As such we set out to collectively draft a charter to ensure that the values that follow from a situated position of alterity are explicit and are what collects our research together, and not merely because the work features VR, AR and other related technological concerns, many of which are unethical, both in terms of extractive practices and their real impact on people, life-worlds, climates, lands.
To reject involvement with military research, military applications of technology, and military funding, either directly or by proxy. With due diligence undertaken in all collaborations, subject coverage.
To specifically prevent the development or intensification of any discrimination between individuals or groups of individuals.
To disclose accurate and truthful information on project and research intentions, uses and outcomes.
To pay attention to non-exploitative forms of labour, collaboration and participation, with specific attention to marginalised groups.
To hold to account the positions of privilege that we hold both institutionally, and personally, and ensuring that the implications of our work are not harmful to others.
To identify and declare any potential biases, competing interests, or undue influence, whether real or perceived.
To commit to high standards of skill, knowledge and care in all research and work.
To identify and critically respond to the measuring, storing and use of psychometric data, surveillance and monitoring of physiological responses to VR stimuli.
Duties toward the natural environment, resources and habitats – to take into account present and future impacts of the use of natural resources and land use.
To commit to ethical collaboration that respects intellectual property, ensures full public acknowledgement of others’ work, and to reject forms of uncollegiate behaviour such as plagiarism, exploitation of labour, taking advantage of colleagues’ work, and damage to personal or professional reputation.
This draft charter draws on principles, codes, ethics drawn up by other organisations and is indebted to the important work undertaken by Design Justice Network, Algorithmic Justice League, Architecture Lobby, RIBA Code of Professional Conduct, CEPEJ European Ethical Charter on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in judicial systems and their environment.
(1) The term Alterities is rooted in the work of Doina Petrescu – Alterities as an “invented word to name the multiple possibilities of praxis: ‘other spatial practices’ or practising ‘otherwise’, expressing alternative and alternative positions formulated according to the current re-compositions of individual and collective subjectivities within the new technological and geopolitical contexts.” Doina Petrescu, ‘Foreward: from Alterities and Beyond,’ Altering Practices: Feminist Politics and Poetics (London: Routledge, 2007) p. xvii.