Prelims

Who's Watching? Surveillance, Big Data and Applied Ethics in the Digital Age

ISBN: 978-1-80382-468-0, eISBN: 978-1-80382-467-3

ISSN: 1529-2096

Publication date: 12 July 2022

Citation

(2022), "Prelims", Walsh, A. and Boucher, S. (Ed.) Who's Watching? Surveillance, Big Data and Applied Ethics in the Digital Age (Research in Ethical Issues in Organizations, Vol. 26), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. i-viii. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-209620220000026010

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2022 Adrian Walsh and Sandy Boucher


Half Title Page

WHO'S WATCHING? SURVEILLANCE, BIG DATA AND APPLIED ETHICS IN THE DIGITAL AGE

Series Page

RESEARCH IN ETHICAL ISSUES IN ORGANIZATIONS

Series Editors: Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris

Recent Volumes:

Volume 8: Applied Ethics: Remembering Patrick Primeaux – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris – 2012
Volume 9: Ethics, Values and Civil Society – Edited by Michael Schwartz, Howard Harris and Stephen Cohen – 2013
Volume 10: Moral Saints and Moral Exemplars – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris – 2013
Volume 11: The Contribution of Fiction to Organizational Ethics – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris – 2013
Volume 12: Achieving Ethical Excellence – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris with Guest Editor Alan Tapper – 2014
Volume 13: Conscience, Leadership and the Problem of ‘Dirty Hands’ – Edited by Matthew Beard and Sandra Lynch – 2015
Volume 14: The Ethical Contribution of Organizations to Society – Edited by Michael Schwartz, Howard Harris and Debra Comer – 2015
Volume 15: Contemporary Issues in Applied and Professional Ethics – Edited by Marco Grix and Tim Dare – 2016
Volume 16: The Contribution of Love, and Hate, to Organizational Ethics – Edited by Michael Schwartz, Howard Harris and Debra R. Comer – 2016
Volume 17: Responsible Leadership and Ethical Decision-Making – Edited by Sunil Savur and Sukhbir Sandhu – 2017
Volume 18: Ethics in the Global South – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris – 2017
Volume 19: Visual Ethics – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris – 2018
Volume 20: Applied Ethics in the Fractured State – Edited by Bligh Grant, Joseph Drew and Helen E. Christensen
Volume 21: The Next Phase of Business Ethics: Celebrating 20 Years of REIO – Edited by Michael Schwartz, Howard Harris and Debra R. Comer
Volume 22: Ethics in a Crowded World: Globalisation, Human Movement and Professional Ethics – Edited by Vandra Harris
Volume 23: War, Peace and Organizational Ethics – Edited by Michael Schwartz and Howard Harris
Volume 24: Educating for Ethical Survival – Edited by Michael Schwartz, Howard Harris, Charmayne Highfield and Hugh Breakey
Volume 25: Transcendent Development: The Ethics of Universal Dignity – Edited by Andani Thakhati

Title Page

RESEARCH IN ETHICAL ISSUES IN ORGANIZATIONS - VOLUME 26

WHO'S WATCHING? SURVEILLANCE, BIG DATA AND APPLIED ETHICS IN THE DIGITAL AGE

EDITED BY

ADRIAN WALSH

University of New England, Australia

AND

SANDY BOUCHER

University of New England, Australia

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2022

Editorial matter and selection © 2022 Adrian Walsh and Sandy Boucher. Published under exclusive licence.

Individual chapters © 2022 Emerald Publishing Limited.

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No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA by The Copyright Clearance Center. Any opinions expressed in the chapters are those of the authors. Whilst Emerald makes every effort to ensure the quality and accuracy of its content, Emerald makes no representation implied or otherwise, as to the chapters’ suitability and application and disclaims any warranties, express or implied, to their use.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-80382-468-0 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-467-3 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-469-7 (Epub)

ISSN: 1529-2096 (Series)

Contents

About the Contributors vi
Acknowledgements viii
‘Who’s Watching? Surveillance, Big Data and Applied Ethics in the Digital Age’
Adrian Walsh and Sandy Boucher 1
What Might Hannah Arendt Make of Big Data?: On Thinking, Natality, and Narrative with Big Data
Daniel Brennan 9
Big Data, Scapegoat or Hero – Ethical Insights from René Girard
Howard Harris 23
China’s Social Credit System: How Robust Is the Human Rights Critique?
Simon Burgess and Matthew Wysel 39
Libraries and Democracy in a Surveillance Culture
Caitlin Rowe 57
Abuse and Misuse of Substitute Decision-making (SDMg) Powers: Guardianship and Administration Law and Associated Governance Institutions in the Spotlight
Joseph Naimo 75
The Comprehensive Multidimensional Legitimacy Model: A Methodology for Applied Ethics Evaluation, Institutional Diagnosis and Practical Reform Development
Hugh Breakey 93

About the Contributors

Sandy Boucher is a Lecturer in the Philosophy of Science at the University of New England. His research interests are mainly in the philosophy of biology (especially functions and teleology, the units of selection, species, natural kinds, macroevolution and paleobiology) and general philosophy of science, but he also works on issues in metaphilosophy and epistemology.

Hugh Breakey is the Deputy Director of Griffith University’s Institute for Ethics, Governance and Law. His research in moral philosophy explores the ethical challenges in many diverse fields, including professional ethics, ethical decision-making, peacekeeping, argument, institutional governance, climate change, sustainable tourism, private property and intellectual property, and international law.

Daniel Brennan is a Lecturer at Bond University. He teaches in Ethics, and his research is in social and political philosophy, phenomenology and the philosophy of sport. He is the author of The Political Thought of Vaclav Havel (Brill) and Surfing and the Philosophy of Sport (Lexington).

Simon Burgess is a Lecturer in Ethical Leadership within the Business School at the University of New England (UNE), where he teaches Business Ethics and Organisational Leadership. Before coming to UNE, he worked in policy development, academia, and in management roles.

Howard Harris, UniSABusiness, University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia, is an Associate Professor. Graduating as a Chemical Engineer, he worked in industry and commerce in Australia and the Pacific Islands before completing his PhD in Applied Philosophy. Now retired, he has taught Ethics to Business students in Australia and Asia.

Joseph Naimo is a Researcher in Philosophy and Professional Ethics, whilst also serves as an Activist and Advocate for people with disability. Much of his time is now spent as a Consultant and Disability Ethical Advisor.

Caitlin Rowe is a PhD candidate at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology where she is researching libraries, democracy and digital citizens in a contemporary surveillance culture. An Information Scientist and Privacy Professional she is currently working in the NFP sector as a Data Privacy Manager.

Adrian Walsh is a Professor of Philosophy and Political Theory in the School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at the University of New England. He is also a Guest Professor in the Financial Ethics Research Group at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. He works primarily in political philosophy, the philosophy of economics and applied ethics.

Matthew Wysel is a PhD candidate in Information Systems at the Centre for Agribusiness, UNE Business School, University of New England, Australia. His interests include the intersection of information theory, and economic and business models. He has worked in corporate and research roles across Western Europe and Australia in aerospace and the medical, industrial, and consumer technology industries and consults to businesses on maximising the value of their data.

Acknowledgements

Hosting the conference 2020 at University of New England (UNE) and editing this volume have been an enormously rewarding experience. We arranged to hold the conference in 2019, pre-pandemic (in a very different world, as it were). Initially with the outbreak of COVID-19 in March 2020, we were unsure whether the conference would go ahead and, if it did, what form it would take. We are very grateful to Hugh Breakey and Bligh Grant from the AAPAE who with great patience helped us work through the possibilities and the logistics of holding the conference on Zoom. We were heading into what was then very new territory, but it worked exceedingly well, with no real problems.

We are very grateful to Adam Piovarchy, Katie Chambers, Simon Burgess and Alex Dunn for all of the work they undertook cheerfully and incredibly efficiently through the planning stages and during the hosting of the conference itself.

We would like to thank all of the reviewers who took on the task of reading and evaluating the papers that make up this collection. This work is often uncelebrated but is obviously integral to the process of quality research publication.

Finally, we would like to thank our university, the UNE, for the unwavering support for the conference, especially during the first half of 2020 when it was not clear what kinds of activities would and would not be possible. The IT support, in particular, was excellent. We are also really grateful to the Faculty’s research office for their encouragement and general assistance. The conference could not have gone ahead without such support.

Adrian Walsh and Sandy Boucher