PROFESSIONAL ETHICS FOR IT PRACTITIONERS IN PUBLIC SERVICE IN SOUTH AFRICA

The association between professionalism and ethics should be strong within the public service. Professionalism imbues its practitioners (such as Information Technology (IT) practitioners) with a code of ethics and a public service ideal. In South Africa codes of professional ethics are often established by professional organizations. One example is The Institute of Information Technology Professionals South Africa (IITPSA), formerly known as the Computer Society South Africa. The IITPSA guides its members so that work functions are undertaken according to consistent and sound ethical principles. From a scan of public service advertisements in the South African press, it appears that there are no vacant IT practitioner posts requiring professional registration with the IITPSA. There is thus a need for the public service, when advertising future IT practitioner posts to state that registration with the IITPSA is an essential requirement. Such registration will give focus to and serve to enhance professional ethics for IT practitioners in the public service.