Rethinking what "research ethics" really means
When we talk about “ethics” in research, we almost always mean data, authorship, or publication practices — plagiarism, consent, data sharing, reproducibility.
These things matter. A lot. They always have, and they always should.
But we rarely talk about the ethics of the institutions themselves — the people and systems that shape the conditions under which research happens.
Over the past decades, universities and research institutes have heavily adopted tactics from corporate culture: KPIs, branding, growth metrics, “impact.” But they’ve done it without importing the checks and balances that keep corporations accountable. Or worse — they’ve built a shell of accountability that looks good on paper, but unfortunately either exists only on paper or is easily gamed, and often makes things worse.
Inside that closed environment, a “culture of niceness” has taken hold — one that enforces harmony over honesty. Dissent is reframed as a “personality clash,” and problems are managed quietly instead of addressed openly. Governance becomes performative — unable or unwilling to challenge those in power. The goal, unfortunately, is to protect those in power, even if what they say is that it’s to provide a “respectful environment.”
Meanwhile, the consequences are everywhere: poor treatment of staff, high turnover, the slow erosion of expertise and trust. Everyone knows it’s happening, but it’s rarely spoken out loud. People are afraid — afraid of retaliation, of being marked as “difficult,” of losing their jobs or their reputations. And the governance structures that claim to care about wellbeing and professional development often do very little when it actually matters.
Big scandals sometimes make headlines, but only the most visible ones do. Journalists can’t chase the small, slow train wrecks — the ones happening quietly inside institutes and facilities. Yet that’s where the real damage builds up, slowly and silently.
We’ve recently seen high-profile cases at ANU, UTS, and others. In past years, there were the UAdelaide scandals: ACAD director, the vice chancellor. None of these were surprises. People close to those situations knew what was happening for a long time, but were either unable or unwilling to act, or no one cared enough to listen to them.
None of this is new. But maybe it’s time to stop pretending it’s normal.
(I know this is all very “high level,” but I’m not speaking in hypotheticals. These are real cases — some from my own experience, others told to me by people who are still too afraid to say them publicly. There is still plenty to come... so I will definitely get around to talking about concrete cases.)
If we’re serious about integrity, then “research ethics” can’t stop at plagiarism and data sharing. It has to include how institutions behave — how they govern, how they treat people, and how they use the public money and trust they’ve been given.