Care Ethics: An Ethical Theory

OVERVIEW
► Care Ethics, also known as Ethics of Care is a normative ethical theory. Remember that normative ethics is the study of behaviour. This ethical theory believes that interpersonal relationships (relationships between people) is the centre - the most important factor when deciding on moral actions. As you can see, this ethical theory avoids "impersonal reasoning" that is usually involved with deontologist, utilitarian or justice ethical theories because it does not focus on the relationships involved.

► To follow care ethics, you must place importance on relationships and what matters to you, as well as what you would naturally respond to in a situation.

► Fun fact: this is one of the cluster of normative ethical theories that were developed by feminists! Carol Gilligan is the mother of Care Ethics and established this philosophy because she found the other ethical theories of utilitarianism and deontology to be too "masculine" or "male" focused perspectives.

► To summarize, Care ethics emphasizes on the personal response of all individuals through the importance of relationships. The biggest difference to pay attention to is that while Utilitarianism and Deontology focus on "what is right" and are known to be "unemotional", Care Ethics is known to be completely "emotional" as it is based on rational thinking through emotions. Decision-making is based on the relationships we have in the situation.

► Children, you're going to hate me for this but LET'S TAKE US BACK TO THE TROLLEY PROBLEM!
► A care ethicist would not pull the lever or switch or whatever I said in my previous videos to divert the trolley onto the other tracks - they would keep going straight because they do not want to kill the one person on the other tracks… this is because according to Care ethics, you have a natural moral compass within you to preserve and protect, and favor those that have a closer relationship to you. Since the family member has a closer relationship to you than the 5 strangers ahead of you, you wouldn't divert the trolley.

KEY THINKER(S)
► Carol Gilligan
► She believes that "humans are relationally responsive people" which means that we just naturally respond to the relationships and those around us
► She compares this moral thinking to a trampoline… if you and a bunch of friends are on the same trampoline together, and you start moving, it will start to affect a lot of people around you!
► She also believes that even though this is known as a "feminist philosophy", it actually applies to everyone - both men AND women.

► Nel Noddings
► She argues that "caring is the foundation of morality"… she saw the idea of relationships as being "ontologically basic to humanity", which means that our identities are defined by the set of relationships individuals have with other humans.

THOUGHT EXPERIMENT
► Please keep in mind that this ethical theory is known as "a feminist ethical theory" or "a feminist approach to ethics" only because it was introduced by feminists. This ethical theory applies to every human because everyone has emotional connection and relationships to someone.

► Lawrence Kohlberg is known as the father of moral development and to explain his stages of moral development, he used the Heinz Dilemma.

► A woman was on her deathbed. There was one drug that the doctors thought might save her. It was only recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the drug store owner was charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the drug store owner that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: “No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it.” So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's laboratory to steal the drug for his wife.

RESOURCES
► https://www.britannica.com/topic/ethi...
► https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics_...
► https://www.britannica.com/biography/...