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

Ethical issues in engineering design
customer had a design problem formulation including some requirements
before hiring an engineering company to make the design. This design problem
formulation may be changed during the design but only in co-operation with the
customer. In the case-studies some decisions, especially those related to what
code to use in normal design, were made by the customer. In the bridge case,
the design team advised the customer with respect to choosing between the NEN
and European codes. In the piping and equipment case, the customer could
choose between several European codes if the installation was to be built in the
EU. In the trailer case, the formulation of requirements and the first
operationalisation of those requirements were done in co-operation with the
customer. Further operationalisations that required more specialist knowledge
were done by the engineers.
Organisations that have to issue permits or certify the design may be involved
in the normal design processes. Advice could be sought from these
organisations. In the normal design cases, the decision making and solving
approaches therefore included engineers, customer(s) and certifying
organisations. The certifying organisations were not involved in the radical
design processes. It should be realised, however, that if a radical design is to be
produced and sold then it has to obtain a CE mark. So, in radical design
processes, certifying organisations may play a role in the last phases of a design
processes. The radical designs studied for this research were not in the last
phases. The lightweight car of the DutchEVO project was not designed to
produce a production model car. The trailer could have been produced and sold
but the design process was stopped by the customer after the feasibility and
preliminary design phase.
The design processes were organised in the normal design cases in such a way
that individual engineers were confronted with ethical issues depending on their
role in the design process. In a normal design case the ethical issues could be
decided on by an individual engineer designing a part of the product. Decisions
on ethical issues were made collectively in the radical designs. The design team
discussed the ethical issues and, although a single engineer might have prepared
the discussion, the decision was ultimately made by the design team. In the
cases where a design was made for a customer, the customer was involved in
making decisions on some of the ethical issues, while certifying organisation
could be asked for advice in normal design cases.
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