Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings
The Code story
One of the Horizon 2020 reference documents!
On 29 June 2018, during the TRUST project final event held at the European Parliament in Brussels, Dr Wolfgang Burtscher, the European Commission’s Deputy Director-General for Research announced:
“As a concrete step forward, I would like to inform you that the Code developed by TRUST will be soon included in the Participant Portal of Horizon 2020 as a reference document to be consulted and applied by all relevant research projects and serve as an education tool for the younger generation of researchers”.
The Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings is now a reference document on the Participant Portal and is included in the Horizon 2020 Programme ethics guidance!
One of the strongest speeches at the TRUST final event was the speech of Joyce Adhiambo Odhiambo, who represented the interests of sex workers from Nairobi. Joyce spoke about fairness, respect, honesty and care. As the moderator said at the end of her speech: “The fabulous Joyce who confirms what I have always believed, which is that African women are going to end up ruling the world.”
The speech is now available as a TRUST video.
Launch of the Code
On 15 May 2018, Prof. Doris Schroeder, Leana Snyders and Prof. Klaus Leisinger presented TRUST's Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings to the high-profile UN Leadership Council of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN). The SDSN met at the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) and TRUST was invited to present in a session entitled: "New opportunities for SDSN engagement". The three speakers were asked interesting questions, including how the Leadership Council could support our work and vice versa. This event also served as the launch of the Code.
The Global Code of Conduct in Vatican City
“Ethics in Action” is an initiative supported and hosted by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in the Vatican. In the spirit of the Encyclical Letter Laudato si’, it seeks morally appropriate solutions for urgent challenges facing the world. Meetings are held over two years in Casina Pio IV and delegates represent all major world religions as well as leaders of their communities and scientific experts. TRUST partner, Prof. Klaus Leisinger, is a core member of this highly prestigious Group.
On 29 – 30 October 2018, Prof. Leisinger was joined by the TRUST Co-ordinator, Prof. Doris Schroeder, for the last but one meeting of “Ethics in Action”. Delegates assembled to discuss the challenges of the Future of Work. Klaus and Doris introduced the TRUST four values framework (fairness, respect, care and honesty) and applied it to the topic under consideration. They also spoke about the Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings, as an example of ethics in action, and distributed the San Code of Research Ethics to those interested.
Engagement activities
Articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9, 10, 13, 16, 19, and 20 of the Code are all about involving relevant actors from low- and middle income settings in research funded by Europe or other high-income settings. Meaningful engagement is the core spirit of the global code. Find below the engagement workshops of the TRUST project that led to the production of the Code.
A guide for community engagement will be added to the Learning Materials in August 2018.
They say...
The development of the Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 664771