Introduction to ethics in ethnography: The practical politics of predictability

Abstract

This introduction to the ‘Ethics in ethnography’ special issue analyzes a crisis facing anthropology and especially ethnography, its primary research method. It highlights how an outdated and parochial ethics model, strengthened by fears of litigation and simplistic views of ethnographic research, threatens the spontaneity and investigative freedom necessary to the method's exploratory character. Contributors to the discussion explore the spectrum of strategies – from compromise to confrontation – for addressing the challenges posed by the bureaucratic oversight of ethics, unrealistic expectations of predictability in fieldwork, the impact of legitimate post-colonial critique and funding constraints on research freedom. They variously address the arbitrariness of bureaucratic procedures and the potential stifling of anthropological enquiry under the guise of ethical oversight. Drawing on the range of experience in anthropology and related fields represented here, the introduction opens the collection with a call to maintain ethical sensitivity while challenging attempts to police fieldwork using inappropriate conceptions of science and ethics.