The Ethical Balance of Using Smart Information Systems for Promoting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals

dc.cclicenceCC-BYen
dc.contributor.authorRyan, Mark
dc.contributor.authorAntoniou, Josephina
dc.contributor.authorBrooks, L.
dc.contributor.authorJiya, Tilimbe
dc.contributor.authorMacnish, Kevin
dc.contributor.authorStahl, Bernd Carsten, 1968-
dc.date.acceptance2020-06-11
dc.date.accessioned2020-06-16T13:33:22Z
dc.date.available2020-06-16T13:33:22Z
dc.date.issued2020-06-12
dc.descriptionopen access articleen
dc.description.abstractThe Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are internationally agreed goals that allow us to determine what humanity, as represented by 193 member states, finds acceptable and desirable. The paper explores how technology can be used to address the SDGs and in particular Smart Information Systems (SIS). SIS, the technologies that build on big data analytics, typically facilitated by AI techniques such as machine learning, are expected to grow in importance and impact. Some of these impacts are likely to be beneficial, notably the growth in efficiency and profits, which will contribute to societal wellbeing. At the same time, there are significant ethical concerns about the consequences of algorithmic biases, job loss, power asymmetries and surveillance, as a result of SIS use. SIS have the potential to exacerbate inequality and further entrench the market dominance of big tech companies, if left uncontrolled. Measuring the impact of SIS on SDGs thus provides a way of assessing whether an SIS or an application of such a technology is acceptable in terms of balancing foreseeable benefits and harms. One possible approach is to use the SDGs as guidelines to determine the ethical nature of SIS implementation. While the idea of using SDGs as a yardstick to measure the acceptability of emerging technologies is conceptually strong, there should be empirical evidence to support such approaches. The paper describes the findings of a set of 6 case studies of SIS across a broad range of application areas, such as smart cities, agriculture, finance, insurance and logistics, explicitly focusing on ethical issues that SIS commonly raise and empirical insights from organisations using these technologies.en
dc.funderNo external funderen
dc.identifier.citationRyan, M., Antoniou, J., Brooks, L., Jiya, T., Macnish, K., Stahl, B. (2020) The Ethical Balance of Using Smart Information Systems for Promoting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. Sustainability, 12(12), pp.4826.en
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.3390/su12124826
dc.identifier.urihttps://dora.dmu.ac.uk/handle/2086/19783
dc.language.isoenen
dc.peerreviewedYesen
dc.publisherMDPIen
dc.researchinstituteCentre for Computing and Social Responsibility (CCSR)en
dc.subjectSmart Information Systems (SIS)en
dc.subjectSustainable Development Goals (SDGs)en
dc.subjectethicsen
dc.subjectcase studiesen
dc.subjectimpacten
dc.titleThe Ethical Balance of Using Smart Information Systems for Promoting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goalsen
dc.typeArticleen

Files

Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Name:
sustainability-12-04826.pdf
Size:
1 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Description:
Main paper
License bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
license.txt
Size:
4.2 KB
Format:
Item-specific license agreed upon to submission
Description: