Rosamond Rhodes has written a welcome, clear, and expansive yet precise book that challenges the hegemonic influence of principlism in biomedical ethics and presents a viable alternative. At the outset, Rhodes critiques the idea of common morality underpinning the four principles from Tom Beauchamp and James Childress's Principles of Biomedical Ethics and ten rules from Bernard Gert, Charles Culver, and K. Danner Clouser in Bioethics: A Systematic Approach. Rhodes not only argues for why medicine is unlike everyday practices and requires (...) a unique ethics but also offers a positive program to meet medicine's "uncommon morality."This "uncommon morality" gives rise to sixteen duties that guide medical practice. Each... (shrink)

I published my first article in the Journal of Medical Ethics back in 2007 as an newly minted PhD. It was a proud moment. I respected the JME as a journal where I had read some of the most tightly argued and challenging essays in the literature. They inspired me to specialise in medical ethics and rethink some of my fundamental positions on various topics. This has been the case since, and I am proud now to join the editorial team (...) as an associate editor focusing on increasing North American presence and on the journal’s feature articles. The journal has included feature articles for several years now, and because they have worked so well, the editorial team wants to build on and invest in their success. Feature articles are primarily selected from the best extended essays or research papers. They are among the most highly cited and accessed articles in the field. On average, they have twice as many citations as a regular article published in the journal. This may be due, in part, to the journal’s practice of making feature articles open access so that all scholars can access them. In addition, the JME is committed to helping promote these articles and their commentaries on its …. (shrink)