Differentiating and Evaluating Common Good and Public Good: Making Implicit Assumptions Explicit in the Contexts of Consent and Duty to Participate

Abstract

The notions ‘common good’ and ‘public good’ are mostly used as synonyms in bioethical discussion of biobanks, but have different origins. As a consequence, they should be applied differently. In this article, the respective characteristics are worked out and then subsequently examined which consent models emerge from them. Distinguishing normative and descriptive traits of both concepts, it turns out that one concept is unjustly used, and that the other one fits better to the context of a plural society. A reflected use of these differing concepts may help to choose an appropriate form of consent and allows public trust in biobank research to deepen.

Big data analytics in E-commerce: a systematic review and agenda for future research

“…Although the unprecedented growth in BDA makes it alluring to use data without consent, that nonconsenting respondents might jeopardise the advancement in research. As such, informed consent is a big challenge in big data environment (Bialobrzeski et al 2012). Indeed, informed consent process need to be streamlined in BDA by embracing flexible, refined, simplified but informative consent process (Beskow et al 2010;Ioannidis 2013;White, 2012) to encourage participatory community research (Bouhaddou et al 2011).…”

Data Donations as Exercises of Sovereignty

“…They might be taken to suggest that an individual acts wrongly if she ultimately prioritizes her privacy over the presumed benefits of a data donation, and/or if she judges the privacy risks to be disproportionate relative to the utility that would be generated by her donation. In other words, a perceived duty to participate might result (Bialobrzeski et al 2012). In view of rhetoric that declares data a common good and public asset, Ajana sees a risk of pitting data philanthropists against privacy advocates when "in the name of altruism and public good, individuals and organisations are subtly being encouraged to prioritise sharing and contributing over maintaining privacy.…”

Big Data-Driven Health Surveillance

“…One may argue that users' acceptance of platforms' use policies is sufficient to justify the negligence of informed consent, especially in light of citizens' proclaimed 'duty to participate' when it comes to ensuring societies' overall wellbeing (Bialobrzeski, Ried and Dabrock 2012) 41 . However, one should not conflate a person's deliberate participation in certain public health measures with their inevitable and involuntary generation of personal, digital data which have not been collected in line with considerations for the public good in the first place.…”

“…30 'The notion of the common good is therefore primarily concerned with the needs and interests of society as a whole, not with individual persons, their interests, and needs. ' (Hoedemaekers, Gordijn and Pijnenburg 2006, 417) For a differentiation between public and common good and the implications of these terms see Bialobrzeski, Ried and Dabrock (2012). 31 Likewise, boyd and Crawford suggest that '[t]he current ecosystem around Big Data creates a new kind of digital divide ' (2012, 674).…”