2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

While discussions of engineering ethics often refer to “integrating ethics into engineering,” there is no clear consensus about what constitutes integration or how it is best achieved. This paper describes a systems approach to engineering ethics that situates it in the context of goal-oriented sociotechnical systems that are designed and managed by human beings with diverse experiences and forms of expertise. This approach recognizes the organizational, cultural, and technical contexts that both shape and are shaped by, enable and constrain, ethical awareness and action. It integrates three essential and complementary components of the successful, ethical practice of engineering:
• Sociotechnical systems thinking, which equips students to analyze the contexts in which new technical capability is developed and implemented and where goals/impacts are realized. It also provides a flexible framework for understanding the many different contexts in which engineers work.
• Communication ability, which is essential for articulating individual values, developing shared goals within groups, and synthesizing diverse perspectives into a common understanding that provides the basis for collective and individual action. It encompasses but goes beyond individual capabilities such as writing or speaking to consider group processes and organizations.
• Engineering ethics, as traditionally defined, that is, codes, moral reasoning, and case studies.
The content of two widely-read engineering ethics texts will serve as evidence of the extent to which these three aspects are implicit in engineering ethics.