ETHICS IN THE SOCIAL KNOWLEDGE
GENERAL ISSUES AND THE POST-SOVIET EXPERIENCE

Dr. Alexander Rubtsov

The social knowledge is highly sensitive to the ethical issues. But at the same time, the ethical aspects are incorporated into it in a far more complicated and less obvious way as compared with the field of the natural sciences.

In the latter ethics is related to the procedures of obtaining and using the result but not to its content. In other words, the result itself can't be moral or immoral, but its achievement can be based on the intolerable methods and the way it is applied could be in a deep contradiction with the existing moral and even legal norms.

In principle, one can think of the damage brought in already in the course of obtaining the social knowledge (for example, in the deep interviews). Nevertheless, such issues are of a much lesser scale and significance here than in the natural science's technologies. At least it is hard to imagine that anything could lead to the super-dramatic or catastrophic cases as it happens in the natural science.

One can assume that in the social knowledge the emphasis has in some way shifted in the direction of the content, the result its application. The intellectual product itself can be recognized as immoral. (And it does not matter to what extend this recognition is legal, just, how it is worked out, etc.) Moreover, in the humanities and the social knowledge the content of the result could become the subject of ethical investigation not only because, for instance, it limits somebody's rights but also because the conclusion has been based on the scandalous violation of the norms of the scientific ethics, for example, under the pressure of the obvious or hidden political engagement.

Something similar is possible in the natural sciences, for example, when the result is adjusted to some ideological or paradigmatic outline. In this sense there is no opposition between the two fields. But one might speak about the distribution of the emphasis, the drift of the focal point of the ethical problem in the natural science and social knowledge.

As to the aspects related to the utilization of the scientific results, to my mind, the ethical issue in the social knowledge is much closer linked to the producer of the intellectual result, to its author. The author of a certain, even published, discovery in the field of the natural science far not always (or even very rarely) can have an influence on its utilization, for instance, in the sphere of arms. While in the social knowledge an author at least has the possibility to discredit - and often rather effectively! - incorrect usage of his result. Moreover, quite often the ethical problems arise precisely in those cases where the author himself is in charge of the result's utilization (ideological, political, socio-psychological, intellectual, etc.).

Thus one might speak of a rather specific, to a large extent not standard set of ethical issues in the social knowledge.

2.

Particularly complex moral and ethical problems arise in the sphere of the humanities and the social knowledge in the context of the regimes with strong and developed ideological control. The soviet and post-soviet social science presents that quite vividly.

At first sight, the political engagement and ideological determination of the social science here were obvious and almost unconditional.

But at the same time the ethical evaluation and self-evaluation were not that simple, rather they were ambivalent. (I am speaking about the evaluation of the sphere of the social knowledge as a whole rather than as its personified variants.) There was to a large extent constructive research, intellectual work taking place in the limits acceptable for the regime. This work allowed in some way to ease the regime itself and well as the conditions of existence inside it. Moreover, this work often determined the positive trends for the regime's evolution, being a necessary if not the main factor of such evolution.

Along with what has been said, the representatives of the academic community could have had a rather high social reputation in that sphere, since it was presupposed that the ideological wrapping was solely a forced one. There remained a strong believe in the society and the social science that in order to overcome if not all at least the most keen ethical collisions it would be enough to get free from, as though, purely external politico-ideological pressure.

This myth has almost materialized in the perestroyka times. An illusion of the social science's Renaissance arose - it seemed that the hints and half-truth have been replaced by the Truth itself. The reputations were created instantly and often despite the lack of any significant background.

It was a very interesting and, perhaps, very rare state of the social consciousness. The effect turned out to be staggering: a few not very good in sports historians defeated the power supplied with well armed units. (Naturally, this is a hyperbole, but not too distant from the reality.)

Nevertheless, later, freedom - not limited and to a large extent unexpected - in a short time gave a birth to a new and in general even more keen ethical collision in the sphere of the social knowledge and its functioning in the society.

First of all it is related to a much more open and, what is important, not at all symbolic participation of the social knowledge in the actual political life. And it should be added, the political life very diverse in terms of ideas. If before and during perestroyka times the social science was regarded as an opposition to the ideological and engaged pseudo- and anti-science now there is an impression of a total political engagement. And this impression is intensified by a complete disorder in valuations and interpretations of what is happening.

Certain - far not flattering - evaluations of the social science have been spreading over the whole sphere. The profession itself has been discredited to a large extent. As an example the election campaign sociology could be named in which the results of the polls are often used directly as an instrument of the political propaganda, advertisement and anti-advertisement.

This effect naturally arises when the percentage of the careless actions reaches a certain critical point while a widely valued procedures of separating the correct and incorrect results are practically absent. The public listens to the sociologists, politologists, political commentators and experts but does not trust them. Or trusts them all at once, speaking more precisely, one after the other. And that creates serious neuroses and frustrations in the public consciousness.

There is nothing surprising about such attitude towards the sphere of the social knowledge. The politologists and sociologists are bought up according to the same outline as the newspapers, TV channels, etc.

In principle, this state of affairs is not a hopeless one in ethical terms. Such market of the social science gives a chance to choose not only to the consumers but also to those who offer services. Thus in principle there is a possibility to trade knowledge without giving up (or almost without giving up) convictions and the correctness of the scientific work. Nevertheless, such sort of possibilities and realities are remaining practically outside the sphere of the public opinion. The general feeling concerning the profession's political engagement remains and that significantly reduces its social status and reputation.

This is dangerous not only for the profession itself, but for the society as a whole in which a stable feeling of uncertainty and disorientation is forming. This state of affairs has a strong negative effect on the social atmosphere and the general socio-political climate.

3.

The loss of reputation by the sphere of the social knowledge as a whole is obviously linked to the violation of norms and procedures, which are supposed to protect the reputation inside the scientific community itself. In fact, the elementary guild's laws have been lost, the maintenance of which is the condition of ones belonging to the guild, while their violation - leads to the fatal sanctions, up to radical discreditation and exclusion from the community. If something unlawful remains unpunished inside the community itself, it means that outside it forms a stable view that in this community almost everything is allowed. It is more so when the competing schools and leaders systematically and publicly proclaim the accusations in carelessness addressed to their competitors, political opponents, etc.

The image of the obligatory academic non-biasness is to a large extent lost. Academic science becomes involved in the politically engaged activity, the conception which represents the issues that the academic community has the right to work on and those that are prohibited to it by its very academic status vanishes. And it is more than enough if this fact remains unpunished even in relation to some of its representatives.

Moreover, there is no more such body which is supposed to look after and be in charge of the guild's principles and the norms of the professional activity. The notions like academic freedom and nonbiase are undermined by the scientific community itself.

This is determined by a set of factors - from the economy of science to the administrative outlines, algorithms of constructing the academic career, etc. Quite often the set of these factors begins to work in the regime of “the self-swinging contour”. In order to solve purely utilitarian problems the academic community gives up the principles, as a result it loses reputation and social status even more - and therefore the privileges.

Correspondingly, the solution of this collision can be presented first of all in the direction of recreation of the system of the guild's norms and those professional bodies which ensure the maintenance of these norms. The question is about the new formation, new assembling and institutionalization of the scientific community. Moreover, the assembling which would be realized on the social base and be “parallel” to the existing organizational structures.

Naturally, such sort of associations, committees, clubs, etc. will have to solve the problem of gaining the recognition and earning reputation on their own. And such a task is not a simple one.

At the same time the situation is not hopeless if it would be possible to relate the claims and the actual possibilities to each other. Obviously, from the very start it is problematic to speak about some sort of high internal professional supervision and arbitration. The harder the task, the higher the level of claims - the more contradictory are the cases and the less obvious are their solutions. Nevertheless, there is a rather wide range of the phenomena in the sphere of the social knowledge and its functioning in politics and social life which are evidently non-correct - one has no doubts concerning ethical violation in these cases.

The body which could at least trace, record and publish the most odious facts of this kind hardly will cause any serious debates on its status. In other words, it is not a high arbitration that is needed but rather some sort of professional ethical hygiene. For the negative processes to develop in the opposite direction it is more important to achieve perhaps small but actual changes.