# Content Ethics Review

Examine a content plan for consent, manipulation, disclosure, fairness, representation, power imbalances, foreseeable harm, and possible misuse before publication.

## Usage note

Use this review early enough to change the premise, sourcing, format, or distribution—not merely to approve finished wording. It supports disciplined ethical reasoning but does not replace consent procedures, safeguarding, legal advice, community expertise, or other specialist duties. Protect sensitive information and involve people with relevant lived or professional knowledge.

## How to use this template

1. Describe the content’s purpose, sponsor, audience, requested action, participants, and evidence before evaluating language.
2. Map who gains authority or value and who may face exposure, manipulation, exclusion, or other harm.
3. Check consent, disclosure, representation, incentives, privacy, and the possibility of the material being reused out of context.
4. Compare the planned approach with safer alternatives and assign controls, reviewers, stop conditions, and response owners.
5. Record the decision and unresolved concerns, then review actual effects after publication or distribution.

## Blank template

### Purpose and relationships

- **Content or campaign:** [Working title]
- **Publisher and sponsor:** [Name interests and funding]
- **Primary purpose:** [Inform, persuade, document, entertain, or another aim]
- **Requested audience action:** [What should readers think or do?]
- **People represented:** [Individuals, groups, or communities]
- **Primary beneficiaries:** [Who gains value or authority?]
- **Potential burden bearers:** [Who carries exposure or harm?]
- **Reviewer perspective:** [Relevant expertise or lived context]

### Consent and disclosure

- **Consent obtained for:** [Interview, image, quotation, distribution, reuse]
- **Uses explained:** [Channels, audience, translation, promotion, archive]
- **Withdrawal or correction process:** [Limits and contact]
- **Publisher interest disclosed:** [Commercial, political, institutional, or personal]
- **AI assistance disclosed where appropriate:** [What was used and how]
- [ ] Participants could decline without an unfair consequence.
- [ ] Identifying details are necessary and proportionate.
- [ ] Compensation or incentives are transparent.
- [ ] Quotations preserve meaning and relevant context.

### Fairness and harm

- **Missing perspective:** [Who is affected but unheard?]
- **Stereotype or framing risk:** [Describe and revise]
- **Manipulative mechanism:** [Fear, shame, false urgency, hidden choice architecture, or None]
- **Foreseeable misuse:** [Actor, action, and consequence]
- **Severity and reversibility:** [Explain]
- **Safer alternative:** [Aggregate, anonymize, narrow, fictionalize, delay, or decline]
- **Residual concern:** [What remains after controls?]

### Decision and accountability

- **Decision:** [Proceed / Revise / Escalate / Decline]
- **Required changes:** [Specific actions]
- **Specialist review:** [Role and status]
- **Monitoring signal:** [Complaints, misuse, correction, or participant concern]
- **Response owner:** [Name and authority]
- **Review date:** [YYYY-MM-DD]
- **Rationale:** [Explain the ethical balance without hiding uncertainty]