects of the past and heritage. The knowledge gained through historical recreation contributes to the construction of quality citizenship. The deepening of democratic values requires that educational systems commit to the promotion of critical citizenship. Service-learning constructively develops experiences that connect science, education and society. Our research describes a systematized praxis of historical recreation. It has been developed by university students, and (...) it has been carried out from the perspective of service-learning, in a manner consistent with the concepts of public history and public archaeology, to contribute to the promotion and defense of heritage history and the preservation of historical memory. (shrink)

BackgroundThe coronavirus 2019 pandemic placed unprecedented pressures on healthcare services and magnified ethical dilemmas related to how resources should be allocated. These resources include, among others, personal protective equipment, personnel, life-saving equipment, and vaccines. Decision-makers have therefore sought ethical decision-making tools so that resources are distributed both swiftly and equitably. To support the development of such a decision-making tool, a systematic review of the literature on relevant ethical values and principles was undertaken. The aim of this review was to (...) identify ethical values and principles in the literature which relate to the equitable allocation of resources in response to an acute public health threat, such as a pandemic.MethodsA rapid systematic review was conducted using MEDLINE, EMBASE, Google Scholar, LitCOVID and relevant reference lists. The time period of the search was January 2000 to 6th April 2020, and the search was restricted to human studies. January 2000 was selected as a start date as the aim was to capture ethical values and principles within acute public health threat situations. No restrictions were made with regard to language. Ethical values and principles were extracted and examined thematically.ResultsA total of 1,618 articles were identified. After screening and application of eligibility criteria, 169 papers were included in the thematic synthesis. The most commonly mentioned ethical values and principles were: Equity, reciprocity, transparency, justice, duty to care, liberty, utility, stewardship, trust and proportionality. In some cases, ethical principles were conflicting, for example, Protection of the Public from Harm and Liberty.ConclusionsAllocation of resources in response to acute public health threats is challenging and must be simultaneously guided by many ethical principles and values. Ethical decision-making strategies and the prioritisation of different principles and values needs to be discussed with the public in order to prepare for future public health threats. An evidence-based tool to guide decision-makers in making difficult decisions is required. The equitable allocation of resources in response to an acute public health threat is challenging, and many ethical principles may be applied simultaneously. An evidence-based tool to support difficult decisions would be helpful to guide decision-makers. (shrink)

Reason and Rationality in Health and Human Services Delivery is the first book to discuss the topic of decisionmaking and services from a multidisciplinary approach. It uses theory and social considerations, not just technology, as a basis for improved services. Health and human service students and professionals will learn how to form rational and reasonable decisions that take their clients'cultural backgrounds into consideration when identifying an illness or appropriating any kind of intervention. With a particular emphasis on theories, models, (...) organizational settings, technologies, and practitioner training methods that lead to culturally sensitive decisions, Reason and Rationality will help you deliver efficient and improved medical and social services to clients from all ethnic backgrounds. Recognizing reason as the centerpiece of most of Western philosophy, this text reveals how our idea of truth, fact, and order are wrongly thought to be universal; yet, Western principles are continually used in the decision-making process for health and social services. Focusing on the policy implications of decisionmaking in medical and social service settings, this text works to incorporate a broad range of factors into the reasoning process, such as cultural traditions and beliefs, that will result in better treatment for patients. Giving you suggestions and strategies for upgrading reasoning and decision-making processes and applying them to every area of service, Reason and Rationality discusses different themes that will help you improve services to patients, such as: the rationale currently used to justify decision-making strategies concerning medical and human services using computer technology to make clinical assessments revising administrative structure, management theories, and organizational strategies so that decision-making processes enhance the overall quality of service delivery how the practitioner/patient relationship is important in choosing the proper treatment soliciting community-based input to assess the public's health and human service needs in order to lessen political involvement in decision-making stages In addition, Reason and Rationality provides information and examples that show why you should consider the "life-world"--the values, beliefs, and commitments of a culture's history-- as the key to understanding the powers of reasoning that specify parameters of health and illness. (shrink)

The first part of this paper provides a general theory of moral climates, which incorporates the following three elements: first, the values and limitations of that picture of moral behaviour focused on rules, rule-following and rationality; second, that picture of moral behaviour focused on institutionally-embedded activity; and third, that picture of moral behaviour that urges us to come face to face with our own limitations, i.e., our own ways of orienting ourselves to objects of value, such that we do (...) not neglect the vigilance required in order to see and recognise the great variety and depth of suffering and vulnerability. The moral climate of any particular social environment can be evaluated from the perspective of these three elements. The second part of the paper applies this general theory of moral climates to that of international economic institutions. It is argued that, despite their importance, both human rights discourse and institutional features designed to increase participation from developing countries in decision- and policy-making, are of limited use, partly because of their inherent limitations, and partly because of the emergence of international economic institutions in the context of an already heavily de-politicised and autonomous economic sphere. The necessary transformation of international economic institutions ought not to neglect the continuing domination of the orientation of those institutions towards the value of efficiency, to which all other values tend to be made subordinate. The paper proposes not only vigilance about the limitations of current and proposed normative languages and institutional features, but also urges the consideration of a Community Forum scheme, which is designed to bring to light and thereafter communicate, via the participation of international experts and artists, some of the particularities of suffering and vulnerability within specific communities. Finally, the paper illustrates the need for greater awareness of the particularities of suffering and vulnerability by considering the continuing problem of access to public goods and services amongst the poor in Nigeria. (shrink)

Some critics of invasion biology have argued the invasion of ecosystems by nonindigenous species can create more valuable ecosystems. They consider invaded communities as more valuable because they potentially produce more ecosystem services. To establish that the introduction of nonindigenous species creates more valuable ecosystems, they defend that value is provisioned by ecosystem services. These services are derived from ecosystem productivity, the production and cycling of resources. Ecosystem productivity is a result of biodiversity, which is understood as local species richness. (...) Invasive species increase local species richness and, therefore, increase the conservation value of local ecosystems. These views are disseminating to the public via a series of popular science books. Conservationists must respond to these views, and I outline a method of rejecting such arguments against controlling invasive species. Ecological systems are valuable for more than local productivity and biodiversity is not accurately described by a local species count. (shrink)

Cochran has argued that Catholic health care occupies a “unique place on the border of public and private life”. Catholic health care is accountable to both its religious and sacramental traditions and its public responsibilities. It is inevitable that “border skirmishes” will arise. Yet there is no single formula for suggesting what public-private collaboration should comprise or how conflicts between values ought to be resolved. It may be, as Cochran suggests, that increasingly bitter conflicts over widely (...) valued services such as sterilization, combined with market pressures to conform to for-profit trends in health care, will make divestiture of faith-based hospitals in favor of other types of church-community partnerships the best course for the future. (shrink)

BackgroundPromoting the social value of global health research undertaken in resource poor settings has become a key concern in global research ethics. The consideration for benefit sharing, which concerns the elucidation of what if anything, is owed to participants, their communities and host nations that take part in such research, and the obligations of researchers involved, is one of the main strategies used for promoting social value of research. In the last decade however, there has been intense debate within academic (...) bioethics literature seeking to define the benefits, the beneficiaries, and the scope of obligations for providing these benefits. Although this debate may be indicative of willingness at the international level to engage with the responsibilities of researchers involved in global health research, it remains unclear which forms of benefits or beneficiaries should be considered. International and local research ethics guidelines are reviewed here to delineate the guidance they provide.MethodsWe reviewed documents selected from the international compilation of research ethics guidelines by the Office for Human Research Protections under the US Department of Health and Human Services.ResultsAccess to interventions being researched, the provision of unavailable health care, capacity building for individuals and institutions, support to health care systems and access to medical and public health interventions proven effective, are the commonly recommended forms of benefits. The beneficiaries are volunteers, disease or illness affected communities and the population in general. Interestingly however, there is a divide between "global opinion" and the views of particular countries within resource poor settings as made explicit by differences in emphasis regarding the potential benefits and the beneficiaries.ConclusionAlthough in theory benefit sharing is widely accepted as one of the means for promoting the social value of international collaborative health research, there is less agreement amongst major guidelines on the specific responsibilities of researchers over what is ethical in promoting the social value of research. Lack of consensus might have practical implications for efforts aimed at enhancing the social value of global health research undertaken in resource poor settings. Further developments in global research ethics require more reflection, paying attention to the practical realities of implementing the ethical principles in real world context. (shrink)

Human stories lie at the heart of professional practice in the human, social services, though these are often discounted when it comes to researching such services and sharing practice through publication. This article identifies and addresses certain methodological and epistemological biases and consequent challenges in human science research, and discusses the importance of story (autoethnography) and discovery (heuristics) in research which can inform practice, meaningfully and ethically. It considers this by addressing both research and publication, illustrating both the challenges and (...) the solutions from the authors’ own experiences. The article argues for reclaiming the subjective and the subjectivist dimension in human, social science, and, therefore, the experiential, in both research and publication; and addresses four problems with regard to publishing in the human sciences, namely: privilege, quality, anonymity in peer-review, and capital. (shrink)

This article describes and proposes the “environmental subsidiarity principle” as a guiding ethical value in forestry governance. Different trends in environmental management such as local participation, decentralization or global governance have emerged in the last two decades at the global, national and local level. This article suggests that the conscious or unconscious application of subsidiarity has been the ruling principle that has allocated the level at which tasks have been assigned to different agents. Based on this hypothesis this paper describes (...) the principle of subsidiarity and its application to environmental policies within forest governance and proposes the “environmental subsidiarity” principle as a critical conceptual tool for sustainable resource management. The paper explains as an example how “environmental subsidiarity” is the key principle that can link payment for ecosystem services (PES) with environmental public policies and applies this principle with all its political consequences to reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and enhancing forest carbon stocks in developing countries (REDD+) architecture. It concludes by showing how the adoption of “environmental subsidiarity” as a ethical principle could help to maximize benefits to all stakeholders involved in PES schemes such as REDD+. (shrink)

This paper reports on the design and implementation of a multi-phase interactive process among a set of scientists, policy makers, land managers, and community representatives, so as to facilitate communication, mutual understanding, and participative decision making. This was part of the Ecosystem Services Project in Australia. The project sought to broaden public understanding about the natural ecosystems in Australia. The study reported here pertains to one of the project sites--the Goulburn Broken catchment, a highly productive agricultural watershed in the (...) south-east of Australia. The paper demonstrates how, starting from a condition of diversity of ideas and interests among the participants, systematic dialogue and mutual learning could be generated, leading to identification of options for more sustainable land management practices. The concept of "ecosystem services" was used as an integrative tool across disciplines and community perspectives. The concept of scenarios was used to encourage future-focussed thinking among the participants. The idea of "stakeholder jury" was used to promote deliberation. A process of multi-criteria evaluation was used to facilitate convergence of viewpoints, through informed trade-offs and compromises. This experience led to the development of a process for integration research, which helped in harmonising across diverse understandings and values in a transparent and structured manner. (shrink)

This survey report is a follow-up to the survey done by the Center for Business Ethics in 1984/85 which was published in the Journal for Business Ethics under the title of 'Are Corporations Institutionalizing Ethics?' (Volume 5, 1986, pp. 85-91). This 1989/90 survey was again sent to Fortune 1000 industrial and service companies to find out what they have done to build ethical values into their organizations. It reveals some interesting comparisons with the 1984/85 survey with regard to (...) expanding efforts, objectives, progress, and methods of implementation, along with some new information on their perception of public pressure for ethics programs and the need for ethics education. The survey shows where some progress in building ethics into corporations seems to be occurring and where much more work needs to be done. (shrink)

The value of biodiversity is usually confused with the value of biological resources, both actual and potential. A sharp distinction between biological resources and biodiversity offers a clearer insight into the value of biodiversity itself and therefore the need to preserve it. Biodiversity can be defined abstractly as the differences among biological entities. Using this definition, biodiversity can be seen more appropriately as: (a) a necessary precondition for the long term maintenance of biological resources, and therefore, (b) an essential environmental (...) condition. Three values of biodiversity are identified and arranged in a hierarchy: (1) the self-augmenting phenomenon of biodiversity maintains (2) the conditions necessary for the adaptive evolution of species and higher taxa, which in turn is necessary for providing humans with (3) a range of biological resources in the long term. Two broad policy implications emerge: increments of biodiversity should not be traded off against biological resources as if they were the same, and the conservation of biodiversity should be a constraint on the public interest, not a goal in service of the public interest. (shrink)

*The opinions expressed are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy of the National Institutes of Health, the Public Health Service, or the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

This paper offers some ideas and methods of consensus building towards integration of values in flood control, environment, and landscape. These three factors sometimes oppose to each other in the process of construction of public infrastructure such as roadbuilding and river improvement. It is crucial to avoid or resolute conflicts between the government and the local people through project management with the consensus building process. In public works in Japan, flood control has been given priority over the (...) environmental preservation and the landscape conservation due to the perception that it is through flood control that the life and property of individuals are adequately protected. As a consequence, the landscape and the environment have been paid only lip‐service. In the case of the Ohashi River Project in Izumo region presented in this paper, however, the river repair process might entail a severe blow to the tourism industry and have a dramatic impact on the fishery resources of the region, which would be considered a major loss in terms of the urban development of the city. One of our concerns is thus to avoid any losses, through proper consideration of the relationship between the three crucial factors. In this paper, the author reports some ideas and methods that appear in “Basic Policy for the Development of the Area around Ohashi River” composed by the Matsue Review Committee on the Development of the Area around the Ohashi River, in which the author is involved as a committee member. The most important task of the Committee wasto search for the ideas and methods to harmonize the values of flood control, environment, and landscape. (shrink)

Forensic mental health services (FMHS) involve restricting certain individual rights to uphold or promote other ethical values – the restriction of liberty in various forms is justified with reference to health and safety of the individual and the community. The tension that arises from this has been construed as a hallmark of the practice and an ever-present quandary for practitioners. Stating this ethical dilemma upfront is a common point of departure for many texts discussing FMHS. But do we run (...) the risk of missing something important if setting the ethical scene rather than exploring it? This paper draws on interviews with three types of interested parties in mental health law proceedings – patients, psychiatrists and public defenders, and seeks to tease out what values are enacted when they describe and discuss experiences of FMHS and court proceedings. In doing so, we find emphasized values such as acceptance, telling it like it is, atonement, normality, and ensuring the future. We find that well-delineated and separate values are not necessarily the basis for decisions. We also find potential for explanation and guidance in bringing ethical discourse closer to everyday practice. (shrink)

The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, founded July 1, 1978, at Clare Hall, Cambridge University, was established by the American scholar, industrialist, and philanthropist Obert Clark Tanner. Lectureships are awarded to outstanding scholars or leaders in broadly defined fields of human values and transcend ethnic, national, religious, or ideological distinctions. Volume 33 features lectures given during the academic year 2012-2013 at Stanford University; the University of Michigan; the University of Oxford; the University of California, Berkeley; Harvard University; the (...) University of Utah; and the U.S. Ambassador’s Palace, Paris, France._ William G. Bowen_, “Costs and Productivity in Higher Education” and “Prospects for an Online Fix: Can We Harness Technology in the Service of Our Aspirations?”_ Craig Calhoun_, “The Problematic Public: Revisiting Dewey, Arendt, and Habermas”_ Michael Ignatieff_, “Representation and Responsibility: Ethics and Public Office”_ F. M. Kamm_,_ “_Who Turned the Trolley?” and _“_How Was the Trolley Turned?”_ Claude Lanzmann, “_Resurrection”_ Robert Post, “_Representative Democracy: The Constitutional Theory of Campaign Finance Reform” and _“_Campaign Finance Reform and the First Amendment”_ Michael J. Sandal_, “The Moral Economy of Speculation: Gambling, Finance, and the Common Good”. (shrink)

In this paper I put forward an ethical argument for the provision of extensive patient choice by the British National Health Service. I base this argument on traditional liberal rights to freedom of choice, on a welfare right to health care, and on a view of health as values-based. I argue that choice, to be ethically sustainable on this basis, must be values-based and rational. I also consider whether the British taxpayer may be persuadable with regard to (...) the moral acceptability of patient choice, making use of Rawls’ theory of political liberalism in this context. I identify issues that present problems in terms of public acceptance of choice, and also identify a boundary issue with regard to public health choices as against individual choices. (shrink)

This study examined the factors driving the public value of e-government from the viewpoint of the Chinese people. The usage of ICT through e-government systems must generate the adequate corresponding public value that can motivate the acceptance of e-government services. The sample 517 data generated from Chinese citizens were analyzed using AMOS 23 software by undertaking the structural equation model system of analysis. The results show that constructs such as information quality, service parameters, user orientation, efficiency, openness, (...) and responsiveness were significantly related to the public value of e-government. Additionally, the research validated that the public value of e-government has a direct influence on the behavioral intention to adopt e-government services. The managerial and practical implications of these research findings on the public value of e-government and the acceptance of e-government services are dissected meticulously. (shrink)

People value highly the digital technologies that are so pervasive in everyday life and work, certainly as measured by economists. Yet there are also evident harms associated with them, including the likelihood that they are affecting political discourse and choices. The features of digital markets mean they tend toward monopoly, so great economic and political power lies in the hands of a small number of giant companies. While tougher regulation may be one way to tackle the harms they create, it (...) does not get at the structural problem, which is their advertising-driven business model. The hunt for people's attention drives algorithmic promotion of viral content to get ever-more clicks. An alternative policy intervention to reclaim public space would be to create a public service competitor that could drive competition along other dimensions. Online space must be reclaimed as a public space from the privately-owned US and Chinese digital giants. (shrink)