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Welcome to the webpage of the International Development Ethics Association. This website provides news about recent and future discussions and research on development ethics.


IDEA promotes ethical discussion of development: the nature of ethically desirable development, ethical means for achieving development, and ethical dilemmas arising in the practice of development. IDEA members include researchers and students from a range of academic disciplines pertaining to development, along with practitioners working with a variety of development NGOs, agencies, and institutions.

Denis Goulet

“Development ethics is useless unless it can be translated into public action. By public action is meant action taken by public authority, as well as actions taken by private agents but having important consequences for the life of the public community. The central question is: How can moral guidelines influence decisions of those who hold power?”

Denis Goulet, The Cruel Choice, 1971