phenomenological approach to information technology and its social and ethical implications

Artifact / tool Approach
View of technology / society relationship	Technologies are tools that society draws upon to do certain things it would not otherwise be able to do. When tools become incorporated in practices it tends to have a more or less determinable impact on those practices.
Approach to ethical implications of technology	The task of ethics is to analyze the impact of technology on practices by applying existing or new moral theories to construct guidelines or policies that will ‘correct’ the injustices or infringements of rights caused by the implementation and use of the particular technology.

Social Constructivist Approach
View of technology / society relationship	Technology and society co-construct each other from the start. There is an ongoing interplay between the social practices and the technological artifacts (both in its design and in its use). This ongoing interplay means that technological artifacts and human practices become embedded in a multiplicity of ways that are mostly not determinable in any significant way.
Approach to ethical implications of technology	The task of ethics if to be actively involved in disclosing the assumptions, values and interests being ‘built into’ the design, implementation and use of the technology. The task of ethics is not to prescribe policies or corrective action but to continue to open the ‘black box’ for scrutiny and ethical consideration and deliberation.

Phenomenological Approach
View of technology / society relationship	Technology and society co-constitute each other. They are each other's condition of possibility to be. Technology is not the artifact alone it is also the technological attitude or disposition that made the artifact appear as meaningful and necessary in the first instance. However, once in existence artifacts and the disposition that made them meaningful also discloses the world beyond the mere presence of the artifacts.
Approach to ethical implications of technology	The task of ethics is to point back to the attitudes and moods that made particular technologies show up as meaningful and necessary. It seeks to interrogate these assumptions and attitudes so as to problematize our ongoing relationship with technology.

reference:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-it-phenomenology/