Institutionalized Research Ethics Practices

The Research Centre for East European Studies (Forschungsstelle Osteuropa – FSO) at the University of Bremen has developed Institutionalized Research Ethics Practices (1).
 
FSO has implemented the Code of Conduct "Guidelines for Safeguarding Good Research Practice" of the German Research Foundation (DFG).
 
At the supra-organisational level FSO cooperates with the University of Bremen and with the Discuss Data Online Repository.
 
The cooperation agreement with the University of Bremen is based on the University’s regulation for Good Research Practice. It includes access of the whole FSO team to the University’s ombudspersons as well as the University’s commission for the examination of allegations of academic misconduct.
 
The cooperation with the Discuss Data Online Repository is based on the participation of FSO in the respective data infrastructure project.(2) FSO refers its researchers to the best practices developed by Discuss Data. FSO also encourages researchers to upload research data (or in case of data-related restrictions “metadata only”) to the Discuss Data online repository. The curators of Discuss Data, academic researchers with expertise for specific research areas, are available for consultation. Discuss Data also has an Ombudsperson, responsible for complaints and arbitration.
 
FSO has its own Institutional Review Board, the FSO Ethics Commission. The FSO Ethics Commission is headed by the director of FSO. The FSO Ethics Commission draws on the expertise of external academic experts, including Jan Matti Dollbaum (Dept. of European and Slavic Studies, University of Fribourg), Rashid Gabdulhakov (Research Centre for Media and Journalism Studies, University of Groningen), Sophia Hunger (Computational Social Sciences, University of Bremen), Eduard Klein (Discuss Data, Research Centre for East European Studies at the University of Bremen), Karolina Kluczewska (Ghent Institute for International and European Studies, Ghent University), Michael Rochlitz (Oxford School of Global and Area Studies, University of Oxford).

As the director is simultaneously Professor at the University of Bremen, research by the director will undergo an ethics review by the University’s institutional review board, if required.
 
Individual researchers at FSO are made aware of these regulations of ethical issues and good academic practice and sign a declaration of acceptance, when joining FSO. They have to apply for ethics approval by the FSO’s Ethics Commission whenever they prepare a project application for submission or start a project which entails empirical research. FSO researchers are encouraged to participate regularly in ethics trainings offered by FSO or the University of Bremen.
 
FSO provides the option to store sensitive research data in a locked place in a water- and fireproof box inside the institute without online access. That means the data remain available exclusively on the territory of the EU. The data storage agreement includes the option to deny access to anyone but an ethics commission in cases where the correct use of the data has to be investigated and after all members of that ethics commission have signed a confidentiality declaration.
 
 
Notes:
 
(1) On the concept of Institutionalized Research Ethics Practices see: Crawford, A. / Fichtner, L. / Guntrum, L. G. / Jänsch / S., Krösche, N. / Soulier, E. / Süß, C.-A. (2024): Ethical research in the German social sciences: Exploring the significance and challenges of institutionalized research ethics practices, in: Research Ethics, online first,  https://doi.org/10.1177/17470161241270787
 
(2) On the concept of the Discuss Data platform see: Heinrich, Andreas / Herrmann, Felix / Pleines, Heiko (2019): Transparency and quality assessment of research data in post-Soviet area studies: The potential of an interactive online platform, in: Journal of Eurasian Studies 10:2, 136-146,https://doi.org/10.1177/1879366519850698