Seduction of Ethics: Transforming the Social Sciences

392 Pages·2011·5.348 MB·English

by  Will C. van den Hoonaard

THE SEDUCTION OF ETHICS:
TRANSFORMING THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
The Seduction of Ethics is an ethnographic work about relationships
between researchers and research-ethics commi(cid:308) ees. In this book, Will C.
van den Hoonaard looks at formal research-ethics codes and how
countless administrators, researchers, scholars, and policy makers are
lured into their ambit. In Canada alone, ethics review is a $35 million
‘industry.’
What drives this seduction is not only a moral panic and a view
of people as vulnerable and needing protection, but also the public’s
desire for institutional accountability. The result is a systematic change
in the way social researchers conduct their work. Students increasingly
rely on ethics commi(cid:308) ees for advice about social research methods, and
when such advice issues from commi(cid:308) ees who have no expertise or
knowledge of those methods, social research becomes divorced from
its traditions. Social sciences disciplines begin to resemble one another
and the richness of conventional social research is lost as researchers
try to fi t their approach to the technical demands of ethics codes. These
inevitable changes are leading to a homogenization and pauperization
of social research.
The Seduction of Ethics off ers an analysis of the moral cosmology and
practices of ethics commi(cid:308) ees in regard to research and researchers.
Using participant observation, records, interviews, and the scholarly
literature on the topic, the book explores the research-ethics review pro-
cess itself. Van den Hoonaard reveals an idiosyncratic and inconsistent
world, where researchers employ particular strategies of avoidance or
partial or full compliance as they seek approval from ethics commit-
tees. In research-ethics commi(cid:308) ees, he argues, administrative routines
o(cid:286) en overwhelm thinking about substantive ethical issues.
will c. van den hoonaard is a professor emeritus in the Department of
Sociology at the University of New Brunswick.
OTHER PUBLICATIONS BY THE AUTHOR
The Equality of Women and Men: The Experience of the Bahá’í Community
of Canada (with D.K. van den Hoonaard) (2006)
The Ethics Trapeze (special issue of Journal of Academic Ethics) (2006)
Walking the Tightrope: Ethical Issues for Qualitative Researchers (editor) (2002)
Working with Sensitizing Concepts: Analytical Field Research (1997)
The Origins of the Bahá’í Community of Canada, 1898 –1948 (1996)
Reluctant Pioneers: Constraints and Opportunities in an Icelandic Fishing
Community (1992)
Silent Ethnicity: The Dutch of New Brunswick (1991)
WILL C. VAN DEN HOONAARD
The Seduction of Ethics
Transforming the Social Sciences
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buff alo London
© University of Toronto Press Incorporated 2011
 Toronto Buff alo London
 www.utppublishing.com
 Printed in Canada
ISBN 978-1-4426-4268-3 (cloth)
ISBN 978-1-4426-1150-4 (paper)
Printed on acid-free, 100% post-consumer recycled paper with vegetable-
based inks.
_________________________________________________________________
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
van den Hoonaard, Will C. (Willy Carl), 1942–
The seduction of ethics : transforming the social sciences /
Will C. van den Hoonaard.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4426-4268-3 (bound). ISBN 978-1-4426-1150-4 (pbk.)
1.Social sciences – Research – Moral and ethical aspects. 2. Social sciences
and ethics. I. Title.
H62.V348 2011  174'.93  C2011-901392-4
_________________________________________________________________
This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Humanities
and Social Sciences Federation of Canada, using funds provided by the
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the fi nancial assistance to its
publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario
Arts Council.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the fi nancial support for its
publishing activities of the Government of Canada through the Canada
Book Fund.
Our civil competencies are resources to warm the world.
–Erving Goff man
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Contents
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xiii
1 Introduction 3
Premise of The Seduction of Ethics 4
Ignorance and Scholarship 9
The Scholarship on the Metabolism of Research-Ethics Review 13
Conceptual Scheme 15
Research Methods 18
Outline of The Seduction of Ethics 18
2 An Archeology of Research-Ethics Review 20
Outside the Ethics Regime: What Drives the System of Ethics
Review? 21
Inside the System: Institutionalization of Research-Ethics Review 26
3 The Criticisms of Research-Ethics Review 39
Does the Ethics Regime Off er an Inappropriate Model for Social
Science Research? 40
Is Research Ethics Strangling Legitimate Research? 41
Does Ethics Review Curtail Academic Freedom? 43
Are Ethics Commi(cid:308) ees Bureaucracies? 45
Does Ethics Review Develop and Maintain the Hegemony of Ethics
Commi(cid:308) ees? 48
viii Contents
A(cid:308) empts to Negotiate the Two Worlds and Transcend the
Criticisms: The Perspectives of Ethics Commi(cid:308) ees 50
4  What Is the Normative Ethics Framework for Social
Researchers? 55
The ‘Subject’ in International and National Research-Ethics
Codes 56
Bursting the Contemporary Ethics Bubble: Three Case Studies 63
5 Structure and Composition of Research-Ethics Commi(cid:308) ees 74
Ethics Commi(cid:308) ees as Part of the University 74
Membership 77
Jurisdictional Power and Independence 89
Workload 90
6 The Moral Cosmology of the Ethics-Review World 97
About Themselves 97
About Researchers 103
About Research Participants 110
7  Procedural Routines: The Application Form and the Consent
Form 122
The Application Form 123
The Consent Form 131
8 The Meeting: Making Agendas and Decisions 144
A(cid:308) endance and Membership 146
The Career of the Agenda 150
Paradigms and Perspectives that Shape the Conversation
about Ethics 162
Making Decisions without Principles 167
9  An Idiosyncratic and Inconsistent World: Communications
between REBs and Researchers 176
Interpretation as the Basis of Idiosyncrasies and Inconsistencies 178
Communications to Researchers/Language of (Dis)approval 180
Content 186
Language 190
REB Communications inside the Larger Context of the Ethics
Regime 196
Contents ix
10  The Underlife of Research-Ethics Review: Preparing an
Application 199
 The ‘Hurt Perspective’ 199
 The Researcher’s Moral Career 203
 Warming up (or Not) to Submi(cid:308) ing the Proposal 208
 Preparing for the ‘News’ 221
11 Secondary Adjustments by Researchers 223
 Reactions by Researchers to Ethics Reviews 223
 Applying Secondary Adjustments 227
 The Social Situation of Students in the Ethics-Review
Process 231
12 The Beleaguered Methods 236
 General Considerations about Redirecting Research 236
 The Declining Use of Particular Methods 238
13 On Theory, Topics, and Favoured Methods 258
 Shaping Theoretical Orientations 258
 Changing Topics of Research 261
 The Rise of Other, Favoured Methods 266
14 Macro-Structural Linkages 274
  Vertical Ethics from the Perspective of Research-Ethics
 Commi(cid:308) ees 274
 Vertical Ethics from the Perspective of Researchers 277
 The Intermeshing of both Systems of Vertical Ethics 281
 Ideological and Practical Linkages 282
15  Will the Social Sciences Wither Away or Is There
an Alternative? 286
 Puncturing the Gloom 289
Appendix A: Methodology 293
Appendix B: Applications Considered Annually by Selected Research Ethics
Boards in Canada 303
Appendix C: Samples of Communications from Ethics Commi(cid:308) ees to
Researchers 305