Abstract
I would like to thank Ann Gallagher for the comprehensive and astute account of the journal’s activities over the past 30 years. It is wonderful to see the journal thrive and have an increasing global presence, although there is certainly still work to do.
I would like to pick up on the concern that the publications within the journal have the potential to be merely ornamentation. I take up this concern because it is one that I have considered myself regarding the field of nursing ethics including the work I have produced. Over recent years, there has been much recognition that little empirical research in healthcare, including nursing research, has an impact on practice and when it does, it tends to be delayed by many years. In response to these concerns, knowledge synthesis, knowledge translation, and implementation science approaches have grown in popularity. It is notable that in Nursing Ethics, there has been a significant increase in literature reviews that synthesize existing studies and an increase in studies that have examined the impact of various interventions such as those to reduce moral distress. These types of studies have the potential to have impact and hence go beyond ornamentation and should be encouraged.
I also have wondered about the impact of our work in nursing ethics to change how people think by introducing new ideas, questioning assumptions, and fostering the capacity to think critically and reflect. These are typically the basis for arguments made for the importance of the humanities in education put forth by Nussbaum and others. This impact is more difficult to measure but may have the greatest potential for the journal to influence the thinking and practice of nurses who work in increasingly complex, and often broken, healthcare systems. The need for this type of education may be of growing importance given the rise of mis/disinformation and racial intolerance that require the capacity for critical reflexivity to resist.
Unfortunately, the pressures on many nursing academics to secure large grants for scientific studies along with the importance placed on data-based publications may continue to impede the publication of philosophical manuscripts. While both empirical and philosophical work in nursing ethics can potentially serve the purpose of promoting critical thinking, the decline of philosophical work in the journal is problematic because this scholarship focuses on the conceptual and normative aspects of nursing ethics. This work is not only important in its own right; it is also important because without it the concepts and normative dimensions of empirical studies may not receive adequate attention and may remain underdeveloped. Clearly, the journal needs to continue to promote the submission of these types of philosophical manuscripts.
Despite my concerns, however, I am hopeful for the continuation of the journal, the future of the field, and the value of my brief “apology” of nursing ethics.