Ethics-Related Activities at Harvard

"Through its public lectures, fellowships, and faculty seminars, the Center provides an invaluable focus and public forum for many, both inside and outside the University, to study the tangled moral questions of political and social life. It offers excellent opportunities for research, in which knowledge and methods of different fields can be brought together, where with good fortune and inspired ingenuity scholarship may reach a fruition not otherwise possible."

-John Rawls (1921 - 2002), James Bryant Conant University Professor, Emeritus

Lectures, Conferences, and Symposia

In the spirit of interfaculty collaboration, the Center's lecture series brings together faculty and students as well as members of the wider community for discussion of a variety of ethical issues. The series encourages philosophical reflection on problems of human values in contemporary society.

Bruce Ackerman, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, Yale Law School, spoke at CEP in March 2003 on: "The Next Liberal Agenda."

The Center provides an environment conducive to scholarly research and writing; opportunities for high-level scholarly exchange with colleagues, faculty and distinguished visiting speakers; and a rich network of intellectual, technological, and scientific resources unique to Harvard University. Fellows participate in the weekly seminar, which provides a forum for discussing problems of teaching and research in ethics. They enjoy access to a wide range of activities in all of the professional schools as well as the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, including opportunities to participate in courses, colloquia, curricular development, collaborative research, study groups,

case-writing workshops, and clinical programs. A significant part of their time is devoted to conducting their own research in ethics. The public lecture series regularly attracts an enthusiastic audience of senior faculty, students, and members of the wider community. These sessions address questions of scholarly significance, as well as issues of more direct interext to professionals. Frequently, lectures are co-sponsored wth other schools and departments. The series has served as a model for several of the successful university-wide forums for intellectual interchange now flourishing.

Michelle Moody-Adams, Director and Hutchinson Professor of Ethics and Public Life, Cornell University, delivered a talk at CEP in December 2002 entitled: "Academic Freedom, Pluralism and Moral Education."

Ethics Activities at Harvard

Ethics education at Harvard has grown tremendously since the Center began. As a result of connections made through the Center, as well as programs within each of the professional schools, individual faculty and students come increasingly together for curricular development and research projects. The Center continues directly to provide ethics education for some faculty and students. But at the same time, nearly all of the faculties have created their own programs and courses, and have their own group of faculty who specialize in ethics.

- The Faculty of Arts and Sciences
- Harvard Divinity School
- The Graduate School of Business Administration
- The Graduate School of Design
- The John F. Kennedy School of Government
- Harvard Law School
- Harvard Medical School
- Harvard School of Public Health

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences

University Hall
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-1566

Explorations of ethics are flourishing in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. With a grant from the American Express Foundation and through private donations, the Center for Ethics has supported the development of over 50 courses. The Moral Reasoning component of the Core Curriculum is now, as a result of these course revisions, home to some of the College's most sought-after and substantial introductory ethics courses. "Equality and Democracy," for example, covers topics such as affirmative action and free speech. Segments of the popular course "Justice," taught by Michael Sandel, can now be seen on video. The course, "Reason and Morality," a part of the Core Curriculum, introduces students to influential approaches to moral reasoning.

The links between the Center for Ethics and several departments of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences continue to strengthen and grow. Through participation in the Center's Graduate Fellowships in Ethics, as well as the public lecture series, faculty and students continue to demonstrate a strong commitment to the field of practical ethics. Several of the Center's visiting lecturers attract large audiences from the departments of government, philosophy, and classics, and generated cross-disciplinary discussions at the dinners following the lectures, now a firmly established tradition.

The lively interactions and collaborations that occur among the various departments and the central Program represent a strong commitment to ethics by both faculty and students. These activities have included jointly sponsored lectures with visiting speakers such as Alasdair MacIntyre and Richard Rorty, luncheon seminars for graduate students with the Tanner lecturers Lani Guinier, Myles Burnyeat, Sir Stuart Hampshire, and Onora O'Neill, and small joint seminars for Faculty Fellows and Graduate Fellows with faculty members Christine Korsgaard, Frank Michelman, Robert Nozick, John Rawls, Michael Sandel, Thomas Scanlon, and David Wilkins.

Harvard Divinity School

45 Francis Ave. - Andover G-16
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-5673

The Divinity School is engaged in the teaching of theologically informed ethics and in research on the ethical dimensions of public policy and professional practice. In its courses, interfaculty seminars, and executive and public education efforts, as well as in the Center for the Study of Values in Public Life (CSVPL), the Divinity School has focused on the importance of religious ideas and institutions in contributing to public life from a variety of perspectives. Subjects receiving curricular attention in the area of ethics include international relations, economic decision making, the environment, medicine, and civic renewal and political discourse.

Three interdisciplinary seminars -- focusing on families, on business and the economy, and on international relations -- have explored ways in which public policy and organizational practice are influenced by religious ideas and institutions. The interfaculty seminar on Public Life and Renewal of Democracy provides a forum for the exchange of ideas on American democracy. The seminar on Environmental Values brings together leaders in science, humanities, business, government, and the religious community to share recent research results and interdisciplinary perspectives on environmental matters.

These initiatives supplement the School's broad range of curricular offerings that deal with ethical and spiritual issues, their modes of inquiry and implications for practical issues that affect both individuals and communities. Subjects addressed include the moral issues in health care policy and practice, the political consequences of theological commitments, human rights and social justice, and the ethical conflicts in lifestyle choices and interpersonal relationships. J. Bryan Hehir, also a Faculty Associate in the Center for Ethics, continues to teach his popular courses on Catholic social teaching and world politics, the ethics of statecraft, moral and political criteria for the use of force, and social ethics and bioethics in Catholic theology.

With the initiation of the CSVPL Fellows Program, which continues the theme of the renewal of civil society and public life, and the development of the Black Church Leaders Project, focusing on church-based economic and community development, the Divinity School maintains its commitment to the practical expression of ethical and religious values.

The Graduate School of Business Administration

Soldiers Field Road
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-6000

From the beginning of the Center for Ethics, the Business School has played a central role, participating in the Center's creation and providing significant financial support. The School's groundbreaking contributions, under former Dean John McArthur, helped to propel the Business School to the forefront of the ethics movement.

The School offers a wide range of popular elective courses in business ethics, classes that draw as many as 250 students. Courses have included: "The Business World: Moral and Social Inquiry through Fiction," "Managing for Organizational Integrity," "Moral Dilemmas in Management," "Profits, Markets, and Values," and "Management, Literature, and Ethics." Another elective, "Entrepreneurship in the Social Sector," has become part of the Business School's Initiative on Social Enterprise. The Initiative's ultimate goal is to help students discover ways to use their business training to contribute to their communities and to society at large. The elective course, "Globalization, Culture, and Management," explores the role of business and ethical values in international and non-U.S. contexts. A second course, "The Moral Leader," uses a combination of fictional works and traditional cases to examine the moral issues commonly faced by leaders of organizations.

Faculty-led research efforts have spurred and sustained the development of new cases illustrating ethics issues in each of the management disciplines. Articles such as "Law, Ethics, and Managerial Judgment" and "Business Ethics: The View From the Trenches," have helped define the role of business ethics for our time. Years of field research and casewriting have borne fruit with the publication of books such as Joe Badaracco's Business Ethics: Roles and Responsibilities and Defining Moments, as well as Lynn Paine's Leadership, Ethics, and Organizational Integrity.

Recognizing the need for outstanding scholars who focus primarily on business ethics, the School confirmed its commitment to ethics by promoting to full professor two of its faculty. The School has also initiated a multi-year effort to enhance significantly the international dimension of both teaching and research in ethics.

"The Center for Ethics and the Professions continues to build important bridges between the world of academia and the world of practice. The Center's alumni are becoming intellectual leaders in professional ethics throughout Harvard, at universities across the country, and increasingly around the world. Closer to home, I am especially grateful for all that the Center has contributed to the Business School's efforts to understand and teach about managers' ethical responsibilities."
-Kim Clark, Dean, Graduate School of Business Administration

The Graduate School of Design

Gund Hall
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-4731

The Design School recently introduced its first courses in the ethics of architecture. The main ethics course is one of the few courses of its kind in the country. Its case studies are based on actual episodes involving dilemmas faced by practicing architects. The cases raise issues such as the ethical limits on soliciting work, the nature of responsibilities to clients and colleagues, and the various conflicts among obligations to clients, professional standards, and the community.

In the course, students are appointed to task forces and assigned further research on each case, after which they report back to the class. The architect featured in the case then meets with the class to discuss the issues. Other case studies are being developed to address themes of design quality in circumstances of diminished project control, effects of professional specialization on fiduciary responsibilities, and issues surrounding international work.

The John F. Kennedy School of Government

79 John F.Kennedy Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-1100

Among the first of the faculties to give ethics a prominent place in its curriculum, the Kennedy School has established the subject on a firm basis. The foundations were laid in seminars on policy values, truth-telling in management, and adversary ethics, sponsored jointly by the School and the Center for Ethics. These gatherings attracted faculty from many disciplines and schools, and provided one of the University's earliest forums for cross-disciplinary discussions and intellectual exchange on ethics issues. They also helped faculty develop cases and readings for new ethics courses.

The School's core course in political ethics, required for the some 280 Master of Public Policy students, is rigorous and well-entrenched and highly successful. The first part of the course explores central political ideas such as liberty, equality, community, utility, and democracy. The second part focuses on the moral responsibilities of public officials, especially when confronting other officials or citizens who hold different political ideas and principles, or who apply political principles differently. Arthur Applbaum, Carla Coglianese, Jane Mansbridge, and Fred Schauer are teaching the course.

Ethics publications by School faculty examine issues and articulate concepts such as executive responsibility, political and professional roles, moral disagreement in a democracy, and ethics in Congress. The School's influence spreads worldwide as faculty engage in legal and constitutional development efforts in countries such as Australia, Mongolia, and South Africa. In the U.S., Kennedy School faculty members associated with the Center have advised the government on matters as diverse as intelligence operations and the reform of the disciplinary process in Congress.

An important new development is the founding of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, which is chaired by Graham Allison and directed by Samantha Power, a former Graduate Fellow in Ethics. By casting a wide net that gathers faculty engaged in teaching, writing, and collaborating on ethical issues in government, the School continues to further its mission to promote better understanding of the moral values that underly our constitutional democracy.

"Understanding ethical questions is essential in training people for careers in public service. The Center for Ethics and the Professions has been a great help to the central part of the Kennedy School mission. We have been delighted to host the Center, and both our students and faculty here benefitted from close interaction with the Fellows."
-Joseph Nye, Dean, John F. Kennedy School of Government

Harvard Law School

Program on the Legal Profession
Hauser 312
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617-495-0958

Under the leadership of the Program on the Legal Profession, directed by David Wilkins, the Law School continues to expand its curricular offerings in ethics. It also sponsors guest lecturers, conferences and panel discussions designed to further the dialogue about ethical issues among students, faculty, and practitioners.

The School offers four specialized ethics courses tied to particular substantive areas of practice. Under the general heading of "Legal Profession," these courses are: "Transnational Practice," "Ethics of a Trial Lawyer," "Tactics and Ethics in Criminal Litigation," and "Ethical Problems in Federal Tax Practice." In addition, the study of ethics is introduced into the first year curriculum through a special exercise in the Law School's pilot course on "Lawyering." With support from the Keck Foundation, ethics problems were devised for students in the course on "Immigration Law" and for students in clinical placements at the Cambridge and Somerville Legal Services immigration law unit.

With the aim of encouraging cross-professional education, the School offered a course entitled "Ethical Issues in Clinical Practice: Lawyers and Physicians in Dialogue." This class brought together law students and medical students to examine the evolving meaning of professionalism, given the challenges facing both law and medicine. It included a moot court exercise in which the law students played physicians and the medical students played lawyers. The course also involved a simulated hospital ethics committee deliberation.

The School hosts a number of conferences and joint lectures, some attracting more than 200 academics, practitioners, and activists from around the country to discuss practical ethics problems in the context of practicing law. Through its leadership, vision and hard work, the School is making great strides to meet its goal of placing legal ethics teaching and scholarship at the center of the School's intellectual life.

"The Center for Ethics and the Professions has an increasing impact on teaching and scholarship at the Law School. Several of our faculty have been active members of the Center, and their experience has influenced the work of their colleagues and students at the School. The subject of ethics has become an important area of study, not only in the required professional responsibility courses, but in our new first-year Lawyering elective and in other mainstream courses. The Law School and the legal community will continue to benefit from further involvement with the Center."
-Robert C. Clark, former Dean, Harvard Law School

Harvard Medical School

Division of Medical Ethics
641 Huntington Avenue
Boston, MA 02115
Phone: 617-432-2570

Ethical issues find a vital voice in the Medical School's Division of Medical Ethics through a multitude of projects and research programs, primarily the Division's Fellowships in Medical Ethics, the Faculty Seminar, and the hospital-based Clinical Ethics Lecture Series, which arranges presentations for Harvard's teaching hospitals.

The ties between the Medical School and the Center for Ethics offer a model for interdepartmental collaboration. Regular participation in Center events by leading figures of the Division of Medical Ethics, by the Department of Social Medicine, and by the Fellows in Medical Ethics, assures cross-fertilization.

The Division of Medical Ethics established the Fellowships in Medical Ethics in 1993 under the direction of former Ethics Fellows Allan Brett and Robert Troug. These Fellowships enlist physicians at an early point in their careers, enabling them to make ethics the focus of their future teaching and research. Upon completing the Fellowship year, participants are better prepared to integrate the theoretical roots of ethics into arenas of practical medical problems at both the level of individual patient care, and at level of institutions and the broader society.

In offering ethics courses and integrating ethics broadly into the medical school curriculum, the Division's goal is to prepare students to become reflective practitioners, capable of understanding patients' values and working responsibly in existing medical and social institutions. All medical students take required courses in the patient-doctor relationship, using ethics materials developed by the Division; and more than 80 percent of the students enroll in ethics electives. Students also publish the Harvard Medical School Journal of Ethics with which they hope to promote discussion of medical morals. In addition to the Division's projects, much of its activity occurs in the hospitals.

Addressing major challenges in medicine and in society with, for example, the establishment of the Center for Ethics in Managed Care, the School positions itself and its students to deal effectively not only with present shifts and struggles, but with a future that requires practitioners who can integrate ethical principles and practical medical issues.

"Events of the past decade have repeatedly confirmed the wisdom of establishing the Center for Ethics and the Professions at Harvard University. This is nowhere more evident than in the Faculty of Medicine where deep ethical issues pervade patient care, education and research. The Center has helped prepare scholars to address these issues."
-Daniel C. Tosteson, former Dean, Harvard Medical School

Harvard School of Public Health

Longwood Ave.
Boston, MA 02115
Phone: 617-432-1000

The School of Public Health, among the first of the professional schools at Harvard to require its students to take ethics courses, continues to develop and expand its research contributions and course offerings in ethics. With contributions from professors Troy Brennan, Michael Reich, Marc Roberts and former Graduate Fellow Karl Lauterbach, the teaching and research on ethics continues to expand in the School. The core course, "The Ethical Basis of Public Health Practice," is required for all Master of Public Health students. A similar course is offered for public health students and participants in the Summer Institute. These courses cultivate not only a firm grounding in contemporary moral theory, but also engage students in a variety of case discussions on actual problems that arise in public health practice. There is also an optional evening seminar for students who develop a particular interest in professional ethics.

A host of elective courses address ethical issues in public health. For example, "Legal and Ethical Issues in Medical Practice," offered jointly with the Medical School, reviews a number of salient topics in medical ethics, and questions how the conceptual basis of the debate evolves as health care institutions change. In addition, ethical issues are now seriously addressed in the School's executive education programs.

The School requires trainees funded by the National Institutes of Health to participate in the course, "Research Ethics in Public Health," which provides an overview of the moral dilemmas that may arise in conducting research on public health issues. In the seminar course "Ethical Issues in International Health Research," students learn how research is conducted in developing countries and explore ways of dealing with the different ethical issues that arise in international public health research.

The Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights also makes an important contribution to the School's efforts in the area of professional ethics. Through the Bagnoud Center, a wide array of sessions are organized which are designed to explore ethics and international human rights. The First and Second International Conferences on Health and Human Rights, held at Harvard, enjoyed the participation of people from around the world. The Center has also seen the launching of the international journal, Health and Human Rights.

Back to Ethics Activities Index

For further information about lectures and conferences in each of the schools, please contact the individual schools directly.