Philosophy strives to give us a firmer hold on our concepts. But what about their hold on us? Why place ourselves under the sway of a concept and grant it the authority to shape our thought and conduct? Another conceptualization would carry different implications. What makes one way of thinking better than another? This book develops a framework for concept appraisal. Its guiding idea is that to question the authority of concepts is to ask for reasons of a special kind: (...) reasons for concept use, which tell us which concepts to adopt, adhere to, or abandon, thereby shoring up—or undercutting—the reasons for action and belief that guide our deliberations. Traditionally, reasons for concept use have been sought either in timeless rational foundations or in concepts’ inherent virtues, such as precision and consistency. Against this, the book advances two main claims: that we find reasons for concept use in the conceptual needs we discover when we critically distance ourselves from a concept by viewing it from the autoethnographic stance; and that sometimes, concepts that conflict, or exhibit other vices such as vagueness or superficiality, are just what we need. By considering not what concepts are absolutely best, but what concepts we now need, we can reconcile ourselves to the contingency of our concepts, determine the proper place of efforts to tidy up thought, and adjudicate between competing conceptions of things,—even things as contested as liberty or free will. A needs-based approach separates helpful clarification from hobbling tidy-mindedness, and authoritative definition from conceptual gerrymandering. (shrink)

Virtue and deontological ethics are now commonly contrasted as rival approaches to moral inquiry. However, I argue that neither metaethical party should seek complete, solitary domination of the ethical domain. Reductive treatments of the right or the virtuous, as well as projects that abandon the former or latter, are bound to leave us with a sadly diminished map of the moral territories crucial to our lives. Thus, it is better for the two parties to seek a more cordial and equal (...) relationship, one that permits metaethical pluralism, and acknowledges mutual dependence. I do not seek to prescribe how that relationship should look: this essay offers less a positive metaethical position than a prolegomenon to such a position, one that attempts to head off harmful attempts to reduce the territory of the aretaic to that of the deontic, or that of the deontic to the aretaic. (shrink)

This article explores the implications of what it means to moralize about future technological innovations. Specifically, I have been invited to comment on three papers that attempt to think about what seems to be an impending social reality: the availability of life-like sex robots. In response, I explore what it means to moralize about future technological innovations from a secular perspective, i.e., a perspective grounded in an immanent, socio-historically contingent view. I review the arguments of Nancy Jecker, Mark Howard and (...) Robert Sparrow, and Wang Jue and respond to their arguments concerning the permissible limits of human-robot sexual interaction. I argue that we are in a poor epistemic position regarding what the actual future human response will be towards sex robots and how it affects society generally. Given this poor epistemic position, I argue that moralizing about future trends like human-robot sex is difficult because we do not have the relevant facts to work with. Furthermore, I remain skeptical as to policy recommendations based on socio-historically contingent moral viewpoints both because they do not carry in principle moral authority to say what future others may or may not do with their property and they may not even appeal to future secular others, insofar as secular morality is plural and consistently develops anew. (shrink)

Since the publication of Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue in 1981, tensions inherent to the relationship between morally educative practices and the institutions that house them have been widely noted. We propose a taxonomy of the ways in which the pursuit of external goods by institutions undermines the pursuit of the internal goods of practices. These comprise substitution, where the institution replaces the pursuit of one type of good by another; frustration, where opportunities for practitioners to discover goods or develop new (...) standards of excellence are frustrated by institutional priorities and resource allocation; and injustice, which undermines the integrity of relationships within the organization and/or with partners. These threats, though analytically distinct, are often mutually reinforcing. This conceptual contribution is illustrated both by the extant literature and by a novel context, the three-ring circus. (shrink)

What I refer to here as the dilemma of authority arises when one ought to defer to authority; one ought to act as the more weighty reason demands; one can do either; one cannot do both. For those who reject the possibility of legitimate authority, the dilemma does not arise. Among those who accept legitimate authority, some, including Joseph Raz, presume the conflict can be resolved without remainder. In this paper, I argue that, in a moral conflict of this kind, (...) when one of the reasons for action is defeated but not cancelled, it is rational to feel regret for failing to do what one ought to do. (shrink)

Communitarians reject the impartial and universal viewpoint of liberal morality in favor of the "situated" viewpoint of the agent's community, and elevate political community into the moral community. I show that the preeminence of political community in communitarian morality is incompatible with concern for people's lives in the partial communities of family, friends, or others. Ironically, it is also incompatible with the communitarian thesis about the situated nature of moral agency. Political community is preeminent in communitarianism because of its unargued-for (...) assumption that a good society is a morally unified society. I further argue that the ability to take the impartial standpoint is essential to the ability to make particular commitments that have an intrinsic human importance. (shrink)

When Aristotle limits the manifestation of true courage to the military context only, his primary target is an overly inclusive conception of courage presented by Plato in the Laches. At the same time, Aristotle explicitly tries to demarcate his ideal of genuine courage from the paradigmatic examples of courageous actions derived from the Homeric epics. It remains questionable, though, whether Aristotle is truly earnest in his efforts to distance himself from Homer. It will be argued that Aristotle's attempt to associate (...) with Homer the two forms of specious courage—courage of the citizen troops and spirit-caused courage—fails to provide sufficient criteria for the demarcation in question. All the essential elements of the Aristotelian account of courage, such as a voluntary choice, a noble goal, and a thumos-driven reaction guided by reason are exemplified by a number of Homeric characters as well. It is thus likely that the philosopher's account of courage largely incorporates the poetic tradition at a new level, rather than supersedes it. (shrink)

Noting the prevalence of a misguided suspicion towards tradition, as well as an overt misunderstanding of the very notion of tradition in certain academic circles, this essay seeks to outline some of the basic tenets of an alternative understanding of tradition, based on a ‘sociological’ reading of several major philosophical works. It does so by revisiting and synthesizing some well-known, highly influential conceptual arguments that, taken together, offer a compelling, comprehensive interpretation and understanding of tradition, which manages to avoid and (...) overcome the false dichotomies that have dominated social-scientific thought. The article offers three corresponding analogies that capture the complex nature of tradition: tradition as language, tradition as narrative, and tradition as horizon. It then goes on to discuss the main implications these analogies carry to our understanding of tradition. (shrink)

Children as learners need adults who love them, even when the children are unable to give anything in return. Furthermore, adults should be able to make wise judgements concerning what is good for the children. The clarification of these principles and of their educational import has to start within our own cultural tradition. Agape (unconditional love, neighbour-love or charity) is a basic concept in the Christian tradition. Phronesis (moral wisdom, practical judgement or prudence) has a key position in the Aristotelian (...) tradition. In his Summa Theologiae Thomas Aquinas has combined these traditions and ethical concepts, with agape (in Latin caritas) as the commanding concept. The article will explore some key challenges and productive resources revealed by this combination for today’s education and upbringing. (shrink)

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (hereafter NICE) was created in 1998 to give guidance on which treatments should be provided by the British National Health Service, and to whom. So it has a crucial role as an agent of distributive justice. In this paper I argue that it is failing to adequately explain and justify its decisions in the public arena, particularly in terms of distributive justice; and that this weakens its legitimacy, to the detriment of the (...) National Health Service as a whole. I argue that this failure arises from the fact that NICE works within the frameworks of positivist science and liberal ethics, largely to the exclusion of other perspectives. This narrowness of view prevents NICE from properly connecting with the range of moral concerns represented in the population. I argue for NICE’s deliberations to become more inclusive, both in terms of epistemology, and also in terms of ethical perspectives. And I suggest a range of perspectives that could usefully be included. Finally I offer a framework of structures, philosophies and discussion process that will enable competing perspectives to be debated fairly and productively in this process. (shrink)

Research evidencing the consequences of the experience of ‘calling’ have multiplied in recent years. At the same time, concerns have been expressed about the conceptual coherence of the notion as studies have posited a wide variety of senses in which both workers and scholars understand what it means for workers to be called, what they are called to do and who is doing the ‘calling’. This paper makes both conceptual and empirical contributions to the field. We argue that Bellah et (...) al.’s (Habits of the heart: Individualism and commitment in American life, University of California Press, 1996) contrast between tradition-based and expressivist understandings of ‘calling’ highlights a fundamental but neglected fissure in the literature. Expressivist accounts amongst both scholars and research participants require only that ‘calling’ be deeply felt by those who experience it. However, tradition-based accounts require an external caller. Exemplifying this, workers who attest to a divine call and scholars who write about ‘calling’ in the context of particular Christian traditions understand ‘calling’ in terms of a relationship with God. These accounts cannot but be in radical tension. We suggest that this conceptual confusion can be understood in terms of MacIntyre’s notion of ‘tradition-constituted rationality.’ The implications of this argument for practice are evidenced in our report of a study of adherents to one such tradition, workers at a Christian organization that supports people in poverty. Through in-depth interviews with long-term volunteers, we seek to assess if tradition-based ‘calling’ can be evidenced in unpaid work for the lack of pay and career progression opportunities strongly suggest the presence of ‘calling.’ This study demonstrates that even in the context of work that exhibits duty and altruism associated with expressivist accounts of ‘calling,’ these workers’ understanding of the relationships between themselves, their clients and Jesus Christ dominate their work choices. It is the meaning derived from a divine caller, understood in terms of Christian tradition, that accounts for their decision to begin and to continue this work. (shrink)

Consistent with the idea that business ethics is a form of applied ethics, many virtue ethicists make use of an extant (pure) moral philosophy framework, namely, one developed by Alasdair MacIntyre. In doing so, these authors have refined MacIntyre’s work, but have never really challenged it. In here questioning, and developing an alternative to, the MacIntyrean orthdoxy, I illustrate the merit of business ethicists adopting a broader philosophical perspective focused on constructing (new) theory. More specifically—and in referring to action sports (...) (e.g., mountain biking, snowboarding)—I propose that an external good motive is not only much more consistent with virtuous practical excellence than MacIntyreans acknowledge, but that such a motive is fundamental to identifying and explaining how practices can be deliberately created (by businesses). Consequently, and in stark contrast with MacIntyre’s deeply pessimistic outlook on modern business and society, I propose that those who value practices might celebrate our current era. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to investigate appropriate methods for educating students into citizenship within a pluralistic state and to explain why civic education is itself important. In this discussion, I will offer suggestions as to how students might be best prepared for their future political roles as participants in a democracy, and how we, as theorists, ought to structure institutions and curricula in order to ensure that students are adequately trained for political decision making. The paper is divided (...) into six sections. In the first two sections, I argue that community is a learned understanding and that such education,even when it supports liberal commitments,cannot be neutral. I use the social contract tradition as an entrance into the perpetual nature of conflict within a pluralist society. In the third and fourth sections, I develop a pedagogy geared towards educating students into what I call cognitive conflict, and argue that the arts, widely understood, should be privileged over other disciplines. In the fifth section, I examine two difficulties inherent inmy pedagogy — first that it seems to demandthat all perspectives be taught, and second that it seems to promote anxiety among students. In the final section, I ask that political theory reexamine the role of harmony in justice. I conclude that a managed conflictis a more acceptable organizational description of liberal political structures. (shrink)

This paper is both a response to the four reviewers in a special symposium on my book Adam Smith’s Pluralism and a substantive discussion of philosophy of education. In it, I introduce what I call “the educative critique,” a mode of analysis similar to Marxist, feminist, or postcolonial critiques, but focusing on the educative role of a text. I argue that choosing education as a theme is itself a solution to interpretive difficulties, not an add-on that only concerns pedagogues and (...) policy-makers. (shrink)

The idea of moral reform requires that morality be more than a description of what people do value, for there has to be some measure against which to assess progress. Otherwise, any change is not reform, but simply difference. Therefore, I discuss moral reform in relation to two prescriptive approaches to common morality, which I distinguish as the foundational and the pragmatic. A foundational approach to common morality (e.g., Bernard Gert’s) suggests that there is no reform of morality , but (...) of beliefs, values, customs, and practices so as to conform with an unchanging, foundational morality. If, however, there were revision in its foundation (e.g., in rationality), then reform in morality itself would be possible. On a pragmatic view, on the other hand, common morality is relative to human flourishing, and its justification consists in its effectiveness in promoting flourishing. Morality is dependent on what in fact does promote human flourishing and therefore, could be reformed. However, a pragmatic approach, which appears more open to the possibility of moral reform, would need a more robust account of norms by which reform is measured. (shrink)

Some years ago, 1985, Alasdair MacIntyre wrote a paper onThe Idea of an Educated Public in which he argued that the only route open for educators for the future, in order to emerge out of the current moral ‘crisis’ created by the ‘emotivist’ modernist culture is to bring back the idea of an ‘educated public’ from the Scottish Enlightenment and to regard education as education into such a public. The notion of an ‘educated public’, in effect, reappears also in all (...) his later books on moral philosophy, particular his latest,Three Rival Theories of Moral Enquiry, where he takes up his original proposal that educated publics should grow around universities and canvasses the new idea that under contemporary conditions what we may need is not one universal university but three kinds contextualized within the three rival kinds of cultural and moral programmes he identifies, and, correspondingly, three kinds of educated public. This paper tries to trace the evolution of MacIntyre's idea of an educated public throughout his work, arguing that there is one particular perspective on the idea which he strangely omits, that represented by Dewey/Habermas, and critiquing his final solution on the basis of its possibility and political desirability. (shrink)

Making better choices about future technologies that are being researched or developed is an important motivator behind lay ethics interventions. However, in practice, they do not always succeed to serve that goal. Especially authors who have noted that lay ethicists sometimes take recourse to well-known themes which stem from old, even ‘archetypical’ stories, have been criticized for making too little room for agency and decision-making in their approach. This paper aims to contribute to a reflection on how lay ethics can (...) acquire more practical relevance. It will use resources in narrative ethics to suggest that in order to be relevant for action, facilitators of lay ethics interventions need to invite participants to engage in a narrative quest. As part of a quest, lay ethicists should be asked to reflect on a specific question or choice, use diverse input which is informative about the heterogeneity of viewpoints that are defended in society and argue for their standpoints. (shrink)

This article argues that, despite its reputation as a homogenising and authoritarian system, the political thought of Bernard Bosanquet contains resources with which to develop a robust and culturally sensitive model of liberal multiculturalism. Throughout the discussion, Bosanquet's thought is located within contemporary theoretical debates. The first section rehearses the critique of Millian liberalism developed by Bhikhu Parekh and others, which alleges that the considerations of individuality and autonomy underlying such a political order preclude it from showing adequate respect for (...) cultures which do not conceive of personal identity in essentially individualistic terms. The next section sketches Bosanquet's social theory, as a preclude to the rebuttal of allegedly insurmountable barriers to the theory's accommodation of cultural diversity. Specifically, section three counters the objection that Bosanquet sanctions the imposition of internal restrictions on personal dissent. The final section rebuts the claim that a General Will cannot exist within a culturally diverse society, showing that in reality Bosanquet's theory leads us to endorse the ‘fundamental beliefs’ of a multi-ethnic society outlined recently in the Parekh Report. It is concluded that, when drawing on Bosanquet's thought, a liberal multicultural society can take different forms and yet still show proper respect for cultural diversity. (shrink)

The reconstructive theory of the procedural legitimacy of modern law developed on the basis of the theory of discourse ethics has limited itself solely to the deontological, moral‐normative aspects of the validity claims of legal norms and judgments. However, teleological and axiological aspects are also intertwined with legal validity claims and with the procedures in which legal norms and judgments are produced. The discursive‐procedural concept of legitimacy seems to require as its support, instead of the theory of discourse ethics, a (...) general theory of practical discourses or, more generally, of rational collective will‐formation. (shrink)

Learning and development are often linked in the organization studies literature. To understand the dynamics of organizational moral development, this paper utilizes the notion of organizational moral learning (OML). It is explored using three perspectives: organizational learning, Islamic and critical realist perspectives. The perspectives are then synthesized together to form a single framework, called the OML by ‘spiritual hearts’ framework. At the centre of the framework is the spiritual heart, the seat of profound understanding and moral consciousness. The heart plays (...) a central role in organizational moral development, especially with regard to its potential to be ‘purified’ and corrupted. Two extreme parameters then are created: on one side is the ‘purified hearts’ with high moral consciousness contributing towards OML, and on the other is the ‘corrupted hearts’ with high immoral consciousness contributing towards organizational immoral learning. Between the two extremes are the ‘diseased hearts’, possessing a mixture of moral and immoral consciousness to various degrees, and have the potentials to contribute to both moral and immoral developments. The paper further suggests strategies to facilitate OML and simultaneously inhibits organizational immoral learning. (shrink)

It is often stated that the German twentieth-century philosopher Martin Heidegger never wrote an ethics while undertaking his critique and deconstruction of the Western tradition of metaphysics. It is, therefore, difficult to know what manner of normative ethics, if any, is consistent with his “hermeneutic of Dasein” such as articulated in his Being and Time. However, in his “Letter on Humanism,” Heidegger refers to the tragedies of Sophocles as “preserving the ēthos” more originally, thus better, than does Aristotle’s ethics. Hence, (...) one may examine Sophocles’s tragedies guided by the hermeneutic Heidegger provides, especially through the concepts of authenticity and authentic selfhood. Doing so, it is argued here that Sophocles’s Philoctetes presents one such opportunity for moral understanding in the interplay of authenticity and inauthenticity, in particular through a study of the moral dilemma that Neoptolemus must resolve as he moves from a situation of inauthenticity to a display of authentic resolve. (shrink)

The beliefs both that sentimental education is a vital part of moral education and that habituation is a vital part of sentimental education can be counted as being at the ‘hard core’ of the Aristotelian tradition of moral thought and action. On the basis of an explanation of the defining characteristics of Aristotelian habituation, this paper explores how and why habituation may be an effective way of cultivating the sentimental dispositions that are constitutive of the moral virtues. Taking Aristotle’s explicit (...) remarks on ethismos as a starting point, we present habituation as essentially involving (i) acting as virtue requires, (ii) both frequently and consistently, and (iii) under the supervision of a virtuous tutor. If the focus is on the first two characteristics, habituation seems to be a proper method for acquiring skills or inculcating habits, rather than an effective way of cultivating virtuous sentimental dispositions. It will be argued, however, that even if only the first two characteristics are taken into account, habituation may be an efficacious means of moderating, reducing or restricting the child’s affective dispositions where these are somehow excessive. But contrary to Aristotle’s view, the effectiveness of processes of habituation that are directed at strengthening, deepening or broadening the child’s sentimental dispositions where these are somehow deficient seems to be a function of the third characteristic, especially of the affective responses of the virtuous tutor to the child’s behaviour. At the end of the paper, this predominantly non-cognitive account of the workings of Aristotelian habituation will be compared with Nancy Sherman’s primarily cognitive view. (shrink)

The modern university is a demoralizing institution, largely devoted to the propagation of nihilism and liberation of desire. The apotheosis of this hungry god of the untrammeled will has taken more than 200 years, but the slow ascent has given humanistic scholarship its basic shape. The ascent of 'reason' over tradition and religion, at the end of the eighteenth century, caused conservative thought to emerge, reluctantly, and frame rational defenses of natural (i.e. spontaneously evolved) social institutions and belief systems. This (...) has always been handicapped by the need to fight rationalism with reason. This same ascent inspired revolutionary theorists to frame their ringing denunciations and inspiring panaceas, most of which proved purely destructive because of the tragic inability of revolutionary practice to produce the promised and indispensable metanoia. Partly due to the limited success of conservative thought and revolutionary theory, untrammeled will has, more recently, ascended over reason, tradition, and religion, to give us the postmodern nihilism of Luciferian scholars. (shrink)

Best known as a political philosopher, Alasdair MacIntyre is also a critic of the modern university. The paper examines the grounds of MacIntyre's criticism of modern universities; it offers an assessment of the philosophical debate occasioned by MacIntyre's writings on the topic; and it proposes a way of taking this debate forward. The debate is shown to be centred around three objections to MacIntyre's normative idea of the university: that it is overly intellectualist, parochial, and moralizing. The merits of these (...) objections are considered and a different interpretation of the normative core of MacIntyre's conception of the university is presented: realization and promotion of the common good. An analysis is offered of the kinds of common good universities may serve to realize, including practices internal to the institution, education of a public, and flourishing relationships in various social roles. The implications of this neo-Aristotelian analysis of the normative core of universities is also shown to be at odds with some of MacIntyre's explicitly stated views on the role of universities in forming an educated pubic and educating students for work. (shrink)

Storm surges, flooding, heatwaves, and prolonged drought, as ever more regular features of life under deteriorating climate conditions, are unmistakably violent. Their effects on the lives of vulnerable human populations and ecosystems across the world are widely known to be devastating. Yet a legal order that denies the victims of such ecological persecution safe haven, no matter how great its use of force (e.g., detention, arrest, forced return) cannot, by definition, be violent. The power of law, used to protect states’ (...) rights to exclude from their jurisdictions growing numbers displaced involuntarily by global climate harms, in being a source of ‘legitimate right’, is never the same as violence. This article challenges the ongoing validity of this assumption. It points to some of the ways in which legal instruments are used today to deny those displaced by climatic conditions sufficient normative status to guarantee their safety. What is needed instead is a new critical normative understanding of the evolving relationship between climate change, violence, justice, and law, one that re-assesses the democratic justificatory grounds for the current positions of non-responsibility for the climate displaced whilst re-affirming such people’s legal and political status as equal co-members of the politically constituted international community of humanity. (shrink)

This paper draws a distinction between ‘right MacIntyreans’ who are relatively optimistic that MacIntyre’s vision of ethics can be realised in capitalist society, and ‘left MacIntyreans’ who are sceptical about this possibility, and aims to show that the ‘left MacIntyrean’ position is a promising perspective available to business ethicists. It does so by arguing for a distinction between ‘community-focused’ practices and ‘excellence-focused’ practices. The latter concept fulfils the promise of practices to provide us with an understanding of the best work (...) for humankind and highlights the affinities between MacIntyre’s concept of a practice and Marx’s conception of good work as free, creative activity. The paper concludes with a suggestion that we reflect on the best forms of work so that we can strive to ensure the very best activities, those most consonant with our flourishing, one day become available to all. (shrink)

This paper argues that Quaker business ethics can be understood as a MacIntyrean tradition. To do so, it draws on three key MacIntyrean concepts: community, compartmentalisation, and the critique of management. The emphasis in Quaker business ethics on finding unity, as well as the emphasis that Quaker businesses have placed on serving their local areas, accords with MacIntyre’s claim that small-scale community is essential to human flourishing. The emphasis on integrity in Quaker business ethics means practitioners are well-placed to resist (...) the compartmentalising pressures of contemporary work. Quaker business ethics is also highly critical of the manipulative forms of management that MacIntyre regards as dominant. As such, Quaker business ethics provides evidence that more morally ameliorative forms of running business organisations is possible, even if they remain difficult to achieve. (shrink)

Central to argumentation theory is a concern with normativity. Argumentation theorists are concerned, among other things, with explaining why some arguments are good (or at least better than others) in the sense that a given argument provides reasons for embracing its conclusion which are such that a fair- minded appraisal of the argument yields the judgment that the conclusion ought to be accepted -- is worthy of acceptance -- by all who so appraise it.

Artikkel käsitleb kriitiliselt üht viimaste kümnendite vastandust poliitilises filosoofias — ‘poliitilise liberalismi’ (Rawls) ja ‘radikaalse demokraatia’ (Laclau ja Mouffe) vahel. Artikkel püüab käivitada potentsiaalset dialoogi nende kahe näiliselt lahkneva lähenemise vahel. Kokkuvõttes näitab artikkel, et vastandus on möödarääkimine vähemalt ühes fundamentaalses mõttes: mõlemad lähenemised jagavad ühiskonnastmõtlemisel sama aluseetost. Artiklis nimetatakse seda ‘sattumuslikkuse eetoseks’ ning väidetakse, et see on kõige fundamentaalsem alusveendumus nii Laclau ja Mouffe’i ‘radikaalse demokraatia’ kui ka Rawlsi ‘õigluse kui ausameelsuse’ idee jaoks. Artikkel osutab ka ühele kesksele kitsaskohale (...) Laclau ja Mouffe’i lähenemises: nende suutmatusele kontseptualiseerida institutsioonilisi korraldusi tulenevalt nende ülemäärasest rõhuasetust demokraatia dekonstruktiivsele potentsiaalile. Selles suhtes osutatakse ka Rawlsi käsitluse ilmselgetele eelistele, kuna see pakub juhiseid organiseerimaks demokraatlikke institutsioone. The paper concentrates on a controversy in recent decades’ political thought between ‘political liberalism’ of Rawls and ‘radical democracy’ (represented in this paper by Laclau and Mouffe). The article tries to initiate a potential dialogue between these seemingly divisive approaches. In conclusion the paper maintains that the whole controversy is misguided in one fundamental respect: both approaches share the same underlying ethos in envisioning society—‘the ethos of contingency’. It is argued that it is the most fundamental tenet informing both Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony with its complementary idea of ‘radical democracy’, and justice as fairness conceived in terms of reciprocity with its accompanying idea of public justification and reflective equilibrium. _e article points to a central impasse in Laclau and Mouffe’s approach: its incapability to conceptualize institutional arrangements due to their overemphasis on the deconstructive potential of democracy. In this respect the obvious merits of Rawls’ conception are highlighted in view of his proposals for organizing democratic institutions. (shrink)

The values of nursing arise from a concern with human flourishing. If the desire to become a nurse is a reflection of an aspiration to care for others in need then we should anticipate that those who choose to nurse have a tendency towards the values we would normally associate with a caring profession (care, compassion, perhaps altruism, and so on). However, these values require a secure base if they are not to succumb to the corrupting pressures of the increasingly (...) instrumental nature of the values of the institutions in which healthcare in general and nursing in particular takes place. One way of securing a base for withstanding the corrupting influences of the institution is to understand nursing as a practice in the sense in which Alasdair MacIntyre uses that term. In this brief paper I will outline ways in which the managerial imperative of meeting targets is both distorting practice and undermining nursing’s values. I conclude that understanding nursing as a MacIntyrean practice provides a refuge from what might otherwise be overwhelming pressures for nurses to adopt instrumental values to the detriment of professional caring values. (shrink)

Alasdair MacIntyre has developed a theory of the rationality of traditions that is designed to show how we can maintain both the tradition-bound nature of rationality, on the one hand, and non-relativism, on the other. However, his theory has been widely criticized. A number of recent commentators have argued that the theory is either inconsistent with his own conception of rationality or else is dependent on the standards of his particular tradition and therefore fails to defuse the threat of relativism. (...) In the present essay, I argue that this objection is mistaken. (shrink)

The advocates of Integrative Bioethics have insisted that this recently emerging project aspires to become a new stage of bioethical development, surpassing both biomedically oriented bioethics and global bioethics. We claim in this paper that if the project wants to successfully replace the two existing paradigms, it at least needs to properly address and surmount the lack of common moral vocabulary problem. This problem points to a semantic incommensurability due to cross-language communication in moral terms. This paper proceeds as follows. (...) In the first part, we provide an overview of Integrative Bioethics and its conceptual building blocks: mutlidisciplinarity, interdisciplinarity, and transdisciplinarity. In the second part, we disclose the problem of semantic incommensurability. The third part gives an overview of various positions on the understanding of interdisciplinarity and integration in interdisciplinary communication, and corresponding attempts at solving the lack of common moral vocabulary problem. Here we lean mostly on Holbrook’s three theses regarding the character of interdisciplinary communication. Finally, in the fourth part, we discuss a particular bioethical case—that of euthanasia—to demonstrate the challenge semantic incommensurability poses to dialogues in Integrative Bioethics. We conclude that Integrative Bioethics does not offer a methodological toolset that would warrant optimism in its advocates’ predictions of surpassing current modes of doing bioethics. Since Integrative Bioethics leaves controversial methodological questions unresolved on almost all counts and shows no attempts at overcoming the critical stumbling points, we argue for its rejection. (shrink)

Abstract:This article elaborates a normative Stakeholder Management Theory (SHMT) from a critical theory perspective. The paper argues that the normative theory elaborated by critical theorists such as Habermas exhibits important advantages over its rivals and that these advantages provide the basis for a theoretically more adequate version of SHMT. In the first section of the paper an account is given of normative theory from a critical theory perspective and its advantages over rival traditions. A key characteristic of the critical theory (...) approach is expressed as a distinction between three different normative realms, viz., legitimacy, morality, and ethics. In the second section, the outlines of a theory of stakeholder management are provided. First, three basic tasks of a theoretically adequate treatment of the normative analysis of stakeholder management are identified. This is followed by a discussion of how a critical theory approach to SHMT is able to fulfill these three tasks. (shrink)

Giubilini and Savulescu in their recent Journal of Bioethical Inquiry symposium article presented an account of conscientious objection that argues for its recognition as a non-financial conflict of interest. In this short commentary, I highlight some problems with their account. First, I discuss their solicitor analogy. Second, I discuss some problems surrounding their objectivity claim about standards of medical care. Next, I discuss some issues arising from consistently applying their approach. Finally, I highlight that conscientious objection should be viewed not (...) as a conflict of interest but as something that society has an interest in preserving. I conclude by arguing that clinicians who have a conscientious objection can be treated in the same way as those who decide to subspecialize and do not need to give up work in their specialty. While Giubilini and Savulescu present an interesting argument about conscientious objection, theirs is not a compelling view. Indeed, the way we approach conscientious objection has more to teach us about conflicts of interest than the other way around. (shrink)

Healthcare professionals often need to make clinical decisions that carry profound ethical implications. As such, they require a tool that will make decision-making intuitive. While the discussion about the principles that should guide clinical ethics has been going on for over two thousand years, it does not seem that making such decisions is becoming any more straight forward. With an abundance of competing ethical systems and frameworks for their application in real life, the clinician is still often not sure how (...) to proceed in the face of ethical dilemmas, either due to a lack of background ethical knowledge or experience in applying it. This paper will discuss whether considering what one would expect one’s friend to do if one was the patient, or what would one think they would do for a friend if they were the patient, can be a helpful, more intuitive, tool for clinical decision-making that can produce outcomes that are congruent with major ethical systems. (shrink)

Abstract.To suppose the possibility of dialogue between theology and science is to suppose that theology is an intellectually worthy partner to engage in dialogue with science. The status of theology as a discipline, however, remains contested, one sign of which is the absence of theology from the university. I argue that a healthy theology‐science dialogue would benefit from the presence of theology as an academic discipline in the university. Theology and theologians would benefit from the much closer contact with university (...) disciplines, including the sciences. The university and the sciences would benefit from the presence of theology, providing a department of ultimate concern, where big questions may be asked and ideologies critiqued. A university theology would need to meet standards of academic integrity. (shrink)

This issue of The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy is dedicated to topics in clinical ethics with essays addressing clinician participation in state sponsored execution, duties to decrease ecological footprints in medicine, the concept of caring and its relationship to conscientious refusal, the dilemmas involved in dual use research, a philosophical and practical critique of principlism, conundrums that arise when applying surrogate decision-making models to patients with moderate intellectual disabilities, the phenomenology of chronic disease, and ethical concerns surrounding the use (...) of artificial intelligence in medicine. Throughout the issue, the themes of conceptual and moral boundaries in bioethics, critiques of current clinical ethics paradigms, and the importance of transparency are prominent. (shrink)

If we accept Popper's idea that the human habitat is described in terms of three worlds, and that there are overlaps between these three worlds, our moral actions and values will also be subject to the same kinds of consideration as a repertoire of behaviours exhibited in a physical environment. We will develop moral habits in a moral habitat and our moral behaviours will also be dependent on the kind of moral habitat in which we find ourselves.There are three main (...) problems to which this analysis leads and on which we will focus in this paper. Firstly, there is the problem of the kind of moral environment—habitat—that we need to provide for human beings if they are to develop the kinds of moral values that we hold to be important. Secondly, there is the question of how we are to develop the kinds of moral habits themselves and thirdly, there is the question of how these moral habits and habitat are to be maintained. If we take Popper seriously then human beings have a crucial responsibility in the creation of a moral third world—that is, a habitat in which human beings can flourish. Schools have an important role as a moral habitat for the inculcation of good moral habits. (shrink)

The perspectives of the dominant Western ethical theories, have dominated the concepts of autonomy and informed consent for many years. Recently this dominant understanding has been challenged by ethics of care which, although, also emanates from the West presents a more nuanced concept: relational autonomy, which is more faithful to our human experience. By paying particular attention to relational autonomy, particularity and Process approach to ethical deliberations in ethics of care, this paper seeks to construct a concept of informed consent (...) from the perspective of ethics of care which is here called relational autonomy-in-informed consent. Thus, providing a broader theoretical basis for informed consent beyond the usual theoretical perspectives that are particularly Western. Care ethics provides such a broader basis because it appeals to a global perspective that encompasses lessons from other cultures, and this will help to enrich the current ideas of bioethics principles of autonomy and informed consent. This objective will be achieved by exploring the ethics of care emphasis on relationships based on a universal experience of caring; and by contrasting its concept of autonomy as relational with the understanding of autonomy in the approaches of the dominant moral theories that reflect rational, individualistic, and rights-oriented autonomy of the American liberalism. (shrink)

This article challenges the individualism and neutrality of modern moral conscience. It looks to the history of the concept to excavate an older tradition that takes conscience to be social and morally responsive, while arguing that dominant contemporary justifications of conscience in terms of integrity are inadequate without reintroducing these social and moral traits. This prompts a rethinking of the nature and value of conscience: first, by demonstrating that a morally-responsive conscience is neither a contradiction in terms nor a political (...) absurdity; second, by suggesting how a morally-responsive conscience can be informed by the social world without being a mere proxy for social power or moribund tradition. (shrink)

Although there are exceptions, most researchers on collective memory have neglected the idea that collective mnemonics involve embodied aspects and practices. And though the corpus of Collective Memory Studies (CMS) has helped us better understand how social groups relate to time, especially to the past, it has taken little notice of how embodied social actors collectively relate to time. In contrast, expanding upon the French School and the French sociological tradition, I argue for an approach that, on the one hand, (...) connects mental schemata to bodily schemata to social frameworks. And on the other hand, I speak of how embodied social actors collectively relate to common pasts and presents; and of how embodiment can thus provide a structure of possibilities for individuals and groups, as well as shared compasses and orientations that help people move toward certain futures while foreclosing others. (shrink)