title: CARE Principles
aliases: [CARE, CARE principles, Indigenous data governance]
tags: [term]
category: Ethics & governance
summary: Indigenous data governance principles — Collective benefit, Authority to control, Responsibility, Ethics.

CARE Principles

A framework for how data about Indigenous Peoples should be governed, centering people and purpose rather than the data alone. CARE is meant to complement the widely used FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable), which say nothing about power, purpose, or who benefits. CARE stands for:

• Collective benefit: data ecosystems should be set up so that Indigenous Peoples actually benefit from data about them.
• Authority to control: Indigenous Peoples have the right to govern how their data, including their languages, is collected, accessed, and used.
• Responsibility: those who work with Indigenous data are responsible for nurturing respectful relationships and supporting Indigenous self-determination.
• Ethics: Indigenous Peoples' rights and wellbeing should be the primary concern at every stage of the data life cycle.

Introduced by Carroll et al. (2020), The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance.