CAUCUS OF CONCERNED SCHOLARS, COMMITTEE ON ETHICS
AND MORALITY

At its mid-winter meeting on January 14, 2005, the Governing Council of the International Society of Political Psychology authorized the establishment of the Caucus of Concerned Scholars, Committee on Ethics and Morality. Kristen Monroe will head this caucus, which is authorized for three years, with the option of renewal at the end of this period, pending approval by the Governing Council.

The Caucus is authorized to hold two sessions at the annual ISPP meetings and will issue an annual report to the Governing Council on its activities. Its mission is to:

• encourage and conduct research on the foundations of ethical action, ranging from altruism and cooperation at one end of a moral continuum to tolerance, bystander behavior and prejudice, discrimination, ethnic violence, and genocide at the other end, with special emphasis to the psychological mechanisms and origins of all forms of behavior having to do with ethics and morality,
• convene workshops and seminars on this general topic,
• develop curricula and collect syllabi for the teaching of related courses, to students ranging from elementary and secondary students to college and graduate students,
• establish a website to publicize substantive findings and work in this area,
• collect names of respected scholars doing research in this field and to provide these names to legitimate media outlets and community groups interested in scholarly speakers,
• collaborate with other relevant agencies interested in the subject, such as Holocaust Museums, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Southern Poverty Center, and academic institutes such as UCI’s Interdisciplinary Center for the Scientific Study of Ethics and Morality, and
• facilitate the generation and coordination of grant proposals to advance scholarly work in the field, including both educational grants dedicated to teaching students and research grants for original research.

 UPDATE, 4/10/07:

The Caucus held two productive sessions at the 2006 ISPP meeting in Barcelona, Spain. The first considered "The Psychology of Ethical Behavior" and included:

• Kai Jonas (Friedrich Schiller University of Jena),

• Mark Levine (Lancaster University),

• Anne Birgitta Yeung (Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies),

• Gerd Meyer (University of Tuebingen), and

• Catarina Kinnvall (Lund University), discussant.        

A second panel, "All Humanity is My In-Group," was organized by Sam McFarland and included papers by:

• Kristen Monroe (University of California, Irvine),
• Joanna Scott (Western Michigan),
• Pearl Oliner (Humbold University), and
• Katarzyna Hamer-Gutowska, and Jakub Gutowski (Warsaw School of Social Psychology)

At the 2007 meeting, the Caucus again will hold two panels. One organized by Sam McFarland will focus on diverse measurements of the altruistic perspective. The second, organized by Catarina Kinnvall, will focus on gender issues. (Click here for schedule.)

The Caucus is pleased that its first few meetings have resulted in an edited volume. We hope further meetings will produce additional volumes of similar high quality. First drafts have been compiled and a final manuscript will be sent to a publisher this summer. For a tentative table of contents, click here.

The Caucus is in the process of creating a list of members willing to be contacted by the press about the psychological foundation of ethics and morality and willing to give public talks on their work. People who wish to be included should contact Kristen Monroe at krmonroe@uci.edu. (Some Caucus members may not wish to have their information made public so we will not list anyone’s information or name without explicit approval.)

ISPP Members interested in the Caucus or its activities should contact Kristen Renwick Monroe at krmonroe@uci.edu or at the UCI Inter-disciplinary Center for the Scientific Study of Ethics and Morality, Social Science Plaza A, Irvine, University of California at Irvine, California 92697 USA.