In 1988, I had an unparalleled opportunity for examining Canadian Research in the area of applied ethics. I was the Principal Investigator on a project that took me over 6,000 km. from Canada's Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast. I talked to over two hundred researchers, research-users, university officials, and interested individuals from the public and private sectors. Through the distribution of over a thousand questionnaires, our three-person research team was in touch with every university and college in Canada and as many Canadian applied ethics researchers as we could identify. The end result of our work was a 350 page report consisting of over 120 pages of description, analysis, and recommendations and supported by over 230 pages of supporting appendices. This report, Towards a Canadian Research Strategy For Applied Ethics, provides an up-to-date assessment of the capacity, needs, and potential for developing applied ethics research in Canada.

I am pleased to say that our recommendations were quickly acted on by the federal government's Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) which, in April 1988, adopted our Report's main recommendations by establishing a five-year strategic research theme in applied ethics, which commences this year. These Canadian initiatives in applied ethics have targeted three main areas: bioethics, business and professional ethics, and environmental ethics. I will focus on the second area and look at (a) teaching, (b) consultative activities, and (c) research.

(a) Teaching. In our three questionnaires, almost as many courses and students were reported in business and professional ethics courses as in bioethics; by comparison, there were only half as many courses in environmental ethics as in either bioethics or business and professional ethics. Most of those teaching in business and professional ethics came from business and professional faculties; humanists only represented about a third of those teaching. All too often we heard complaints that instruction failed to rise above the merely anecdotal learning of professional etiquette or factual presentations of professional and legal requirements.

Concerns were expressed about the lack of suitable curriculum materials, especially case studies and articles that address features specific to Canadian businesses and professions. While Canada is geographically avert' large country, in population, wealth, and the size of its educational establishment, it is small compared to the United States. We tend to import many of our teaching materials in ethics from the U.S.-these are often unsuitable both in content, because they fail to address the specific circumstances of Canadian professionals, and linguistically, given that Canada has two official languages.

(b) Consulting. As in teaching, business and professional ethics consulting is also in its embryonic stages compared to bioethics. While some individuals in the private sector were in touch with academic ethicists, others reported that academic researchers failed to communicate their work in easy to find and useful forms. While there might be some hesitation on the part of some professionals to seek help from ethicists (especially, if they are from outside the profession), we saw important opportunities. For example, the Association of British Columbia Professional Foresters said that in the wake of widespread controversies over the use of forests in that province, it would welcome the help of ethicists in rethinking its whole code of ethics "from first principles:"

(c) Research. Unsurprisingly, one of the primary research concerns is the development of curriculum materials, in particular, case studies, and the development of a significant core literature for specific areas of business and professional ethics. A widespread concern was with the need for research on topics in ethics specific to the Canadian context. Professor Brooks (Administration, Toronto) said that in accounting ethics he no longer relies on American materials and has developed an extensive set of Canadian materials. The same was reported by Professor Stevenson (Philosophy, Toronto) for engineering ethics. Another general theme was the need for research that grows out of and feeds into teaching and consultation.

There was a good deal of concern for the development of a research infrastructure. There is no Canadian academic association that focuses on business and professional ethics; instead researchers work in diverse disciplinary areas scattered across the humanities, the social sciences, and the professions and are often unaware of each others' efforts. Of the more than a dozen Canadian centers for applied ethics, almost all are concerned with bioethics. There is also a significant deficit in regard to the training of new teachers and researchers.

I will now summarize some of the general observations and recommendations made in our report:

Observations-1: Canadian academic research in business and professional ethicsshould serve the needs of business and professional people and organizations as well as the general public.

Observation-2: Work in business and professional ethics should be interdisciplinary. We face formidable obstacles to such interdisciplinary efforts: Given the compartmentalization of Canadian higher education, strong centripetal forces are needed to counter the almost overwhelming centrifugal forces generated by academic disciplines and faculties. These centripetal forces are needed at both the national and local levels.

Observation-3: As researchers, teachers, and consultants in business and professional ethics we need to develop effective national and international networks. Like acid rain, many ethical issues do not stop at national boundaries. Still, those of us who are researchers in smaller countries must also tend our own gardens; in ethics, as in other areas of life, there are situations specific to particular regions and countries.

I would mention three factors that specially affect Canadian business and professional life. First, while in economic and political terms Canada is a middle power, Canada is extremely dependent on the United States. Second, we are a country with two languages and two founding peoples. Third, we have an extraordinarily complex governmental arrangement which divides power between the federal government and the provinces; by most measures, we are one of the most decentralized countries in the world. One cannot understand Canadian businesses and professional associations without taking into account these realities.

But how, one might ask, can we assemble networks of researchers in ethics given all the obstacles I have mentioned? We talked about the four C's: Contact, Collaboration, Consultation, and Communication. Contact leads to collaboration with other researchers and consultation with user groups and to the effective communication of research.

The networking we envision begins inside the university among its own researchers and extends to user groups in the region. The next level of linkages is to researchers in other institutions and to the public, private, and not-for-profit institutions and groups outside the immediate region up to and including both national and international groups and associations.

We were successful in getting SSHRC to set up a Thematic Applied Ethics Program for the next five years commencing in 1990-1991, with a possible three-year extension. The allocation of funds in the new Applied Ethics Program is to be determined by a peer-review process. Most importantly, the peers in this case are being drawn from researchers active in applied ethics and likely users of such research. Given the interdisciplinary character of applied ethics research, this would mean that those assessing research proposals would likely be sympathetic to work that cuts across disciplinary lines.

ISSHRC also accepted our suggestion that it actively solicit funding from other national agencies. In addition, SSHRC agreed to a number of specific funding initiatives. These include provision of matching grants for funds coming from the private sector and other public sector agencies, strategic research grants particularly for multidisciplinary projects, support for research networks and research institutes.

Finally, at the same time as SSHRC has taken these bold initiatives in support of professional and business ethics research, there have been complementary developments elsewhere in Canada. In Toronto, there is a new not-for-profit organization, the Canadian Centre for Ethics and Corporate Policy. A further indication of activity is the number of major conferences held in early 1990: Business and the Environment, Moral Philosophy in the Public Domain, and Ethics in Public Administration. New centers in the area are being launched in Toronto and Vancouver. At the latter, an endowment has been given to establish the Maurice Young Chair in Applied Ethics, of which I will be first incumbent. Over the next several years, Canada will provide a kind of laboratory in which one should be able to observe the effect of a determined national effort to advance research in applied ethics generally and professional and business ethics in particular.

The report, Towards a Canadian Research Strategy For Applied Ethics by Michael McDonald, Marie-Helene Parizeau, and Daryl Pullman, is available from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, 151 Slater, Suite 407, Ottawa, Ont., Canada K1P 5H3 for a cost of $10.00.