“If we see ethics as part and parcel of design, of producing and deploying products with genuine value, we can also see studying ethics as something to be integrated with studying AI, computing, and technology, not some separate afterthought to design.” (Boddington, 2023)
Ethics has traditionally been about people, and their good behaviour. By contrast, ‘Ethics by Design’ (EbD) is an organisational concept where ethical considerations are built into new designs right from the beginning.
This allows ethical discussions throughout the process, and enables products, systems and decision-making activities that foreground such considerations – e.g., sustainability, privacy or equality.
With AI and the ongoing issues of privacy, transparency of business practices and data protection, mindful design processes have never been more vital. The right to dignity, equality, privacy, data protection, transparency and trust are principles identified by the European Commission, which they wish to see incorporated into the funded technologies.
When we began our ethics work on SHARESPACE, we followed best practice in ethics by design aiming to achieve the above aims and objectives. We noticed that in the ethics by design literature a checklist style was the most common approach. We initially followed this pattern and created our own SHARESPACE checklist. For example, we identified over 20 categories including deception, privacy, personhood, attachment, reality and human-machine interactions (see Deliverable 1.4 of the SHARESPACE project for the full list). While a checklist style does offer valuable critique for the development of technologies, the excess of categories produces an overwhelming amount of issues that cannot be feasibly addressed within the confines of EU-funded projects (that typically last 3 to 4 years).
Good Enough Ethics (GEE) by contrast is a relational model inspired by Good Enough Parenting. The parenting philosophy, developed by paediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott in the 1950s, prioritises familial relationships rather than parental perfectionism.
GEE works with technologists to draw on their experiences and intuitions. It is not a top-down approach, but one developed dialogically in collaboration. It aims to prioritise the role of relationships in ethical technology development.
Below are the 6 principles of GEE:
Professor Kathleen Richardson launched GEE at the Ars Electronica Festival 2024 in a keynote speech. You can find the full talk down below:
To find out more information about GEE, read our policy document or contact the DMU team (Professor Kathleen Richardson, Dr Kathleen Bryson and Dr Jessica Sutherland).
References:
Boddington, P. (2023). AI Ethics: A Textbook. New York, New York, USA: Springer
