Reflections on Responsibility and the Prospect of a Long Life

Public Health Ethics 12 (2):130-132 (2019)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

In this commentary on Brown and colleagues’ paper, entitled ‘Against Moral Responsibilisation of Health: Prudential Responsibility and Health Promotion’, I highlight the tension between individual responsibility—even when this is prudential and not moral—and systemic factors that impact people's health. Brown and colleagues and I agree that individuals are frequently held inappropriately responsible for health-related behaviours or diseases that have become associated with the so-called ‘lifestyle’ diseases. We further agree that health is an instrumental value to people, allowing them to achieve their goals or plans. However, while Brown and colleagues argue that health promotion is justified in providing education campaigns that highlight the pragmatic reasons people have for improving their health-related behaviours, I argue that this amounts to the same inaction on systemic issues as holding individuals morally responsible. Further, without action on systemic issues such as the social determinants of health, some people lack the kinds of future-oriented pragmatic reasons that Brown and colleagues place at the centre of their argument. Rather, for some groups, the pragmatic thing is to enjoy current pleasures even if unhealthy, rather than to forego them for the sake of health in a mythical future.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,593

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

The right perspective on responsibility for ill health.Karl Persson - 2013 - Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 16 (3):429-441.
Resisting Moralisation in Health Promotion.Rebecca C. H. Brown - 2018 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 21 (4):997-1011.
Moral responsibility for (un)healthy behaviour.Rebecca C. H. Brown - 2013 - Journal of Medical Ethics 39 (11):695-698.
The goals of health work: Quality of life, health and welfare. [REVIEW]Per-Anders Tengland - 2005 - Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 9 (2):155-167.
Taking Responsibility for Responsibility.Neil Levy - 2019 - Public Health Ethics 12 (2):103-113.
Information, choice and the ends of health promotion.Angus Dawson - 2014 - Monash Bioethics Review 32 (1-2):106-120.

Analytics

Added to PP
2019-06-24

Downloads
8 (#1,138,312)

6 months
1 (#1,040,386)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Kathryn MacKay
University of Sydney

References found in this work

Responsibility and Control: A Theory of Moral Responsibility.John Martin Fischer & Mark Ravizza - 1998 - New York: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Mark Ravizza.
Agency and answerability: selected essays.Gary Watson - 2004 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Responsibility and Control: A Theory of Moral Responsibility.John Martin Fischer - 1998 - Philosophical and Phenomenological Research 61 (2):459-466.

Add more references