Engineering Ethics and Engineering Identities: Crossing National Borders

Abstract

This article describes and accounts for variable interests in engineering ethics in the United States, France, Germany, and Japan by locating recent initiatives in relation to the evolving identities of engineers. A key issue in ethics education for engineers concerns relationships between the identities of engineers and the contents and responsibilities of engineering work. These relationships have varied significantly over time and from country to country around the world. One methodological strategy for sorting out similarities and differences in engineers’ identities is to examine who counts as an engineer, or what makes an engineer. The significant interest in engineering ethics in the United States has been linked to difficulties in adding professional identities to corporate employment. While engineering ethics has attracted little interest in France and formal education in the subject might very well be seen as insulting, German engineering societies have, since the conclusion of World War II, demanded from engineers a strong commitment to social responsibility through technology evaluation and assessment. In Japan, recent flourishing of interest in engineering ethics appears to be linked to concerns that corporations no longer function properly as Japanese “households.” In each case, deliberations over engineering ethics emerge as part of the process through which engineers work to keep their fields in alignment with their changing images of societal advancement.