Ethical dilemmas in community intervention.

Ethics code books provide only general guidelines and are inadequate in resolving explicit ethical dilemmas that frequently occur in community intervention. Ethical choices often reflect personal values as well as professional role proscriptions and are difficult to resolve for a number of reasons. It often is not clear to whom the interventionist should be accountable, or what the long-range impact may be of specific programs that seem to have short-term benefit. Value clashes can occur between consultants and consultees, even when both groups believe that they represent the best interests of vulnerable client groups. Since personal values are important determinants of ethical choices, whenever possible, they should be communicated openly so community groups can understand the interventionist's values before community projects begin. It also is important to share ethical dilemmas with professional colleagues in order to provide community psychologists with constructive feedback from their professional peers, and to help others anticipate similar value conflicts in their own work. These points are illustrated by discussion of the vignettes presented by O'Neill (1989) and by additional examples drawn from my own experience.