Privacy as Professional Identity

This article explores an important course of action to safeguarding privacy in the workplace, grounded in the professional identity of workers and their corresponding moral and ethical duties towards clients or patients. Described as “privacy as professional identity,” this concept is developed through two key contributions. First, the article argues that workers who are ethically and legally obligated to protect the confidentiality and privacy of their clients or patients — such as psychologists and lawyers — also inherently safeguard their own personal privacy. This argument is substantiated through illustrative examples and anchored in theoretical frameworks concerning the right to privacy. Second, the article critically evaluates the advantages and limitations of privacy as professional identity, contrasting them with the two dominant paradigms in labour law scholarship: privacy as an individual right, and privacy protected by collective action through trade unions or other forms of employee representation. By doing so, the article demonstrates the potential of privacy as professional identity to enhance workplace privacy protections, either independently or in conjunction with these established strategies.