Abstract
This article responds to the challenge implicit in the words ‘provisional draft’ appended to the title of the Ethical principles of Clinical Psychologists proposed for the SAICP by Steere and Wassenaar. An ethical code should be understood not only as a device for protecting and aiding the public but also as a way in which clinical psychology defines itself as a profession. It may even be the case that this second aspect of the code is the more powerful. The code rests on three assumptions: those of universalism, voluntarism and individualism, all of which can be viewed as relating to an underlying liberal ideology. The position of the clinical psychologist who does not accept this ideology is raised. Formalizing the code into anything more than a ‘provisional draft’ may obscure the historic specificity of the code and the particular views and interests it serves.

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