Transcript CONSENSUS MORALITY

Moral Free Space
THE TERM MORAL FREE SPACE
IMPLIES THAT IT IS RIGHT AND
PROPER FOR COMMUNITIES TO
SELF-DEFINE SIGNIFICANT ASCEPTS
OF THEIR BUSINESS MORALITY.
* CULTURAL DIVERSITY IS
EMPHASISED AND ANY SUCH THING
AS 'HUMAN ESSENCE' IS REJECTED.
HYPERNORMS:

HYPERNORMS ARE SECOND-ORDER
MORAL CONCEPTS. THEY
REPRESENT NORMS SUFFICIENTLY
FUNDAMENTAL TO SERVE AS A
SOURCE OF EVALUATION AND
CRITICISM OF COMMUNITYGENERETED NORMS.
 On
the other side there is
the cosmopolitans, who
defend the universal
character of human
experience.

Our aim here is to show by
recognizing the diverse communities
and de- recognizing the fact that one
-size -fit-all suit of clothes ,one can
evolve a universal principles and
values that is common to all people
that is based on a reflection on the
deepest sources of human ethical
experience.
CONSENSUS MORALITY

This comes to limit relativism by
placing restraints based on
internationally or universally
accepted ethical rights. The
United Nations, public opinion in
the democratic states and the
decisions of area blocs attempt to
impose such limits.
 Civil
rights, the
environment and child
protection are some of the
areas in which much good
has been done by such
consensus morality.
RELATIVISM IS NOT THE
ANSWER

One answer to this question is as
old as philosophical discussion,
and as old as Sophistry. Its label is
“cultural relativism” and it is a view
that holds that no culture has a
better ethics than any other, and
that, in turn, there are no
international “rights” and “wrongs”.

If Thailand tolerates the bribery of
public officials, then Thai tolerance
is no worse than Japanese or
German intolerance. If Switzerland
fails to find insider trading morally
repugnant, then Swiss liberality is
no worse than U.S. fairmindedness.

The concept of cultural
relativism is fairly simple to
grasp, and unfortunately, fairly
tempting when business
opportunities are at stake.

In the final analysis, relativism must
be rejected. Perhaps its main
problem is that not all cultural
differences lie at the fairly
inconsequential level of insider
trading or petty bribery.

If one seriously maintains the view of
cultural relativism, one must be prepared
to tolerate all cultural differences. If one
state endorses piracy (as some in history
have), then one must grant piracy the
same moral status as a doctrine of antipiracy. Or consider the dramatic example
of crime prevention in ancient Rome.
There it was the practice to kill all
the slaves in a household even
when one slave murdered the
master. All slaves were lined up
and summarily executed without
trial.

They were executed whether they
were young or old, male or female,
and whether or not they were
involved in, or had any knowledge
about, the murder. In some instances
involving large households, the
practice resulted in the execution of
three and four hundred innocent
persons.

While the practice was justified on
the grounds that it deterred future
plots against the master, few of us
today could embrace such
reasoning. And in the light of
heinous practices such as this, few
us can cling to theoretical relativism
that would tolerate these or even
worse practices.
Hence, if we reject relativism in
the extreme instances, then
morality in the international
sphere must be something more
than an unprincipled, “do-whatthe-native-do” undertaking.

It does not follow that all
questions of moral differences
among cultures can be solved by
measuring them against a rigid,
universal yardstick. But it means
that morality has some, albeit
imperfect, relevance to
transcultural contexts.