ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces applied ethics in a law library context and reviews the current status of ethics in law librarianship. A central theme of ethics is decision-making between what may be right and what may be wrong. The librarian him- or herself may not be equipped, either intellectually or practically, to resolve such situations and ought to resort to the firm's ethics committee. The chapter suggests that it is morally unjustified to abrogate a wider obligation to provide an objectively balanced service on the basis that the lawyer may only expect a one-sided (that is, partisan) response. For proponents of the adversarial system, the notion of an adversarial role is accepted as an unavoidable element of the legal profession. Law librarians may often find themselves tempted to make use of their employer's information resources. Some law librarians have suggested that the reason none of professional associations has a code of ethics is that law librarianship is not a regulated profession.
