Ethics charter

The BOKU Ethics Charter consists of the preamble (history, context), and the following six chapters: aims, basic ethical principles and values, interaction, principles in teaching, principles in research, supportive measures fors implementation.

The Ethics Charter has been developed in several phases between 2011 and 2014. The initial phase started off with a survey resulting in the identification of BOKU-relevant ethical issues. In the next phase a first draft – a long and a short version – was developed. The draft reflected still different opinions on how to deal with the freedom of research and its limits. This phase was followed by a phase of intensive discussions of and comments about the initial draft. In the last phase the Ethics Charter was finalized the ethics platform. External experts have been consulted in several phases. The Ethics Charter has been approved by the rectorate and the senate in March 2015.

A participatory approach involving all BOKU-members had been chosen to develop the Ethics Eharter. This bottom-up approach was one of the first of this kind for the BOKU in these days.