Abstract

This study examines critically the metaethical and normative moral assumptions underlying the universality claim made in Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral development. The examination focuses on the philosophical-empirical validity of the philosophical foundations for the universality claim. The focal questions are: whether the philosophical account for Kohlberg's six-stage model of moral judgment provides an undistorted and meaningful interpretation in explicating the development of the dominant moral concepts that are prevalent in different moral traditions, and whether compatible rationales of moral judgment can be found or constructed based on moral theories prevailing in different moral traditions to support Kohlberg's universality claim of his six-stage model. ;The Aristotelian and Chinese Confucian moral traditions are chosen as providing rival moral theories and rationales of moral judgment against which the universality claim is examined. Two models concerning moral universality are identified: the model of different-at-the-surface-level-but-common-deep-structure and the model of difference-in-deep-structure. Following the two model argument, the analysis demonstrates that Kohlberg's universality claim fails to permeate into the Aristotelian and Confucian moral traditions, because the claim is grounded in a narrow deontological view of morality. Thus the validity of the claim is defensible only within the conceptual framework of deontological morality. Without a rationale of moral judgment shared across traditions, Kohlberg's six-stage model fails to provide a firm philosophical ground upon which to base its claim to be universal. It is suggested that moral education in public schools should rest on a broad notion of morality and moral judgment, with emphasis on fostering moral character rather than being limited to competence training in principle-based moral reasoning