About ERE

This website's aim is to give researchers and other interested parties access to and information on the guidelines, ethics codes and laws that regulate and place ethical demands on the research process. The website's various 'entrances' are intended to make it as easy as possible to find the resources one is seeking. Short introductions to issues in research ethics systematize the material and help those looking for a quick overview.

Target audience

ERE addresses first and foremost those who are actively involved in research, but also the interested public. Thus, no special previous knowledge is needed to understand the website's contents.

Content

ERE's ambition is, through groupings of links and introductory texts, to provide access to and information on central guidelines, ethics codes and laws that regulate and place ethical demands on the research process.

The selection of guidelines and rules was made bearing in mind general research work in Europe. We have chosen documents that regulate or are directed toward European circumstances, and some international documents with relevance to work here. We have also occasionally included, for example, US guidelines of special interest.

Note that, concerning documents on ethical questions, it is not only the current 'valid' guidelines that are of interest. A researcher him/herself must always take an independent stand on various requirements and views. There is nothing to hinder an appeal from the '80s from being seen by an individual as morally imperative - even if it is not legally imperative or even if it means, for example, abstaining from a procedure that is allowed by law. Therefore, certain older policy documents have also been included when deemed appropriate.

Navigation

ERE provides links to research ethics rules and guidelines. These can be found via an alphabetical index, found under "Rules and guidelines", as well as in the research ethics summaries, collected under "About research ethics".

The alphabetical index provides direct links to external documents such as directives, regulations, rules and guidelines. In addition to providing a collective overview, the alphabetical index can be used to search for a specific document or author of research ethics rules and guidelines. Most documents can be found under both title and author.

It is also possible to do a search on the website.

The short introductions to issues in research ethics ("About research ethics") create a certain coherence and help those looking for a quick overview. They provide a detailed though limited selection from the documents. To each page belong a heading, "See further", where interesting and relevant resources can be found, such as other research ethics summaries, websites, collections of documents and so on, but also e.g. forms and contributions to debates.

Note that the alphabetical index contains all the links to guidelines contained in ERE, whereas the research ethics summaries provide a detailed though limited selection from the documents.

On each page, the left column provides an overview of ERE's contents and provides information on the reader's location in the website's structure. There is also a sitemap.

Authors and financiers

ERE was developed by Stefan Eriksson, from the CODEX website for Ethicsweb, with support from the European Union's 7th Framework Program.

Contact

Responsible for this webpage is Ulrich Marder.

Last updated: 2009-12-18