A Hitman’s Approach to Ethics: Temptations and Challenges and Topic Overview - Ethical Engineering for International Development and Environmental Sustainability - page 6

￿ The origin of the topic in the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC)
Supplemental Ways of Improving International Stability (SWIIS) Technical
Committee, now Technology, Culture and International Stability (TECIS 9.5),
which has facilitated the discussion of the issues and refi nement of the arguments
presented in the topic over a number of years.
￿ The parallel discussions taking place in Science for Global Responsibility (SGR),
with most of the authors actively involved in either SGR or TECIS 9.5 and some,
like Marion and Alan, involved in both.
￿ The detailed reference list at the end of each chapter and the bibliography of
additional reading at the end of the topic.

The main benefi ts of reading the topic are the following:

￿ An increased understanding of what is meant by ethical engineering and its
practical implications.
￿ The consequences of ethical and unethical behaviour for sustainable develop-
ment and international stability.

￿ Increased understanding of some of the wider implications of the decisions made

by engineers in their working lives and the types of ethics-related questions to
ask before making these decisions.

4 Part I: Introduction

This part contains two chapters. Chapter 1 is this overview chapter, and Chap. 2 is
'Ethical Engineering: Defi nitions, Theories and Techniques' by Marion Hersh,
Scotland. This chapter on engineering ethics provides the background and supporting
framework to the topic through presenting a number of defi nitions, theories of ethics
and techniques and approaches for applying them in practice. After the introduction,
the chapter is divided into three main sections. Section 2 considers different theories
of ethics, including rule-based approaches such as the professional codes of engi-
neering societies. These theories are organised according to a classifi cation based
on the two categories: (1) monist/pluralist and (2) process based, outcome based
and process and outcome based. This section also includes a table of a number of
theories of ethics, their properties and some references.
Section 3 presents a number of methods, approaches and techniques for applying
ethical principles in practice. These include the ethical grid (Seedhouse 1988 ),
which was originally developed to support ethical reasoning and decision making
by health workers, an approach called perspectives, principles and paradigms (Anon
undated ) and the formation of a complete picture through the consideration of dif-
ferent ethical theories (Hersh 2003 ). Approaches to understanding individual values
based on the Johari window (Brockbank and McGill 1999 ) and to achieving a
change of ethos in organisations using multi-loop action learning (Hersh 2006 ;
Nielson 1996 ) are also presented.
Section 4 considers ethical issues associated with processes and outcomes and