Ethical design manifesto
The Ethical Design Manifesto comes from the Small Technology Foundation. It describes in three layers what technology must achieve to be fit for human beings. The order of those layers is the real substance.
The three layers
At the bottom are human rights. Technology that respects them is, according to the manifesto, decentralised, encrypted, open source, interoperable, accessible and sustainable. It protects civil liberties, reduces inequality and supports democracy.
In the middle is human effort. What is meant is technology that works, is dependable and asks little. It reckons with people being distracted or having a disability, and it is sparing with their time.
On top lies experience: technology that explains itself, recedes into the background and gives pleasure.
Why the order matters
The layers are meant as a pyramid, not a list. A good experience cannot be built where the foundation is missing. An application can be beautiful and convenient and still collect data nobody meant to give up.
That is the manifesto’s demand: it turns questions of architecture into ethical questions. Where data sits, who can decrypt it, whether the source is open, none of that counts here as a technical detail, but as a decision about what relations a technology establishes.
Where it becomes uncomfortable
The manifesto states a maximum position. Hardly any system in public administration or civil society meets the bottom layer in full. Used as a checklist, it fails almost everything.
It is more useful as an ordering of questions: which layer is negotiable in this project, and which is not? A participation process that works without accounts has gained something at the base, even where the rest stays unfinished.
The top layer is the weakest in its language. Talk of magic and superpowers sits badly with a text whose strength lies in the sobriety of the layers below.
The full manifesto is available from the Small Technology Foundation.