World Ethical Electronics Forum (WEEF): A Focus on SDG, Not Just Profits
Do engineers, makers, and tech companies have an ethical responsibility to use their skills and products in positive ways? The World Ethical Electronics Forum (WEEF) will address this question and more.
Do individual electrical engineers, embedded programmers, and makers have an ethical responsibility to use their skills and components in positive ways? Should ethics play a role in how multinational electronics-focused corporations do business? How should electronics ethics factor in the ways hardware start-ups approach product development? These are important questions to consider as we develop the electronic systems and information technology solutions that will shape the 21st century. Elektor and ELEKTRONIK PRAXIS invite members of the high-tech community to think along with us. After a few months of brainstorming and engaging in healthy debates about electronics ethics, we will launch a yearly event, World Ethical Electronics Forum (WEEF), which will feature in-depth talks and debates on a wide range ethical issues, as well as some beverages so we can toast to Elektor’s 60th anniversary.
The first ‘’pioneer edition’’ of WEEF will take place in Munich, Germany. After the 2021 event, future WEEF events will take place all over the world (large and small events, online and onsite), with a leading event planned for Munich every November.
With our publications (print and digital) and live events (in-person and digital), Elektor and ELEKTRONIK PRAXIS will educate and engage electronics community members on the most pressing ethical issues of our time. We invite hardware engineers, embedded systems programmers, C-level executives, government officials, shareholders, academics, and electronics makers to deep-dive with us on a few key ethical topics, which we will track and document at ElektorMagazine.com. And after several months of virtual discussions, reporting, and online events, we will host the World Ethics in Electronics Forum in Munich, Germany. Ultimately, we aim to arrive, by early 2022, at basic code of ethics for electronics practitioners and ranking of the top SDG-friendly electronics companies.
During the next several months, we will collaborate with industry partners, notable engineers, CEOs, company owners and innovative makers to publish articles, surveys, and other thought-provoking content on a few crucial ethics-related topics. Let’s review.
The first ‘’pioneer edition’’ of WEEF will take place in Munich, Germany. After the 2021 event, future WEEF events will take place all over the world (large and small events, online and onsite), with a leading event planned for Munich every November.
World Ethical Electronics Forum: Ethics, SDGs, and More
Elektor launched the first do-it-yourself (DIY) electronics movement in the 20th century. Since 1961, approaches to ethical decision-making have changed quite a bit. Much like design processes and technical workflows, engineers and makers alike must regularly revisit and reimagine codes of ethics to keep up with the times. Today, over year after the global COVID-19 pandemic began, the WEEF team asks engineers and makers to carefully consider the ramifications of their work as they engage with revolutionary electronic technologies in a rapidly evolving globalized marketplace.- How are your design, programming, and sourcing decisions affecting your community, the environment, and the industry?
- Are your projects and products helpful or harmful?
- Are you using your electronics- and engineering-related skills and expertise for positive endeavors?
- Can you agree with your peers on basic electronics-related ethical principles as we approach 2022?
- Is your company rewarding its staff when it increases profit or when it helps reach sustainable development goals (SDG)?
With our publications (print and digital) and live events (in-person and digital), Elektor and ELEKTRONIK PRAXIS will educate and engage electronics community members on the most pressing ethical issues of our time. We invite hardware engineers, embedded systems programmers, C-level executives, government officials, shareholders, academics, and electronics makers to deep-dive with us on a few key ethical topics, which we will track and document at ElektorMagazine.com. And after several months of virtual discussions, reporting, and online events, we will host the World Ethics in Electronics Forum in Munich, Germany. Ultimately, we aim to arrive, by early 2022, at basic code of ethics for electronics practitioners and ranking of the top SDG-friendly electronics companies.
WEEF Details
Mark your calendars and start thinking about ethics-related topics to discuss with your peers.- Event: WEEF 2021
- Date: November 18, 2021 @ 17:00 CET (The time is subject to change.)
- Location: Munich, Germany (and online)
During the next several months, we will collaborate with industry partners, notable engineers, CEOs, company owners and innovative makers to publish articles, surveys, and other thought-provoking content on a few crucial ethics-related topics. Let’s review.
- Ethics in Technology: Ethics in technology is on the one hand a part of ethics in general, and therefore as a science to be classified as philosophy. However, it also has an action-relevant role in the working life of a technician, where it provides criteria for evaluating and weighing in the following aspects of technology: advantages against disadvantages; benefits against damage; opportunities against dangers; and self-interest against the common good. So, it poses questions about the actions of technicians and their handling of technology and technical objects or devices: Is a special technique good? Is it right what to do with this technique? Is the technology safe? Is the technology useful to all people? Does technology only use parts of people, or only parts of political systems, while it marginalizes others, or does it only benefit an individual?
- Ethics of Digitalization in Industry: In the course of the rapidly advancing digitalization, which finds a prominent presence in human life through progressive innovations, the first question arises: What is the role of the human being if a machine becomes a substitute for human labor power? Digitization is changing the world in an unprecedented way. It is the task of ethics to answer these moral questions and to further develop these answers against the background of disruptive changes caused by digitization.
- Ethics, Corporate Value and Sustainability: “The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits." (Friedman 1970). This oft-quoted postulate is controversial about the possible correlations between social and environmental factors and the market value of a company. According to a more recent survey, the majority (about 57%) expect of German listed companies rather have a positive impact on the company's value, for example due to low energy consumption or ecological product characteristics. Such an influence is made to an even greater extent (72% of respondents) for the relationship between a company's market value and social performance, such as the maintenance of socially responsible employee relationships. Unlike Friedman, most respondents seem to expect a correlation between a company's market value and its "ethical performance."
