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TechEthos

New and emerging technologies bring with them new ethical challenges and societal consequences. TechEthos will develop guidance to ensure the highest ethical standards are adopted at the EU and international levels. In this endeavour, Ecsite members play a crucial role in understanding and further developing societal perspectives through a programme of public engagement events, in-depth dialogues, exhibitions and analyses.

TechEthos aims to reinforce the pivotal role of the European Union as an ethics trailblazer in the area of new and emerging technologies. Such technologies bring with them new ethical challenges and societal consequences that need to be addressed. The project will develop guidance to ensure the highest ethical standards at the EU and international levels by:

  • Carrying out a horizon scan of emerging technologies with high socio-economic impacts
  • Identifying and analysing the ethical issues raised by a selection of such technologies
  • Explorating the views and attitudes held by different stakeholders - the research community, industry, the public - towards the ethical implications of those technologies, using various tools such as scenarios and media analysis
  • Developing an ethics framework and identifying what could best support the research community in integrating the ethics dimension into their research 
  • Exploring and compareing the policy, legal and procedural frameworks to assess the possible need for dedicated legislation at the EU-level; and  
  • Developing operational guidelines to ensure “ethics by design” and support the work of the research community, research ethics committees and integrity bodies

To do so, TechEthos will engage with researchers and innovators, research ethics committees (RECs), research integrity (RI) bodies, civil society organisations (CSOs), policy-makers and the public, to while reconcile their needs and concerns. 

Public engagement is key to the project: Ecsite and six of its members will develop tools to capture and develop of societal awareness on new and emerging technologies. Science engagement organisations will engage their publics, including vulnerable groups, in exploratory events and in-depth dialogues, as well as develop light exhibitions and displays on these topics, and explore the media landscape in their countries on the selected technologies. 

European Union flagTechEthos has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under Grant Agreement no. 101006249.

List of project partners

  • Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH (AIT) (Coordinator), Austria
  • Associazione per la Ricerca Industriale (Airi), Italy
  • All European Academies (ALLEA), Netherlands & Germany
  • Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA), France
  • De Montfort University (DMU), UK
  • European Network of Research Ethics Committees Office (EUREC), Germany
  • Trilateral Research (TRI), United Kingdom
  • Technische Universiteit Delft (TUD), Netherlands
  • Universiteit Twente (UT), Netherlands

Attachments

Resources

Material for workshops and exhibitions

In the ever-evolving landscape of new and emerging technologies, it can be easy to lose track of the ethics of it all. "Ethics by design" means bringing ethical and societal values into the design and development of such technologies, from the very beginning of the development process. And the truth is everyone can have a say! Wondering how?

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Topics in science