Ethics, technology,
and democratic progress
A nonprofit think tank studying the ethical and policy implications of emerging technologies — with a commitment to human freedom, health, and democratic governance.
What drives our work
Health and Longevity
We make the case for longer, healthier lives as a genuine policy priority — and push back on ageist and ableist attitudes that limit access to health technology.
Global Democracy and Security
We work to strengthen democratic institutions at the global level and advocate for policies that reduce catastrophic risks to humanity and the biosphere.
Political Empowerment
We investigate how emerging technologies can expand citizen engagement and give ordinary people more meaningful control over the decisions that shape their lives.
Why IEET exists
The Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies is a nonprofit think tank which promotes ideas about how technological progress can increase freedom, happiness, and human flourishing in democratic societies. We believe that technological progress can be a catalyst for positive human development so long as we ensure that technologies are safe and equitably distributed. We call this a 'technoprogressive' orientation.
Focusing on emerging technologies that have the potential to positively transform social conditions and the quality of human lives — especially human enhancement technologies — the IEET seeks to cultivate academic, professional, and popular understanding of their implications, both positive and negative, and to encourage responsible public policies for their safe and equitable use.
The liberal democratic revolution, centuries old and still growing strong, has at its core the idea that people are happiest when they have rational control over their lives. Reason, science, and technology provide one kind of control, slowly freeing us from ignorance, toil, pain, and disease. Democracy provides the other kinds of control, through civil liberties and electoral participation.
Technology and democracy complement one another, ensuring that safe technology is generally accessible and democratically accountable. The convergence of nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, and cognitive science in the coming decades will give us unimaginable technological mastery of nature and ourselves. That mastery requires progressive democratization.
Our purpose is to stimulate and support constructive study of ethical issues connected with these powerful emerging technologies.
The questions we ask
The Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies was formed to study and debate vital questions about technology, society, and our collective future.
Which technologies — especially new ones — are likely to have the greatest impact on human beings and human societies in the 21st century?
What ethical issues do those technologies and their applications raise for humans, our civilization, and our world?
How much can we extrapolate from the past, and how much accelerating change should we anticipate?
What policy positions can be recommended to promote the best possible outcomes for individuals and societies?
Follow our work
We seek to engage the human rights community, legal scholars, reproductive rights activists, advocates of public health, and others in a campaign to deepen and broaden the intersection of human rights and technology policy.