Social responsibility
[1] An organization can demonstrate social responsibility in several ways, for instance, by donating, encouraging volunteerism, using ethical hiring procedures, and making changes that benefit the environment.
"[6]: I.2 He saw ethics and politics as mutually-reinforcing: a citizen develops the virtues in large part so that they can contribute to making the polis an excellent and stable one.
[15] Scientists and engineers have a collective responsibility to examine the values embedded in the research problems they choose and the ethics of how they share their findings with the public.
[16][editorializing] Committees of scientists and engineers are often involved in planning governmental and corporate research programs, including those devoted to the development of military technologies and weaponry.
[19] Scientists and engineers, individually and collectively, have a special and greater responsibility than average citizens with respect to the generation and use of scientific knowledge.
Some argue that because of the complexity of social responsibility in research, scientists and engineers should not be blamed for all the evils created by new scientific knowledge and technological innovations.
[14] First, there is fragmentation and diffusion of responsibility: Because of the intellectual and physical division of labor, the resulting fragmentation of knowledge, the high degree of specialization, and the complex and hierarchical decision-making process within corporations and government research laboratories, it is exceedingly difficult for individual scientists and engineers to control the applications of their innovations.
Similarly, most of the research funded by governments is mission-oriented, such as protecting the environment, developing new drugs, or designing more lethal weapons.
"[22] Another point of view is that responsibility falls on those who provide the funding for the research and technological developments (in most cases corporations and government agencies).
Quasi-legal instruments, or soft law, has received some normative status in relation to private and public corporations in the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights developed by the UNESCO International Bioethics Committee particularly in relation to child and maternal welfare.
[clarification needed][24]: 7 The International Organization for Standardization will "encourage voluntary commitment to social responsibility and will lead to common guidance on concepts, definitions and methods of evaluation.
