1. Roundtable on the Role and Relevance of Professional Societies to America’s Energy Choices Workshop on Energy Ethics in Graduate Education and Public Policy September 13, 2013 Washington, DC Mark S. Frankel, Ph.D. Director, Program on Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights & Law American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

2. Society has a need for an independent and reliable scientific voice when making policy decisions with a strong technical component. By virtue of their special knowledge and skills, scientists are particularly qualified to point out opportunities and dangers associated with advances in science and technology.

3. Individual/Collective efforts The professional society as a community of common purpose. Scientists, wherever they work and whatever discipline they pursue, are bound together by common aspirations, values, and training. They are a community whose members “are distinguished as … a group by widely shared goals, beliefs about the value of those goals,…and about the kinds of relations which in general should prevail among themselves, and in many cases between themselves and others.”

4. The professional society is a major normative influence whose values and standards of conduct serve as guides by which individual scientists organize and perform their work and, equally important, by which outsiders can understand and evaluate their performance. Societies are gatekeepers, whose normative influence on individual members serves to advance public trust in the profession and individual professionals.

5. What can the societies do in the arena of energy ethics?

6. Developing professional standards Standards of conduct arise out of the accumulated experience and wisdom of the group. Standards are testimony to profession’s acknowledgement of its ethical responsibilities.

7. Standards can have these advantages Help scientist navigate novel situations Encourage a “conscience of responsibility” within the profession Signal to the public that scientists take matters seriously/trust Guard against improper external demands Lessen use of public resources expended for government regulation

8. Public Outreach

9. One of the basic social responsibilities of scientists is to explain the nature of their work to those who support it and who are likely to feel its effects

10. “providing citizens with the knowledge required to make informed decisions on science related public issues, the scientists and his organizations have both a unique competence and a special responsibility. As the producer and custodian of scientific knowledge the scientific community has the obligation to impart such knowledge to the public.” AAAS Committee on Science in the Promotion of Human Welfare, “Science and Human Welfare,” Science 8 July 1960

11. Scientific community has a responsibility to mobilize its intellectual resources in a common effort to contribute to social decisions related to setting research priorities.

12. Partnering in Graduate Education

13. In a letter to the journal Science in 2009, entitled “Science Careers: Where Does Advocacy Fit?” a graduate student wrote: “As I begin to form my own scientific identity, I wonder what it will mean for my fellow socially conscious students and me to exercise our voices in the world we’ll inherent.”

14. Association of American Colleges and Universities College Learning for the New Global Century, 2007 Every field of study, no matter how “technical,” is a community of practice. For this reason, no field is “value-free.” Every community of practice is framed by communal values and ethical responsibilities; these expectations need to be made explicit and fully explored among students and faculty. When students choose a field of study, they need and deserve the opportunity to explore openly all of the issues basic to their community with their fellow students and with guidance from mentors. They should have many occasions to clarify and apply their own sense of ethical, professional, and civic responsibilities as they move forward in their chosen course of study.

15. Empower students to act on their ethical responsibilities Prepare them: to be clear about their own values and that of their profession/discipline; to be sensitive to the values held by others (to listen); to understand the social complexity of the issues they will face; and to cultivate the confidence, tools/skills, and insights needed to fulfill their social responsibilities.