Family values reconsidered: a response

Abstract

It is wonderful to receive so much careful attention. But it’s also frustrating. Each paper poses important questions, and between them they cover a wide range of issues. It is challenging, on such big topics, and in so few words, simultaneously to set the record straight, to identify the various objections posed by our critics, and to respond to them in a way likely to advance our collective understanding of the issues. Still, here goes.     

Migrant protest in times of crisis: politics,ethics and the sacred from below

This paper focuses on the 300 Migrant Hunger Strikers event in Greece to explore the material conditions of possibility for migrant politics in times of crisis. It identifies three elements that played determinant roles in the articulation of the event: the politics of equality enacted by migrants, the ethics of hospitality and witnessing enacted by the Greek activists and host populations and the sacredness of the event. Critically engaging with the theories of Rancière, Derrida, Agamben and Durkheim, this paper demonstrates how these elements encountered and how their encounter helped migrants to achieve rights, albeit limited and temporary. Moving beyond the particularity of the event, this paper also highlights the event’s importance for migrant politics in times of austerity, and increased surveillance and racism against migrants. Despite its limited and temporary success, the event demonstrates how a politics of equality, ethical openness and respect for human life can form the basis of true cosmopolitan universality. The event also demonstrates how cosmopolitan universality is constructed from below by the migrants, who despite their undocumented status, engaged in an act of citizenship to demand equality.     

An ethical defense of treason by means of espionage

This essay argues that treason by means of espionage is ethically justified when six factors are present, two of which are: that the political community being betrayed fails to secure for its citizens basic human rights and other means of peaceful or otherwise lawful protest are unavailable. The paper begins by analyzing the application of several theories of ethics to treason, including: consequentialism, deontology, the Just War tradition, and Michael Walzer’s influential concept of ‘dirty hands.’ It then criticizes these points of view and offers an account of jus ad proditione per intelligentia (just treason by means of espionage) based upon Aristotelian thinking about ethics and politics.     

Self-Care in Public and Community Sector Workplaces

Key aspects of modern public service and community workplaces associated with significant levels of distress are identified. This includes the transformation of public sector and community agencies under the aegis of new public management (NPM). Using a child protection case study, it is argued that NPM ethos generates stressful workplaces and “uncomfortable knowledge” adding pressure to a system already in crisis. It is also argued that while there is value in self-care practices like debriefing, “boundary maintenance,” and “work-life balance,” one critical aspect of self-care associated with the virtue ethics tradition is missing. This gap in the literature and practice needs attention.     

斯洛特德性伦理学特点初探

迈克尔·斯洛特是当代著名德性伦理学家。他采取了一种特别的纯粹德性伦理学样式,即关怀伦理学,或以行为者为基础的德性伦理学。这种德性伦理学开启了一条不同于新亚里士多德主义的德性伦理学复兴之路,成为当代德性伦理学领域中重要的分支之一。     

青少年网络道德问题的心理学分析

网络是一把双刃剑,它对青少年开阔视野、拓宽知识领域起到了积极的促进作用,但同时也带来了某些负面的、消极的影响,其中最突出的问题是网络严重地冲击着青少年的世界观、人生观、价值观和道德观,导致青少年严重的网络道德失范行为。青少年网络道德失范问题已十分严重,这也给我们的青少年道德教育带来严峻的考验,成为教育工作者的一大研究课题。     

当前中国社会道德状况分析

社会道德主要反映在社会风尚、公德水平方面。本文从实证角度利用社会学方法做出科学分析,得出结论:(1)家庭是中国人道德的生长点。(2)在道德问题上,多数人的认知程度明显高于他们的行为能力。(3)在社会道德方面,存在不同层次、不同侧重的要求。(4)人们在不同问题的选择上并不总是保持逻辑上的连贯性。揭示当代中国公众关于社会道德总体评价及其特点,既可以为准确认识我国社会道德状况提供依据,也可以为进一步深化道德建设提供佐证。     

公正的旁观者:亚当·斯密经济伦理思想的伟大创新

斯密从经济理论的人性假设出发,对其独特的"经济模型"和"看不见的手"理论进行了创新性研究,指出道德标准和公正原则是其"经济模型"赖以实现的价值支撑."公正的旁观者"是价值的最高裁判者,是上帝、自然神性与人的德性的统一."公正的旁观者"在经济伦理思想的演进中发挥着承前启后的作用.以"公正的旁观者"理论的提出为标志,经济与伦理的关系在现代性语境中发生了重大的转向."公正的旁观者"是现代经济伦理思想的伟大创新,是实现现代经济社会良序运行的伦理保障.     

制度伦理视阈下公权力异化的制约机制

公权力易于异化,而制约公权力异化却是人类历史的难题。虽然近年来人们普遍强调从教育、制度和监督的综合治理模式入手来解决,但是从制度伦理视角来分析和制约公权力异化则还是更为清晰和有效的路径选择。     

A role for structured observation in ethics

Progress in the natural sciences has depended upon the collection and use of carefully controlled observational data. By contrast, ethicists have failed to agree upon a role for observational data in their enterprise. Although factors embedded in the human condition obscure the role of observational data in ethical theory, barriers to the use of such data in ethics may be superable. Observation may not provide definitive answers to most ethical or metaethical questions. However observation of carefully constructed experimental conditions may provide the basis for cumulative progress in some branches of ethics.