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Moral Decision-Making as Discernment: Scotus and Prudence
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Moral Decision-Making as DiscernMent: scotus anD PruDence Mary Beth inghaM, c.s.J. In the three decades since the publication of Carol Gilligan’s In a Different Voice,1 feminist writers have developed a sustained critique of contemporary moral philosophy. Ethicists among them argue that the Kantian-Kohlbergian analysis of moral development and decision-making does not accurately reflect women’s experience in making moral judgments.2 The ethical analysis proper to modernity betrays women’s moral intuitions and defends a male-dominant paradigm. In response to this feminist critique, some ethicists object to its apparent lack of foundation. They point out that the feminist perspective appears to privilege women’s experience in the way the earlier tradition has favored men. The ethics of care promoted by feminist ethicists does not seem able to explain and justify its own conclusions. At times, it resembles a situationist-type theory. Susan Parsons3 rightly points out that the dominant libertarian moral model may not furnish 1 Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982). 2 Rita Manning, in her Speaking from the Heart: A Feminist Perspective on Ethics (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1992), offers a very good version of this critique, complete with her own survey illustrating its power. See especially chapter 3, 33-43. 3 “Feminist Ethics after Modernity: Towards an Appropriate Universalism ,” Studies in Christian Ethics, vol. 8, n. 1, (1995), 77-94. MARY BETH INGHAM 122 the best way for feminist ethics to develop and that other alternatives need to be explored. eleMents of the feMinist critique The most important dimension of modern ethical discussion critiqued by feminist thinkers is the foundation for the moral order. They reject the Natural Law tradition of the Aristotelian-Thomistic approach as well as the rights/obligational tradition of the Kantian-Rawlsian perspective. In addition , the utilitarian/consequentialist methodology, with its calculus of cost/benefit offers no concern for persons and for the value of relationships. All three classic moral approaches point to an abstract, depersonalized and universal foundation upon which moral decision-making must be based. By contrast, feminist thinkers hold that the true basis for moral judgments is expressed in the way women actually make moral decisions. This refers less to the deduction of norms from a priori principles, but to the affirmation of human connectedness and relationships. For a renewed moral order, one needs a relational and interpersonal foundation. A second feminist critique points to what is needed for moral decision-making and judgment. Susan Sherwin4 rightly points to the dangers of abstraction and generalization in Kantian ethics. Rita Manning stresses the importance of the moral context and to the significance of the particularity of each moral decision. For Manning, the so-called “textbook conception” of ethical theory has promoted expectations both of too much and too little. Moral theories are expected to do too much: they must provide answers to virtually every situation. But they are also seen to do too little: they present ethical theories that compete with one another. This inevitably produces moral skepticism. In both cases, contemporary 4 “Feminist and Medical Ethics: Two Different Approaches to Contextual Ethics,” Feminist Perspectives in Medical Ethics, (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1992), 17-31. [54.224.52.210] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 03:41 GMT) MORAL DECISION-MAKING AS DISCERNMENT 123 moral discussion does not pay sufficient attention to the concrete matter for moral consideration.5 This lack of attention to the particular is especially egregious where rule-based moral theories (such as rule-utilitarianism ) are concerned. Since rules must be applied impartially , one must disregard the specific aspects of a situation in order to discover the general characteristics. It is these general aspects that allow one to apply the principle or rule correctly. The result of this sort of approach is that rules dominate over particular aspects of a situation. It is a type of “moral reductionism” that plays well in the abstract, but can be horrible in the concrete, where real persons are concerned. Indeed, the moral situation is precisely what it is by virtue of those particular aspects that specify this rather than that. A fully developed moral approach should be able to take into account specific and particular elements of the concrete situation , without falling into relativism or subjectivism. A third and final critique involves the exclusivity of moral concerns today. Elizabeth Johnson6 calls for an expanded moral vision, broadened to include the environment. Annette Baier7 argues that ethics...