The governance of research involving human participants in Canada.

This has resulted in increased public scrutiny over the past few decades in some countries like the United States and only more recently in others like Canada. In the midst of the repeated calls for increased public oversight of research activities, much attention has focussed on the development of social, ethical and legal norms. In addition, in many countries, ethics review committees (or research ethics boards (REBs) as they are called in Canada) were created to serve as the primary oversight mechanism of research involving humans primarily based in the institutional setting. These committees were created to review research protocols from a research ethics perspective that aims to promote ethical reflection and behaviour among those involved in research, with a particular focus on protecting and promoting the dignity and well-being of research participants. Ethics review committees have come under a lot of pressure and criticism in the past years and various national solutions proposed including, in some cases, in depth restructuring of the ethics review system that would include accreditation.