Ethical issues in engineering design - 3TU.Centre for Ethics and ...

Conclusions of the empirical study
individually or collectively. Second there may be a customer that is involved in
deciding on some ethical issues. Third, other organisations might be included or
asked for advice, for example certifying organisations.
In the case-studies a difference could be seen between radical and normal
design processes in the organisation of the design processes. In the normal
design processes there was more division of labour. Individual engineers (or
small groups) designed a part. Most of the ethical issues that came up in
designing that part were initially resolved by the individual engineers. The
individual engineers were experienced and for some situations they could rely on
internal company rules. If the problem was especially difficult or might
influence other parts of the design then the engineers discussed the problem
with the job engineers and / or with the engineers designing the other parts.
Within the IBA the engineers would ask engineers who had the same role in
another design project to check their design. In the piping and equipment case
this was not possible because some customers did not want the engineers to
work on projects for their competitors. Decisions to consult the customer or the
certifying organisation were always discussed with the job engineer or project
manager. Decision making in normal design processes can, therefore, be
characterised as individual and hierarchical. This does not mean that there was
no communication between engineers in the normal design process but the
division of labour was very clear and every one had a clearly defined task in the
design process. In contrast to individual engineers being confronted with ethical
issues in normal design, ethical issues were discussed and decided on
collectively in the radical design processes. Different design team members had
different tasks in the two radical design processes that were studied but there
was a lot of communication between members. The ethical issues concerned
more than just one engineer designing a part so the ethical issues were decided
on by the whole design team. In the DutchEVO lightweight car case, the master
and bachelor students had to make a design for a small part of the car, for
example the drive train or suspension. These students made preliminary choices
in their work. These preliminary choices and the argumentation for them were
presented to the whole design team. After the presentations, typically
discussions followed and then definitive decisions were made. So although some
decisions were first taken by one or two students, the whole design team was
involved in discussions on these decisions and making the final decisions
regarding the lightweight car design.
Whether the design is made for a customer or not is important for who
decides on ethical issues. There is little difference between the role of a customer
in either a radical or normal design process. If the design is made for a customer
then the customer plays an important role. In three of the case-studies, the
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