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Moral Agency (moral + agency)
Selected AbstractsMORAL AGENCY AND THE UNITY OF THE WORLD: THE NEO-CONFUCIAN CRITIQUE OF "VULGAR LEARNING"JOURNAL OF CHINESE PHILOSOPHY, Issue 4 2006YOUNGMIN KIM [source] GENOCIDE AND THE MORAL AGENCY OF ETHNIC GROUPSMETAPHILOSOPHY, Issue 3-4 2006KAREN KOVACH Abstract: Genocide is the deliberate destruction, in whole or in part, of a people. Typically, it is a crime that is committed by a people. In this essay, I propose an analysis of the concept of an ethnic identity group, which is, I argue, the concept of ethnicity at issue in many important discussions of group rights, group acts, and the moral responsibility of group members for the acts of the groups to which they belong. I develop the account of collective agency presupposed by this analysis and explore its implications for assessments of individual moral responsibility for genocide. I argue, further, that among other advantages over culturalist approaches to questions about group rights, the approach that follows from the concept of an ethnic identity group sheds light on the specific moral wrong of genocide. I reply to individualist objections to the idea that ethnic group membership may be morally significant and argue that morally adequate responses to genocide presuppose acknowledgment of the fact that groups act and are acted upon in morally significant ways. [source] Moral Agency, Cognitive Distortion, and Narrative Strategy in the Rehabilitation of Sexual OffendersETHOS, Issue 3 2010James B. Waldram I demonstrate that what forensic psychologists refer to as a "cognitive distortion" or "thinking error" is often embedded within a broader narrative, and that these narratives reveal the existence of identifiable strategies designed to communicate something salient, enduring, and moral about the offender. Through the examination of narratives offered by imprisoned sexual offenders, several such narrative strategies containing the seeds of moral agency are identified. It is suggested that CBT's current focus on cognitive distortions effectively eliminates this narrative context and thus serves to disguise and even eradicate the positive, moral notions of self that most offenders exhibit in some form or another. A rehabilitative approach that works with narrative, facilitating development of shared narratives among offenders and therapists, would allow for the emergence of a plan for morally agentive living, transcending what is currently possible within the hostile, challenging framework of CBT. [narrative theory; cognitive behavior therapy; moral agency; sexual offenders; prisons] [source] Girls Blush, Sometimes: Gender, Moral Agency, and the Problem of ShameHYPATIA, Issue 3 2003JENNIFER C. MANION Few contemporary philosophers discuss the ways in which the emotion of shame may be gendered. This paper addresses this situation, examining Gabriele Taylor's (1985 and 1995) account of genuine vs. false shame. 1 argue that, by attending to the social pressures placed on many women to conform to a certain vision of femininity, an analysis of the shame to which women may be prone shows that Taylor's account of shame remains incomplete. [source] Moral Agency, Cognitive Distortion, and Narrative Strategy in the Rehabilitation of Sexual OffendersETHOS, Issue 3 2010James B. Waldram I demonstrate that what forensic psychologists refer to as a "cognitive distortion" or "thinking error" is often embedded within a broader narrative, and that these narratives reveal the existence of identifiable strategies designed to communicate something salient, enduring, and moral about the offender. Through the examination of narratives offered by imprisoned sexual offenders, several such narrative strategies containing the seeds of moral agency are identified. It is suggested that CBT's current focus on cognitive distortions effectively eliminates this narrative context and thus serves to disguise and even eradicate the positive, moral notions of self that most offenders exhibit in some form or another. A rehabilitative approach that works with narrative, facilitating development of shared narratives among offenders and therapists, would allow for the emergence of a plan for morally agentive living, transcending what is currently possible within the hostile, challenging framework of CBT. [narrative theory; cognitive behavior therapy; moral agency; sexual offenders; prisons] [source] The Hidden and Triune GodINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY, Issue 1 2000Robert W. Jenson Luther rightly perceived that God is hidden in his presence. The challenge systematically is to integrate discourse about God's hiddenness with a serious trinitarianism. The attempts by Gregory Palamas and Karl Barth to do just this are judged inadequate. A constructive proposal begins by recognizing that God's hiddenness is an impenetrability of his moral agency in his history with us as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, rather than a correlate of God's ontological uniqueness or our creaturely epistemic limitations. God's hiddenness must be thought of in terms of the sheer factuality of God the Father, which limits theodicy; the suffering of the Son, and thus the rejection of idolatry; and the freedom of the Spirit. [source] Can Kant Have an Account of Moral Education?JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION, Issue 4 2009KATE A. MORAN There is an apparent tension between Immanuel Kant's model of moral agency and his often-neglected philosophy of moral education. On the one hand, Kant's account of moral knowledge and decision-making seems to be one that can be self-taught. Kant's famous categorical imperative and related ,fact of reason' argument suggest that we learn the content and application of the moral law on our own. On the other hand, Kant has a sophisticated and detailed account of moral education that goes well beyond the kind of education a person would receive in the course of ordinary childhood experience. The task of this paper will be to reconcile these seemingly conflicting claims. Ultimately, I argue, Kant's philosophy of education makes sense as a part of his moral theory if we look not only at individual moral decisions, but also at the goals or ends that these moral decisions are intended to achieve. In Kant's case, this end is what he calls the highest good, and, I argue, the most coherent account of the highest good is a kind of ethical community and end of history, similar to the Groundwork's realm of ends. Seen as a tool to bring about and sustain such a community, Kant's philosophy of moral education exists as a coherent and important part of his moral philosophy. [source] The history of nursing in the home: revealing the significance of place in the expression of moral agencyNURSING INQUIRY, Issue 2 2002Elizabeth Peter The history of nursing in the home: revealing the significance of place in the expression of moral agency The relationship between place and moral agency in home care nursing is explored in this paper. The notion of place is argued to have relevance to moral agency beyond moral context. This argument is theoretically located in feminist ethics and human geography and is supported through an examination of historical documents (1900,33) that describe the experiences and insights of American home care/private duty nurses or that are related to nursing ethics. Specifically, the role of place in inhibiting and enhancing care, justice, good relationships, and power in the practice of private duty nurses is explored. Several implications for current nursing ethics come out of this analysis. (i) The moral agency of nurses is highly nuanced. It is not only structured by nurses' relationships to patients and health professionals, i.e. moral context, it is also structured by the place of nursing care. (ii) Place has the potential to limit and enhance the power of nurses. (iii) Some aspects of nursing's conception of the good, such as what constitutes a good nurse,patient relationship, are historically and geographically relative. [source] The roles of embodiment, emotion and lifeworld for rationality and agency in nursing practiceNURSING PHILOSOPHY, Issue 1 2000Patricia Benner RN Such a practice requires a commitment to meeting and helping the other in ways that liberate and strengthen and avoid imposing the will of the caregiver on the patient. Being good and acting well (phronesis) occur in particular situations. A socially constituted and embodied view of agency, as developed by Merleau-Ponty, provides an alternative to Cartesian and Kantian views of agency. A socially constituted, embodied view of agency is less mechanistic and less deterministic than Descartes' and Kant's radical separation of mind and body, and more responsive and generative than Kant's vision of moral agency as constituted by autonomous choice makers who are uninfluenced by emotion. The role of emotion in perception and judgement is explored in this paper. Distinctions between techne and phronesis are drawn. The role of emotion in market relationships and procedural ethics drawn for the abstract, general other are strategies for exchange of goods and services, but these same market relationships are dependent on well-functioning nonmarket relations of noncalculated giving and receiving. [source] Presidential Leadership: Skill in ContextPOLITICS & POLICY, Issue 2 2002Erwin C. Hargrove The essay illustrates the value of studying individual presidents consecutively across time in order to compare and assess the relative importance of personal political skill in political and historical contexts. The presidency is the primary source of moral agency in American politics, and policy and agency occur in the leadership of individuals. An analytic framework to compare presidents encompasses the historical context; the skill factor; leadership strategies and tactics; and the assessment of results of skill in contexts. Use of the framework will permit systematic comparison of presidents in relation to the ad hoc ahistorical comparisons that permeate journalism and some scholarship. Narratives of leadership in domestic, economic, and foreign policy are presented for presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton. This approach achieves an understanding of presidential leadership that cannot be achieved by work that bemoans the small N and focuses on pieces of the presidential institution, without including the president, because the dynamics of leadership shape the institution more than the reverse. Among the conclusions are that skill and context reinforce each other in policy achievement; skill can be effective at the margins, even in unfavorable contexts; ineptness makes a difference for the worse; and cumulative presidents may resolve policy problems across time as each contributes a step on the way. [source] The Mass Media as Discursive Network: Building on the Implications of Libertarian and Communitarian Claims for News Media Ethics TheoryCOMMUNICATION THEORY, Issue 3 2005Patrick Lee Plaisance Media theorists have created competing normative ethical frameworks based on libertarian and communitarian philosophies, but because each approach essentially promotes different moral principles, they do not merely offer competing alternatives that essentially serve the same purpose, as some scholars have presumed. This analysis suggests that the two dominant theoretical approaches of libertarianism and communitarianism require further clarification and elaboration. The article seeks to clarify why the libertarian approach is insufficient as a basis for a news media ethic. Instead, it suggests a modified communitarian approach that advances media ethics theory by resisting a moralizing ethic, foregrounding the epistemic nature of moral philosophy as it relates to the communicative enterprise, and reconceptualizing the public sphere being served by the mass media as a population predicated on moral agency. [source] | |||||||||||||