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Paper short abstract

Ethical reflection in QT remains dispersed across policy, academia, industry, and community initiatives. Rather than consolidating into a distinct field, “quantum ethics” operates as a distributed governance practice under conditions of early-stage maturity and geopolitical salience.

Paper long abstract

Quantum technologies (QT) are increasingly framed as strategically significant emerging technologies. At the same time, calls for “responsible quantum” and “quantum ethics” are gaining visibility. Unlike artificial intelligence, however, ethical reflection in QT has not consolidated into a recognisable interdisciplinary field.

This presentation examines how ethical discourse around QT is currently structured and institutionalised. Drawing on bibliometric mapping, policy analysis, and review of community and industry initiatives, ethical engagement is shown to be characterised by structural dispersion rather than disciplinary consolidation.

Three dominant approaches can be identified: pragmatic risk governance (e.g., cryptographic disruption and security concerns), normative principle-building (responsible innovation frameworks), and critical contextual analysis (geopolitics, sovereignty, and innovation systems). Ethical reflection emerges across multiple sites — grassroots networks, academic scholarship, multilateral governance platforms, and corporate responsibility initiatives — without a stable institutional centre.

As a result, governance integration often substitutes for field formation. Ethical concerns are embedded within strategic roadmaps, policy architectures, and industry standards rather than institutionalised as an autonomous domain of inquiry.

Quantum technologies thus provide an empirical case for examining how ethical authority, coordination, and anticipatory governance are organised under conditions of early-stage technological maturity and high geopolitical salience.