Philosophy 2700F/G Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Deontological Ethics, Feminist Ethics, Kantianism
17 May 2018
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Week 12: April 3rd, Tuesday
Feminist ethics (by Lindemann)
- Feminism focuses on power
- It’s aout soial patters, idespread aross ultures ad histor, that distriutes poer
asetriall to faour e oer oe 9.
- The focus more specifically is on gender – crucially involved in the unequal distribution of power
- Gender is normative: it outlines how women should or ought to behave, what men are entitled
to extract from women
- This creates unequal power, in marriage, in education, in medicine, so on
Feminism seeks to challenge how gender operates in our moral beliefs and practices, and to challenge
the power of inequality – it is akin to challenging racism/other forces leading to unequal distributions.
Feminist ethics also aims to identify legitimate relations of unequal power (e.g. parent-child relations),
explore vulnerability and trust, and examine the sources of morality.
Feminism is in part descriptive and political:
- Figuring out the way things are integral to figuring what and how to change
- Personal choices may reinforce inequity (e.g. sexual choices)
- Political forces shape personal choices
o To combat such forces, we need political action
o Political scrutiny is applied to ethical theory – does it reflect bias?
Week 12: April 5th, Thursday
Calhou: Bakgroud of disussio is Gilliga’s In a Different Voice
- Gilligan distinguishes between the ethics of justice and the ethics of care
- Men mostly focused on the ethics of justice: focusses on rights, impartiality (as in Utilitarianism
and Kantianism), rationality, autonomy, etc.
- Women mostly focused on the ethics of care: focusses on sympathy, contextual decision
making, special relationships, care, etc.
The ethics of justice is dominant in moral philosophy.
- Gilligan has two objections to the ethics of justice:
1) Incomplete account of moral life: it excludes important dimensions of moral
experience
2) Not geder eutral: it eludes the its ost releat to oe’s oral eperiee
*The remedy is to combine the ethics of justice with the ethics of care – might think that
ethics of justice requires attention to context, care, etc.
- Does this remedy eliminate gender bias in moral thinking?
o Calhoun: not if gender neutrality requires more than accommodating the ethics of care
o I order to eplai h a tradition has the contours that it does, one may need to
suppose general acceptance of particular beliefs that are not logically entailed by any
particular theory and might be denied by individual theorists were those beliefs
artiulated .
It might be that the repeated focus on some aspect of our moral thinking has non-logical implications,
namely, that these things are more important. This is where the charge of gender bias gets its grip.
- The traditional focus might have undesirable political implications for women
o Calhoun: looks at the implications of the central preoccupations of moral philosophy
o Calhou: thiks aout as i hih e a safeguard oe’s iterests
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Feminism focuses on power (cid:862)it"s a(cid:271)out so(cid:272)ial patter(cid:374)s, (cid:449)idespread a(cid:272)ross (cid:272)ultures a(cid:374)d histor(cid:455), that distri(cid:271)utes po(cid:449)er as(cid:455)(cid:373)(cid:373)etri(cid:272)all(cid:455) to fa(cid:448)our (cid:373)e(cid:374) o(cid:448)er (cid:449)o(cid:373)e(cid:374)(cid:863) (cid:894)(cid:1005)(cid:1007)9(cid:895). The focus more specifically is on gender crucially involved in the unequal distribution of power. Gender is normative: it outlines how women should or ought to behave, what men are entitled to extract from women. This creates unequal power, in marriage, in education, in medicine, so on. Feminism seeks to challenge how gender operates in our moral beliefs and practices, and to challenge the power of inequality it is akin to challenging racism/other forces leading to unequal distributions. Feminist ethics also aims to identify legitimate relations of unequal power (e. g. parent-child relations), explore vulnerability and trust, and examine the sources of morality. Figuring out the way things are integral to figuring what and how to change. Personal choices may reinforce inequity (e. g. sexual choices) Calhou(cid:374): ba(cid:272)kgrou(cid:374)d of dis(cid:272)ussio(cid:374) is gilliga(cid:374)"s in a different voice.
