Thinking about the digital economy

Some years ago when I was spending a morning in a somewhat obscure library in London looking for materials relevant to the development of a British trade union in the 19th century, I came across a sermon delivered shortly after 1800 in a London church. The clergyman in question was most exercised by what we would now call the impact of new technology. He feared that humanity’s ability to perform ‘miracles’, which should be the sole preserve of God, would create a materialistic society in which a very small number of people would reap the rewards of science and engineering, while the majority would become redundant and face destitution.

I was reminded of this recently when the US company Boston Dynamics, a spin-off from MIT, unveiled a humanoid robot that could jump up and down on various obstacles and, finally, do a back somersault. You can see the whole spectacle here. This display quickly led to a whole tsunami of online anguish about how we are all doomed. If a robot could successfully mimic an athlete, then humans might as well all just go home and wait to be put out of our misery by the new artificial master race. You get the idea.

As for me, I thought the Boston Dynamics machine was pretty smart engineering, but to be honest I was less captivated by it than by another recent item of news: a group of engineering researchers helped by an economist were able to design a robot which delivered a lecture to economics students and successfully answered questions from them at the end. Apparently the robot answered questions with stuff like ‘Well, this is a hotly contested point, but I tend myself to support the view that…’

Today, lots of people are talking about the digital economy and what it may involve and what it may do to us. The science and engineering of it all is of course important, but it may be as important for us to come to grips with what it all means: how it affects our understanding of humanity and human purpose. This isn’t a debate about automation; that’s a debate we’ve been having for 250 years, and to be honest there aren’t many new things to say. It’s a debate about who we are, and how we will harness human ingenuity, and how we can ensure that we evolve successfully to engage that ingenuity with the new means at our disposal.

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Cruel principles?

Some readers commenting on my last post drew attention to the appalling news just in from Ireland, of the death of a woman in a Galway hospital, where she had been taken as she was experiencing a miscarriage. Medical staff, apparently, were unwilling to terminate her pregnancy even though the foetus was inevitably dying and the delay in forcing the delivery was placing the mother in jeopardy; in the event both mother and baby died. According to the report in the Irish Times, the patient, Ms Savita Halappanavar, was told that no termination could take place while there was still a foetal heartbeat because ‘this is a Catholic country’.

I have never believed that abortion is simply a human rights issue; it seems to me to be far more complex. But nonetheless what appears to have happened here is outrageous and horrible. As far as I know we have not heard yet from the hospital, so we don’t know for sure what the medical staff believed they were doing; nor have they confirmed that Ms Halappanavar was told what I have quoted above. But if it is all true, then so-called ‘pro life’ principles, which in any case seem often to have a curiously limited view of ‘life’ and of quality of life and which may be more about opposition to social liberalisation, are being conscripted into a campaign that in cases such as this just seems cruel.

One must absolutely accept that doctors and nurses sometimes have horrifyingly difficult decisions to take in extreme medical cases. But pro-life groups, and those who  allow themselves to be bullied by such groups into enacting or enforcing extreme laws, need to be reminded that life is complex, not simple, and that to elevate abstract principles above people is to abandon the values that make us civilised. It is time to ensure that whatever may have happened in Galway cannot happen again.

On the record?

A few years ago, when I was President of Dublin City University, I took part in what was a somewhat difficult meeting on a sensitive topic. Those present held, and expressed, a variety of what one might call robust views. A few days later I received, from one of the participants, what was described as a note of the meeting. Except that this wasn’t what I would recognise as a note; it was clearly a full transcript. Not only did it contain, fully verbatim, what everyone had said, it even included, precisely, everyone’s linguistic infelicities and ramblings. It seemed to me that the only way this transcript could have been assembled (not least because the person who sent it to me had not during the meeting visibly written down anything other than very occasional notes) was if the meeting had been secretly recorded. I asked a question, and received a strong response along the lines that no recording had been taken. I didn’t believe that for a moment, but decided not to pursue it, though I also felt that if a recording had been taken it was completely unacceptable.

Of course I am not alone in this experience. Last week Scotland’s Herald newspaper reported an incident in which a meeting addressed by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, Michael Russell MSP, was secretly recorded by one of those taking part. The recording was subsequently distributed to a select group of people who had not been present. The Cabinet Secretary took exception to this, and has asked the person who took the recording to consider his position. I have to say I fully sympathise with the Cabinet Secretary.

Of course today’s technology makes taking such recordings very easy indeed. I am often at meetings in which those present have their mobile phones lying on the table in front of them, and setting these to record is very simple, and more or less impossible for anyone else to detect. I will hazard a guess that the incident above is not the only time I have been recorded without my knowledge.

But is it acceptable? I might say, for the avoidance of doubt, that nobody has ever been recorded by me without being advised and asked first. I would then add that I regard making a secret recording to be ethically totally unacceptable, except possibly at a public and open meeting. But can it be stopped or controlled? Or do we have to accept that the available technology is dictating acceptable practice? And in that context, is it acceptable for students, without first seeking permission, to record lectures or classes? And if the answer is no,  does that in any way contradict a desire for openness and transparency?

The ethical dimension

Just after I stepped down from my post as President of Dublin City University, I received an email from someone who described himself as ‘an interested and concerned member of the public’. The email in question was by no means short, but I can summarise the burden of it as follows.  His message to me was that I had failed to observe high ethical standards as a university head. Mind you, he added that this did not make me unique; he wrote:

‘Universities seem to be unable or unwilling these days to provide a clear moral as well as an intellectual compass. Morality matters not a bit to them, unless that is something you measure in money. You were just following the herd, but I really wish you had been better than that.’

So what had disappointed my correspondent? Two things, mainly. First, that I had not taken a personal stand in support of the ‘pro-life’ agenda, and that I had allowed the university to engage in some forms of research that did not value the human person sufficiently, from conception to the grave. Secondly, that I had not challenged the rampant materialism of society, and more particularly the growing materialism of the student body.

In fact universities are not as unconcerned with ethics as my correspondent suggested. Not only has ethics become a major academic area of study and research, but universities are also increasingly concerned with policies and structures that assess their conduct from an ethical point of view; research ethics committees being a particularly important example. I may also have been just a tad hurt that he did not apparently regard the establishment of DCU’s Institute for Ethics during my tenure as important.

But then again, we tend to regard ethics as very complex territory in which a difficult balance may have to be struck. My correspondent on the other hand appeared to regard it as the determined defence of a stronghold under attack from barbarians. But am I right to dismiss him so easily? Maybe I don’t altogether share his frame of reference, but should I not take seriously the contention that universities should in their actions uphold the highest standards of ethical behaviour, and expect to see this reflected in the actions of their members?

These are difficult questions, and universities need to be seen to be engaging with them. I do not believe that we should see ourselves as having a role in preaching to students about complex private morality issues, but we should take seriously the expectation that we will behave with integrity and responsibility. That should be our moral compass. We’re probably not always good at following it.

When institutional ethos conflicts with public policy

The University of Wales is currently attracting some criticism over its links with certain colleges that hold to what has been described as a ‘fundamentalist Christian ethos’. In particular, some of the institutions concerned (often operating outside the UK) adhere to the view that homosexuality is morally wrong. The University of Wales validates their degree programmes, and in that sense endorses the content and standards of what is taught.

It has now been reported that some senior academics of the University of Wales plan to make a formal complaint to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, based on their view that the validation of these colleges runs counter to the Equality Act 2010, which requires public bodies to observe the requirement of non-discrimination in relation to a number of categories, one of which is sexual orientation.

If this complaint goes ahead it will address something that is more widespread than just overseas-based fundamentalist Christian colleges. There are numerous indigenous educational institutions that are based on particular religious or other cultural principles, and some of these could be seen as problematic. For example, the Roman Catholic Church and Islam also regard homosexuality as morally wrong, and the Roman Catholic church also reserves its ordained ministry for men only. This ethos is no doubt visible in at least some of the educational establishments that are maintained by them, which in turn either are public bodies or are institutionally linked to them.

There is in this a clash between the ethos of the state as set out in legislation and public policy, and the ethos of these and other institutions. How should the state deal with this? Is it a matter of freedom of speech and conscience that should be protected, or where at least an expression of something that deviates from public policy should be tolerated in the interests of cultural diversity? Or should the principles of equality to which the state is committed trump that? If that is so, it will affect more than just the validation arrangements of the University of Wales.

Often these matters are allowed to be obscured in creative ambiguity, whereby respect for inherited cultural and religious principles gives some leeway to the maintenance of an ethos that might otherwise be suspect. On the other hand, it is difficult to see what the point is of non-0discroimination principles that do not appear to apply to some of the bodies most inclined not to observe them. This is particularly significant in educational institutions, which will influence future generations.

It seems to me to be right to allow people to hold and express their religious beliefs; but that this must stop short of funding the teaching of those beliefs where they conflict with principles of equality and justice. Christians have often been at the heart of campaigns to protect and advance human rights, in line with the key messages of the New Testament. That is still the dominant ethos of Christianity. It should not be undermined by state tolerance of discriminatory principles held by some groups within it.

Protecting an educational ethos?

In 1985 in Ireland a female schoolteacher was dismissed by the secondary school employing her when she became pregnant. She challenged the lawfulness of the dismissal, and the case was heard in the Employment Appeals Tribunal, and on appeal in the Circuit Court and, finally, the High Court. The teacher’s case was that she had been dismissed on grounds of pregnancy, a ground for dismissal expressly prohibited under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977. The school in question was a Catholic convent school, and it argued in its defence that she had not been dismissed because she was pregnant, but because her pregnancy was a visible rejection by her of the ethos of the school, as she was living with a man to whom she was not married. The school won its case at all stages, with the various tribunal members and judges stating that it was entitled to protect its particular ethos, and that the teacher had demonstrated visibly that she was rejecting it. In fact in an extraordinary aside the Circuit Court judge hearing the case pointed out in his judgement that ‘in other places women are being condemned to death for this sort of offence’ (Flynn v. Power and Sisters of the Holy Faith).

So is all this kind of thing different today? Well, last month a Roman Catholic institution in Philadelphia, Chestnut Hill College, fired one of its lecturers, a priest, after the local diocese received a complaint about the priest because he was gay. It is in fact a complex case, because when they discovered that he was gay they also discovered that he was not a Roman Catholic priest, but rather a priest of the Old Catholic church (which split from Rome in the 19th century and is now aligned with the Anglican church). The college has defended its actions by pointing out that same-sex partnerships are ‘contrary to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church’.

In these islands there are many denominational schools and institutions, and these cases raise the question of whether they should be allowed to protect their ethos even when this means disciplining or dismissing staff whose actions violate the denomination’s moral code but are protected by law. It is unlawful to fire someone because of their sexual orientation: but should there be an exception to this where the employer maintains religious objections to homosexuality? This may become even more significant when colleges with a denominational ethos are the only providers of certain kinds of programmes.

I am not arguing the case against religious institutions (though I think the near-monopoly of denominational education at primary level needs to be revisited urgently) – indeed DCU has three affiliated denominational colleges of which I was always very proud. But I do not believe that it should be lawful to protect an ethos where elements of that ethos actually violate the law of the land. It is, I think, to maintain a moral perspective opposing certain types of sexual conduct, but where such conduct is protected by law, the law cannot (or should not) be trumped by private morality.

Observing the political classes: the Berlusconi circus

One typical type of fall-out from economic crisis is a steep drop in respect for politicians. If conditions become really bad, most voters become really negative about the politicians who presided over the period that got them there. Sometimes that is both understandable and justified, sometimes it’s just understandable. These moments are genuinely risky for political and social stability, and it becomes vital for politicians to display skill and integrity.

Right now we are at such a moment. Irish politicians – those that have been in government – have had some difficulty finding the right note for the times they are in, as was the case also with the last British government under Gordon Brown. But whatever else we might say about Brown or Brian Cowen (who is rapidly disappearing from everyone’s consciousness), they have not been accused of personal wrongdoing or lapses in professional integrity (as distinct from serious lapses of judgement).

The same can manifestly not be said of Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi. Throughout most of his career as a political leader he has been dogged by scandal and controversy, covering his business activities and interests and his personal life. From the distance of these islands it is sometimes easy to laugh at his antics and to marvel at how his political career can have survived them to date. But really, it’s not a laughing matter for a European politician and the leader of one of the large countries of the EU to be seen in this way, as his collapsing credibility has some effect on the integrity of European politics more generally.

Now a judge in Milan has ordered Berlusconi to stand trial in April for paying for sex with an under-age woman, amidst rumours that this conduct, if found to be true, might resemble other similar, additional, allegations.

In the interests of European political integrity, it is time for Italy to remove this politician from office, and to do so fast. It is no longer funny, if it ever was.

Searching for higher standards of ethics: a real quest, or a wild goose chase?

In 1972 I completed my secondary schooling in Germany. As some readers may know, the final German school examination is the Abitur, and this has a written and an oral component. For the oral Abitur (at least in those days), students could be tested in a small selection of subjects in which they had either excelled during their studies and written exams, or in which their status might be doubtful. I was orally examined in Physics and Philosophy. In the Philosophy section, the examiners (and there were 25 of them in the room) focused on ethics, and I believe I did rather well.

Two years later I was in another exam. This time I had just completed a training programme as a German banker, and this too ended with a written and an oral examination. In the oral exam (and again there were over 20 examiners, all of them established bankers) I was asked this and that: about letters of credit, principles of monetary policy, central banking controls – and then, perhaps as an afterthought, the chair of the panel asked me what I thought about the ethics of the banking sector. Oh good, I thought, I can pick up where I left off two years ago, and I launched into a quick oral treatise on Aristotle right up to Habermas. But I had not been talking for more than 45 seconds when I was interrupted by the chair with this: ‘I was not intending you to talk about philosophy, but rather I wanted you to say something practical’. Well, I thought I was about to say a few very practical things, but I sensed the mood, smiled politely and just stopped. I passed my exam with flying colours, but my report noted in passing that ‘he has a possible tendency to theorise’, not meant as a compliment, I think.

Exactly ten years later, in 1984, I was a lecturer in the School of Business Studies in Trinity College Dublin. My then Head of Department, Professor Charles McCarthy, was keen to explore whether we might establish a senior post in business ethics, and called a meeting of some staff of the School and a small number of prominent Irish businessmen (and they were just men). The consensus offered by the businessmen was that (as one of them actually said) ‘ethics has no relevance for business’. I avoided my little lecture on Aristotle and Habermas.

A quarter century on again, and we have come some distance from those perspectives. Many financial and business scandals later, and with some offenders against codes of ethics pondering these matters in prison, nobody would seriously argue that ethics and business are unrelated. But despite that, business ethics as a framework for analysing business decisions and practices is not yet very far advanced. In the minds of the general public, it is probably largely about dealing with and preventing serious corruption such as bribery and fraud; some businesspeople may regard it as being about avoiding regulatory problems. But while these are indeed significant, the real issues we need to address are more subtle, and are not easily summarised in a ‘thou-shalt-not’ code. They include an analysis of the philosophy of business, and of corporate social responsibility.

As we face up to the reality of some serious misjudgements, and indeed some serious wrongdoing, in various business and financial circles, we have to see that we don’t solve these problems by throwing a few people in jail while we wait for the next generation to do more or less exactly the same thing. We need to develop a much better understanding of what ethics is really about, why it matters, and what we must do to entrench a code of ethics in both private and public conduct. This is something much more complex than condemning or jailing those whom we once admired but about whom we are now embarrassed. Prison is no more likely to make better people of these guys than it does of any petty criminal.

Universities have a vital role to play here. I cannot help feeling that every undergraduate student, no matter what they are studying, should be doing a module on ethics; and we should have much more sophisticated public discussions on ethical issues, perhaps led by some academic experts. It is time to get practical about ethics.

The onward march of crude stupidity

A friend of mine is of the view that the movement of history is unstoppable and will continue to drive us towards enlightenment and progress. I think that on the whole I share that optimism, and I agree that each generation is likely to experience a life that is at least somewhat better than that of the last one; but then again, maybe that’s a comfortable western liberal speaking: in some parts of the world the march of progress is at best tentative.

In any case, you don’t have to go very far to experience, from time to time, the obstinate durability of backward stupidity and crudity. Just this week we have learnt about some morons working for accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers in Ireland, all males, who apparently passed around an email with photos and names of new female recruits and the suggestion that they should be ranked in terms of their desirability. The email was distributed widely in the firm, and then ‘went viral’ and was circulated outside it as well, leading of course to the inevitability of its finding its way into the media. So not only were these guys wholly inappropriate in their email discussion, they were also just incredibly stupid (though maybe there is a connection between these two aspects).

It is amazing that educated and well paid people should behave in this manner, and apparently not encounter any opposition within the firm where the email was so widely read. PwC will need to do more than just find the culprits (which they are now attempting to do), they must also take a serious look at their corporate culture.

The bottom of the barrel

In the 2008 United States presidential election campaign, and in the aftermath of the selection of Governor Sarah Palin as Republican candidate John McCain’s running mate, one issue that came up repeatedly in relation to Ms Palin’s home state opf Alaska was the so-called ‘Bridge to Nowhere’: a plan to spend $398 million in order to build a bridge linking Gravina Island (with its 50 inhabitants) to the local airport and another island. The project was the pet project of a local Republican Senator, and Governor Palin’s views on it became an election issue.

But in truth this project was nothing much out of the ordinary in the United States; indeed the allocation of funds to support local capital or other projects at the instigation of constituency politicians is bread and butter in US politics, and every Congress decision on the annual budget habitually has lots of what are called ‘earmarks’ attached to it, which are local projects inserted at the insistence of politicians in return for their support for the overall budget. It is a form of blackmail, or bribery, or the purchase of votes – whichever way you want to look at it. It is a venerable tradition in the US, and since the mid-19th century has been called ‘pork barrel politics’. While it is widely found in the US, to nobody’s great credit, there are at least also determined efforts being made to control the practice or bring it to an end. The bipartisan organisation Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) publishes an annual report (known as the Pig Book Summary) listing pork barrel expenditure for the year. This year has been a good year for ‘research’ projects in earmarks: such as nearly $3 million for ‘shrimp aquaculture research’, with the money to be spent in specific states, or nearly $5 million for ‘wood ultilization research’, $2.5 million for ‘potato research’, and so on. In the past, some of the more exotic examples of earmarks have included a large sum to fund research into ‘how students watch television’, and $2 million to construct an ‘ancient Hawaiian canoe’.

However, before we get into a finger-wagging mood on this one, it needs to be said that pork barrel politics is not exactly an unknown phenomenon in Ireland. Indeed it can be argued that, for all its other merits, an electoral system with constituency-based members of parliament often encourages such conduct, as the politicians scramble around to find ways of impressing their voters. And so we get local members of parliament who campaign largely on the basis of local investment issues, and independent candidates who stand as representatives of single capital projects. Or we get people like Jackie Healy-Rae, on whom the government now depends to an extent, and who tends to produce local shopping lists so that his support may be secured. This, it has to be said, is wholly disreputable, and the only responsible answer by the government to Mr Healy-Rae would be to tell him to get lost. I hope, but probably in vain, that this is what will happen.