bomeara / coccoe

Code of Conduct + Code of Ethics Test

CoCCoE Test

The Bechdel Test is a test for movies to check for treatment of women. It is:

1. It has to have at least two [named] women in it
2. Who talk to each other
3. About something besides a man

This appeal of this test is its simplicity. Of course, one can identify shortcomings, but as a fast indicator of treatment of women, it can be very illuminating.

I propose a similar test for scientific societies: the CoCCoE [pronounced "cocoa"] test:

1. There is a Code of Conduct that can result in expulsion from the meeting for unambiguous harassment of an attendee
2. There is a Code of Ethics that can result in removal from the society for unambiguous assault of a member

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Codes of Conduct typically apply to activities (most usually a scientific meeting, but also activities like contributing computer code). They stipulate expected behavior, how to report problems, and often potential consequences. See this one from rOpenSci for an example.

Codes of Ethics describe behavior expected of members in general, not just during society activities. This can include not giving appropriate credit, making up results, financial mismanagement of grants, or assaulting other members of the community. See this PDF from AGU for a detailed example.

There are different standards for evidence ("preponderance of evidence", "clear and convincing evidence", "beyond a reasonable doubt") which are used in different aspects of the law (civil vs criminal cases, for example) and in different jurisdictions. By unambiguous we mean cases where it is clear to an unbiased society, after hearing evidence from the reporter and the alleged assaulter, that the incident has occurred. There will be borderline cases with insufficient evidence and even false accusations: the focus here is on what societies do when there is incontrovertible evidence of a problem. For many societies, the answer is nothing, and the CoCCoE test is intended to highlight this.

Even for societies that have not yet gotten reports of incidents at meetings or in general, there is ample reason to believe there are incidents and these will be reported in the future, especially once there are trustworthy mechanisms for reporters to use. Without a policy, a society is left scrambling when this does happen. Lack of a policy also sends a signal about society priorities. Good policies will have details about reporting procedures, mechanisms to ensure allegations are handled fairly for all involved, about ethics regarding plagiarism, harassment, assault, reporting of conflicts of interest, etc. The CoCCoE test doesn't check all aspects of this, just the presence of a policy that can address these problems. Once a policy is in place, it can be improved, but many societies have no policy.

As with the Bechdel test, once a result is found, the best action is up to individual choice. One could ignore it, push from within a society for change, leave a society until it is changed, etc. This just creates a discrete signal one can use as a guide to action.

List of societies

You can see an updated, crowd-sourced list of societies and the status of their codes of conduct and ethics at this Google spreadsheet, started by Kermyt Anderson.