How Principled are Guidelines?

Abstract>

The burgeoning of codes, criteria and guidelines in recent years results from a number of factors, including the client's right to know, preoccupations with notions of consistency and fairness and the fear of litigation. These are explored and interpreted with regard to codes in three kinds of context. First, a survey of the assessment of higher degrees and dissertations in 12 British universities is evidence of the displacement of academic judgement and experience by objective schemes that have largely to do with format and procedure rather than traditional notions of quality. Second, an examination of two groups of guidelines for teachers and university lecturers indicates an instinct for professional self‐interest and exposes ways in which guidelines shift responsibility to individuals without assuming responsibility in professional direction. Third, an examination of current codes for researchers in the social sciences illustrates the tendency of codes to be prescriptive in the letter but not in the spirit: they may control procedures in order to indemnify the professional without honouring the rights of the subjects or clients in whose interest they are said to be framed.