Ethics of Information Management.

• Author: Bennett, James C.
• Position: Book Review - A SAGE Publications book - Review - Brief Article

Almost every day there are newspaper reports of unethical and illegal business activity. Much of this activity covers new and uncharted terrain; more and more of it relates to records and information management. In fact, reports indicate that the fastest growing crime in America is identity theft. And in many ways our records are our identity.

Because of concerns about ethics in society, many books have been written about business ethics, but few deal directly with information management. One book written specifically for information professionals is Ethics of Information Management by Richard O. Mason, Florence M. Mason, and Mary J. Culnan. All three authors have extensive backgrounds in this topic through their teaching, research, and consulting. Because of new challenges and ethical dilemmas, this book can be valuable in helping to sharpen the ethical focus of anyone in an information-related job.

The authors state that the primary mission of this book is to "prepare the reader to identify moments of truth concerning information, to be able to think clearly about them, and to act ethically when they occur." To help achieve this mission, the authors have organized the book into three very logical parts: Part 1 provides the motivation and a conceptual background for the book as a whole; Part 2 focuses on fundamental concepts about ethics; and in Part 3 the concepts underlying information work and the need for ethics and ethical thinking among information professionals are applied.

Chapter 7, which begins Part 3, should be of special interest to records and information managers. The authors develop a model of an information professional, and they define the wide range of jobs that these professionals hold. Among the jobs listed are records managers, archivists, librarians, and information systems analysts. Because organizations are increasingly dependent on such people, the authors suggest that information workers assume a much more powerful and prominent societal role. They also think that along with this power comes a greater need for ethical responsibility; these people must agree to a stronger "professional covenant."

The ethical concepts of this book correlate closely to those of ARMA International as reflected in its Code of Professional Responsibility. The ARMA code has two major components: Social Principles and Professional Principles. The authors also believe that the responsibilities of information professionals fall into these...