Ethical evidence generation
Do no harm
Generating evidence is the key to everything we do at UNICEF Innocenti. And generating that evidence, more often than not, involves people. Involving real people in our work brings risks because so often we focus on children, young people, the marginalized and the vulnerable. The rights of children must always be respected and upheld, and we must always be accountable and worthy of trust.
To ensure the gathering of evidence on which our work is based is ethical, we rely on critical principles:
Benefit
Evidence generation activities must be designed so that they benefit people and the planet, while minimizing harm.
Do no harm
Requires that we take a risk-informed approach, recognizing the potential harms and unintended impacts of our activities.
Non-discrimination
Evidence generation at UNICEF must be non-discriminatory, creating inclusive opportunities for engagement and participation for stakeholders, partners, and practitioners.
Respect
Involves engaging with all stakeholders in a way that honours their dignity, well-being, participation and personal agency.
Justice and fairness
Activities must actively consider who benefits from the work and who carries the burdens – including who bears risks to the reputation, costs and time, for example. This also includes assessing the broader equity of the project, its implementation and outcomes.
Integrity
Requires the active adherence to moral values and professional standards.
Accountability
Is the obligation to be answerable for all decisions made and actions taken. This includes being responsible for honouring commitments without qualification or exception, as well as to report potential or actual harms observed through the appropriate channels.
Gathering evidence in a way that is ethical ensures that our programming, humanitarian responses and advocacy for children are informed by the best possible and most up-to-date evidence on children’s needs, interests and perspectives – while always respecting their safety and the rights.
Ethics resources for practitioners
In addition to supporting UNICEF's own work, our ethics function advocates for child rights by advancing ethical standards in the world at large and supporting good practice in research, evaluation and other evidence activities involving children. UNICEF Innocenti tools and guidance are available and free to use for researchers, evaluators and others working on data collections and analyses involving children and their families.
