Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2010; 1(1):7

political influence, bribery and other means of subjective influence. So long as discretion is wide and the scope 
remains for abuse of power with impunity, and as long as effective legal and ethical standards are not in place with 
enforcement mechanisms for zero tolerance to corruption, no true results can be expected or sustained in enhancing 
ethical and moral standards. 

No less important is the issue of salaries and benefits, which must be viewed as investments for future. Much would 
definitely depend on the extent to which anti-corruption values and ethics can be mainstreamed in the public service. 
A key role would be played by preventive measures against  erosion of public service integrity and honesty by 
enforcing public service code of ethics including positive and negative incentives. 

Ethics and integrity in public service are more than a project of value or moral education, however well-designed it 
may be.  It  cannot  be viewed in isolation from systemic  challenges,  and must  be part  of  a holistic institutional 
structure and process that would promote and sustain integrity in the public service as well as other aspects of life in 
a holistic infrastructure of integrity. A comprehensive and institutional approach strongly backed by highest level 
political commitment is indispensable.

Ethical Dilemma and Research Methodology of Social Sciences

Prof. Ahmad A.N. Neaz, DSSc., American International University-Bangladesh , Email: aneaz@aiub.edu

Today,  when  the  galaxy  of  knowledge,  be  it  social,  political,  economic  or  scientific  is  expanding  at  an 
unprecedented pace, new questions and new interests require us to enter into a new search for a new answer. For 
many  millennia  knowledge  was  exclusively  confined  under  the  grip  of  subjectivity  and  pre-conceived  ideas. 
Although, Greek scholars started to think objectively the Newtonian paradigm came as a major breakthrough in this 
regard. The ultimate outcome turned out to be the development of a ‘Positivistic methodology’, solely relying on 
empirical evidence. 

Social scientists also pretended to follow scientific method and their search for objectivity was the foundation of 
research endeavor. They also followed Newtonian philosophy by considering a closed autonomous system, ruled by 
endogenous factors of highly selective nature, self regulating and moving to a determinate predictable point in terms 
of linear, stable and equilibrium analysis. Social science, particularly economics ahead of others, claims itself as a 
‘value  free  science’  in  order  to  follow  positivistic  methodology,  depended  solely  on  empirical  evidence. 
Consequently, it discards ethics, values and any subjective involvement as idealistic rather than realistic. For nearly 
a century, in order to become increasingly scientific, ethics has been abandoned by many disciplines and ultimately,  
ethics  has  been  tethered  around  and  nurtured  by  philosophy  only.  Einstein  tried  to  synthesize  the  positivist 
accommodating  the  ‘world  of  idea’  in  the  field  of  research.  M.K  Gandhi  was  the  first  person  to  challenge 
economists as a ‘value free’ subject.   

Bioethics could be termed as a landmark in order to rehabilitate ethics. It is for sure that within near future ethics 
will be the guiding philosophy of all the disciplines of knowledge. In order to achieve that, education and research 
method need to be redesigned to developed epistemology. It is a fallacy of the positivistic methodology that there 
will  be  no  subjective  involvement.  In  the  field  of  social  sciences  where  events  or  phenomena  have  unique 
particularity and have no scope for repeated experiment, empirical evidence must be supported by rational thinking. 
Otherwise it will lead to empiricism which may not be considered as knowledge even. Application of intensive 
observation,  RRA,  PRA  and  other  methods  have  been  supplementing  and  complementing  the  limitations  of 
positivistic approach. Amartya Sen tried to introduce values in economics but in vain.

Development economics initially considered ‘economic growth’ or GNI as the yardstick of development. Since mid 
1970s it  has  been  shifted to  ‘human development’  which  has  been  intensified  under  Millennium Development 
Goals. Economists yet to conceive ethics as a guiding philosophy which may further shift the discipline from human 
development to  ‘humane development’ emancipating human civilization from the realm of poverty, greed and 
inhumanity to the arena of welfare, peace and global harmony.

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