Stephen J. A. Ward, Ph.D
Stephen J. A. Ward is an internationally recognized media ethicist, historian of ideas, and award-winning author of 11 books on media ethics. His research is on the ethics of global, digital media, the rise of extreme media, and the impact of these trends on democracy.
He is professor emeritus and Distinguished Lecturer on Ethics for the University of British Columbia (UBC). A former war reporter, he is founding director of the Center for Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin, and co-founder of the UBC School of Journalism. He is former director of the George S. Turnbull Center in the University of Oregon’s School of Journalism.
Ward is author of the award-winning books Radical Media Ethics and The Invention of Journalism Ethics. He is editor-in-chief of the Springer Handbook of Global Media Ethics, a multi-volume, digital resource.
Radical Media Ethics, won the 2015 Tankard Award as the best academic book in journalism and mass communication, from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication in the United States. The Invention of Journalism Ethics won the 2005 Harold Innis Prize from the Canadian Federation of the Humanities and Social Sciences.
Dr. Ward was a war correspondent, foreign reporter, and newsroom manager for 14 years and has received a lifetime award for service to professional journalism in Canada. He covered conflicts in Yugoslavia, Bosnia, and Northern Ireland, among others. He has been the British Columbia bureau chief for The Canadian Press news agency in Vancouver. He is founding chair of the ethics committee of the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ). The CAJ recognized Prof. Ward with a lifetime service award to Canadian journalism.
He serves on many editorial and advisory boards for ethics organizations and for journals on media ethics and science, such a Journalism Studies and the Journal of Media Ethics.
Ward has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Waterloo, Ontario, and a Masters’ degree from the University of Toronto.