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Case examples of ethical issues in technical communication
Several of the Web resources for this chapter contain links to ethics case studies and examples. |
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PCBs
- PCB Pollution Suits Have Day in Court in Alabama
New York Times article on the Monsanto pollution of Anniston, Alabama. You may have to register for free to be able to access the New York Times, but if you use the exact link above, there should be no charge to access the article.
- The Chemical Industry Archives: A Project of the Environmental Working Group
The cover story on the first page changes from time to time. Look for an article titled "Anniston, Alabama: Monsanto & Pollution, Contamination, Betrayal." Analyze this site. Does it have an axe to grind? Can you detect a bias in its archives?
- The Chemical Industry Archives: Dirty Secrets
The "Dirty Secrets" link has a treasure trove of media articles on the Anniston investigation, but more importantly, PDFs of CONFIDENTIAL internal Monsanto technical documents and memos are archived at this site, memos that have only become public because of the court case. Print and read these documents carefully. What is hidden between the lines? What ethical lines did these writers cross, if any? What would you do in the same position as those writers? What would you do if your internal technical memos were suddenly public and part of a legal proceeding?
Anthrax
- Anthrax Missteps Offer Guide to Fight Next Bioterror Battle
New York Times article by Lawrence K. Altman and Gina Kolata that follows the unfolding of a bioterror response team in Washington, DC. Despite the extraordinary circumstances of January 2002, this story is more about effective and responsible technical communication than biochemistry. Public health officials had to respond quickly to the anthrax outbreak and decide how much to tell the public at the same time. Very likely the officials quoted in this article knew that first Sunday of the press conference announcing a serious inhalation anthrax case in D.C. that cross-contamination was more than a likely factor. Yet that single fact, that other pieces of mail from the Postal Center were being delivered with anthrax powder on them, was not discussed until 2 WEEKS and several mysterious deaths later. What is the best ethical position to take when presented with this type of case? Does the possibility of panic negate the need for timely release of information?
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Public Health Emergency Preparedness and Response. FAQs on Anthrax and Smallpox, What to Do in an Emergency, and a biological, chemical, and radiological listing of agents and threats. Less accessible to the layperson than many media sites, the CDC is the site of record for public health professionals and public relations people, providing both policy and guidance. How does what you see here appear to be a clarification and response to the criticism in the New York Times article above?
Challenger Disaster
- The Rhetoric of the Challenger Disaster: A Case Study for Technical and Professional Communication
You may need to fill out the free registration to enter and view the resources at the Association for Teachers of Technical Writing Website. The cluster of links at the
URL above looks at many different sides of the complex social and technical interactions during the Challenger disaster.
Collaboration
- Legal Issues in Evaluating Teams
New York Times article on the legal challenges made to "stack ordering" of company workgroup teams. It discusses suits filed against Microsoft, Ford, and Conoco, saying the workgroup rating system favors white males over other groups of employees.
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Real-word issues in ethical communication
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Visit the two Web sites below, both of which contain graphical representations of data. Both of these Web pages come from the Web site of Edward Tufte, the renowned information-design expert. Tufte critiques both graphics (and also presents redesigns of the graphic depicting cancer survival rates), but his critiques do not specifically address the ethical dimensions of the graphics. Using what you’ve learned from class discussions and the textbook, assess the graphics in terms of their ethics. What ethical issues are raised by the use of these graphics, and how well (or not so well) are the graphics designed to handle these issues? How is information distorted, or not distorted? Are there any elements of the graphics that are used unethically? What are the ethical issues involved with Tufte’s redesigns of the graphic depicting cancer survival rates, particularly the PowerPoint graphics? Note that the very topics of both graphics raise ethical considerations on their own, a fact you should address in your critique.
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Graphics
The following exercise will help you to consider the use of graphics within an ethical context: |
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Visit the two Web sites below, both of which contain graphical representations of data. Both of these Web pages come from the Web site of Edward Tufte, the renowned information-design expert. Tufte critiques both graphics (and also presents redesigns of the graphic depicting cancer survival rates), but his critiques do not specifically address the ethical dimensions of the graphics. Using what you’ve learned from class discussions and the textbook, assess the graphics in terms of their ethics. What ethical issues are raised by the use of these graphics, and how well (or not so well) are the graphics designed to handle these issues? How is information distorted, or not distorted? Are there any elements of the graphics that are used unethically? What are the ethical issues involved with Tufte’s redesigns of the graphic depicting cancer survival rates, particularly the PowerPoint graphics? Note that the very topics of both graphics raise ethical considerations on their own, a fact you should address in your critique.
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