Etiska

Etiska is a Swedish adjective meaning ethical or relating to ethics. It is derived from etik, the concept of morality and codes of conduct, which itself comes from Latin ethica and Greek ethos. In Swedish, etiska is used to describe actions, rules, or beliefs that are considered morally acceptable or inappropriate according to a given standard. Common phrases include etiska principer (ethical principles), etiska riktlinjer (ethical guidelines), and etiska problem or frågor.

The term is used across various domains, such as medical ethics (medicinsk etik), business ethics, and research ethics (etisk prövning av forskning). It also appears in discussions of normative ethics, which studies how people ought to act, metaethics, which examines the nature of moral judgments, and applied ethics, which focuses on concrete issues like privacy, animal welfare, or environmental responsibility.

In institutional contexts, bodies concerned with ethics may be described as etiska nämnder or etiska kommittéer and operate to evaluate actions or proposals against established ethical standards. In everyday language, etiska considerations are used to evaluate decisions from a moral perspective. The word forms part of a broader family of cognates in other languages (ethics in English, éthique in French), reflecting shared roots in ancient philosophical traditions. The term remains central to discussions of morality, law, and public policy in Swedish-speaking contexts.