UniSUN

GENERAL AIMS

to foster discussion and promote understanding of the wider health endeavour as an ethical enterprise through constructive, critical engagement
to approach issues in health and health care from multiple perspectives including philosophy, law, medicine, sociology, anthropology, public health, health systems management, public policy, community politics, literature and aesthetics
to foster an intellectual community through discussion, research and education
to identify and support attitudes and practices that are exemplary, challenge those that are deficient, and initiate appropriate responses where they are called for
to mobilise different perspectives and to encourage participants to "think outside their own boxes"

AIMS IN RELATION TO

Ethics

to position bioethics as a region of ferment rather than a commitment to any single system of ideas that is closed off to other perspectives
to foster dialogue across conventional boundaries such as humanities/sciences, quantitative/qualitative, masculine/feminine, macro/micro, fact/value, in order to promote cross fertilization of different approaches and perspectives

Philosophy

to demonstrate the relevance of philosophy to everyday life and work
to engage the values of teachers and learners by inviting them to explore the ethical rewards and concerns that arise in their everyday life and practice, and grasp these as a source of questions, and as opportunities for learning
to provide opportunities to learn about European and non-Western philosophical perspectives, in addition to the usual Anglo-American sources

Health professions

to place medicine and health sciences in their social contexts
to recognise the need for an ethical community to support ethical behaviour
to engage with the cultures and practices of medicine and other health professions, and ask: Which attitudes and practices support and which undermine the professions as ethical enterprises?

Law

to explore the impact of the law in health care and to consider whether and how much the law and legal processes assist in patient care, and support ethical practice in a particular domain
to explore how the law can function as a means for changing practice for the better
where the law is brought to bear, to explore whether other processes for resolving conflict might be more appropriate and more effective
to help practitioners understand the law, and develop strategies for using it to ethical ends, rather than learning simply to cope with it
to address risk management from a broad perspectives e that goes beyond strategies for managing legal liability
to challenge legal processes where these are detrimental to good practice

Politics

to demonstrate that ethics is inextricably political and that politics must ultimately justify itself in ethical terms
to take a broad approach to politics as an instrument for achieving equity through the balanced representation of a plurality of voices in the discourse of public policy
to provide opportunities to explore different philosophical understandings of democracy, as well as different practical approaches to achieving political goals in a democratic system

Community

to establish community as a basis for ethical commitment, and also to stimulate critical reflection on the notion of community
to ask: What constitutes an ethical community, and how can we create one?
to provide forums for participants to discuss current issues and learn about facilitating public discourse

Institutions

to explore the relationships between systems and individuals and to find the effective locus for change in promoting responsible behaviour and ethical commitment
to ask: It is possible for an institution to be ethical? and if so, to what extent is ethics an institutional responsibility?
to develop an understanding of ethical management and administration, and find practical ways to support and strengthen them
to be critical of bureaucracy when institutions or systems undermine ethical conduct, or foster unethical conduct
to address concerns that ethics has become "bureaucratised" (for example in the form of ethics committees or disciplinary bodies that may serve other primary functions)