The Nuremberg Code is a ten-point statement of research ethics articulated in the August 1947 judgment of United States v. Karl Brandt et al., the so-called Doctors' Trial held before US Military Tribunal I at Nuremberg. The tribunal convicted several Nazi physicians of crimes against humanity for lethal and coercive experiments conducted on concentration camp prisoners, including hypothermia, high-altitude, sulfanilamide, and sterilization experiments. To explain the legal standard against which the defendants' conduct was judged, the tribunal set out principles that came to be known collectively as the Code.
The Code's most cited element is its first principle: "The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential." The remaining nine points require, among other things, that experiments yield results beneficial to society and unprocurable by other means, be based on prior animal study, avoid unnecessary suffering, prohibit experiments where death or disabling injury is expected, keep risks proportionate to humanitarian importance, protect subjects from harm, be conducted only by scientifically qualified persons, allow the subject to withdraw at any time, and require the investigator to halt the experiment if continuation seems likely to cause injury or death.
Although the Code was not a treaty and has no direct binding force in international law, it became the foundational reference document for subsequent bioethics instruments, including the World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki (first adopted 1964, revised several times since), the Belmont Report (1979) in the United States, and the CIOMS International Ethical Guidelines for biomedical research. Its principles also inform Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966), which prohibits subjecting anyone "without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation."
For IR and human rights researchers, the Code is significant both as an early articulation of individual rights against state and institutional power and as a precursor to the modern international bioethics regime.
Example
In 1997, US President Bill Clinton formally apologized for the Tuskegee syphilis study, acknowledging that it violated principles later codified in the 1947 Nuremberg Code.
Frequently asked questions
No. It is a judicial statement of ethical principles, not a treaty or statute. However, its principles have been incorporated into national regulations, professional codes, and instruments like the ICCPR (Article 7).
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