ICAIMT — The Digital Oath for Corporate Governance: A First Model
Marianne Najm, Joao Francisco do Amaral Giovani · Journal of Information & Knowledge Management · 2025
This paper introduces the Digital Oath framework, in a theoretical study about an approach designed to translate high-level ethical principles into actionable commitments for corporate governance in the age of artificial intelligence. Drawing inspiration from the enduring Hippocratic Oath, the Digital Oath is built upon three foundational pillars, Participation, Do No Harm, and Do Good, offering a structured pathway for embedding ethical responsibility throughout organisations. The three foundational pillars establish three cumulative levels of commitment named Safe, Responsible and Beneficent, bringing, respectively, awareness and human rights, avoidance of harm through justice, transparency, and accountability, and the active promotion of solidarity, sustainability, and the common good. The paper describes the studied oath and the challenges of such a framework, then introduces the concept of Collaborative Positive Ethics (CPE), a key part of the framework, which provides support to oath-takers to overcome challenges in a collaborative way, reinforcing positive ethical engagement across stakeholders. The paper then reveals the dynamics of such an oath that include creating mechanisms for public certification for corporations and for individuals, highlighting success stories, continuous monitoring and defining appropriate metrics, explaining the importance of corporate governance ethics. With its structure and content accompanied by CPE, the Digital Oath looks at the individuals in every role and provides guidelines, guardrails and a network of support to reinforce ethics in the corporate governance realm, fostering professionalism, facilitating moral deliberation and enhancing compliance.