Applying Rawlsian Approaches to Resolve Ethical Issues: Inventory and Setting of a Research Agenda

Abstract

Insights from social science are increasingly used in the field of applied ethics. However, recent insights have shown that the empirical branch of business ethics lacks thorough theoretical grounding. This article discusses the use of the Rawlsian methods of wide reflective equilibrium and overlapping consensus in the field of applied ethics. Instead of focussing on one single comprehensive ethical doctrine to provide adequate guidance for resolving moral dilemmas, these Rawlsian methods seek to find a balance between considered judgments and intuitions concerning particular cases on the one hand and general principles and theories on the other. In business ethics this approach is promising because it enables decision-making in a pluralist context with different stakeholders who often endorse different or even conflicting cultural and moral frameworks without giving priority to any of them. Moreover, the method is well founded in political theory. A taxonomy of different kinds of applications is developed, and classified according to the purpose, the content, and the type of justification. On the basis of this taxonomy an inventory of 12 recent applications is made. In terms of the purpose and content of the method the applications are rather diverse. Two conceptual obstacles for applying Rawlsian methods are identified, viz. inclusiveness and the communitarian objection that people have to become detached from their personal life. It is found that methodological questions, such as the question how to retrieve the relevant empirical data, are scarcely addressed in the literature. To advance the use of empirical approaches in general, and that of Rawlsian approaches in particular, it is important not only to use empirical data but to use methodological insights from social sciences in order to further advance the field of empirical ethics. It is recommended that stakeholders be given a more active role in the assessment and justification of these methods.

Appendices

Appendix

This appendix gives a brief description of the 12 applications.

Same-sex marriage (McClain, 1998)

McClain discusses Rawls’ overlapping consensus in the light of the question what type of arguments citizens may appeal to or what kind of reasons they may proffer to support their positions. She illustrates this with the example of same-sex marriage and the requirements of reciprocity, i.e., the requirement to give reasons that can be understood by other citizens and that s/he might reasonably expect other citizens to accept (PR 797). McClain stresses the importance of critical examination of a supposed overlapping consensus and repudiation of it if it impinges on basic rights. Citizens who deliberate on political policy should support their comprehensive beliefs (i.e., arguments derived from philosophical, religious, or moral doctrines) by reference to public reasons and political values.

The status of the EU and international law (La Torre, 1999)

In his paper La Torre presents a moral framework for the European Community law. Because Community law directly concerns and affects some of the most fundamental interests and values of Member States’ citizens, Community Law is in need of a “general” and “thin” criterion by which to settle disputes between the different communities. This criterion should be based on a (minimum) common denominator of the different substantive thick legal and political communities, i.e. on an overlapping consensus between the different member states, the author argues.

Curriculum reform (Halliday, 1999)

This paper discusses recent proposals to introduce citizenship and values education in the UK. Although widely welcomed, the values underlying this curriculum reform are open to debate. Halliday argues for a Wittgensteinian reinterpretation of overlapping consensus with regard to the political values in order to arrive at “a conception of citizenship to which all can happily assent” (p. 47). The consensus consists not so much in doctrines as in beliefs about what ought to be done in particular circumstances. The curriculum reform should not be a State affair but rather something which is done inside the locus of community.

Liberal education (Paris and Kimball, 2000)

Paris and Kimball discuss the method of overlapping consensus in the context of liberal education in the US during the twentieth century. Based on previous work of Kimball, the authors compare a more pragmatic form of Rawls’ overlapping consensus with the original approach as suggested by Rawls. Based on this comparison the authors argue that the emerging consensus concerning liberal education at the beginning of the 21st century is an overlapping consensus, that is, “a consensus whose nature is pragmatic, as well as a consensus whose substantive tenets are rationalized by pragmatism” (p. 143), which is less “thick” than Rawls’ version. This also allows for substantive changes over time if these are required.

European citizenship (Lehning, 2001)

Lehning discusses how questions regarding political identity and citizenship, raised by the creation of the “new Europe”, can be addressed by appeal to liberal ideas of justice. The author claims that an overlapping consensus that results in a political conception of justice, shared throughout a political community, does generate a shared identity that will supersede rival identities based on, for instance, ethnicity.

Pediatric cochlear implants (Reuzel et al., 2001)

Reuzel et al. discuss the method of WRE in the light of interactive technology assessment (iTA). iTA is a kind of technology evaluation that is characterized by active stakeholder participation and deliberation. Reuzel et al. do not apply the method of WRE but propose it as a way to come to a justified agreement on decision making in medical technologies. They argue that not any agreement or reflective equilibrium will do. It is important that the reflective equilibrium is inter-subjective. Stated generally, a WRE is only morally justified if the considerations of all relevant actors are involved, with no exceptions.

International business versus globalization (Ho, 2003)

In her paper on transnational economic activities Ho uses Rawls’ conception of overlapping consensus and original position to defend the shift from international business, which she conceives as a practice of mutual competition and promotion of self-interest between separate national units, to globalization. According to the latter view, the construction of a global moral community, in which there is an overlapping consensus, is encouraged. This overlapping consensus will guide economic institutions and business practices such that they can benefit all participants within the global community. Rawls’ political conception of fairness can serve as a basis of informed and willing political agreement among free and equal participants through public reason.

Environmental values (Preston, 2004)

Preston tries to extrapolate principles of Rawls’ Theory of Justice to the field of environmental ethics. Although Rawls himself does not consider environmental issues to be part of the public good – and therefore not part of fundamental political justice – it is desirable that environmentalists appeal to public reason to support their claim for environmentally friendly policies. In this article environmental issues are the stepping stone to exploration of the limits of fundamental political justice.

Human rights (Tobin, 2005)

In her paper on the universality of human rights, Tobin criticizes the use of Rawls’ notion of overlapping consensus to explain “how we can have meaningful agreement about human rights despite extensive cultural and moral diversity” (p. 33). By discussing the issue of equality in Islamic comprehensive doctrine, Tobin tries to show that the interpretation of equality rights in Islamic comprehensive doctrine and Western, liberal, democratic communities is fundamentally different, which renders meaningful agreement impossible. Instead Tobin proposes to construct universality through actual dialogue both within and between communities.

Muslim minorities (March, 2006)

In his article on liberal citizenship and Muslim minorities March seeks to establish “what political liberalism demands of Muslim citizens living as minorities in liberal states by way of a doctrinal affirmation of citizenship” (p. 373; italics in original). The objective of the article is to establish when it can be said that there is a consensus on the terms of social cooperation in a liberal society and thus that the comprehensive doctrine in question is providing its adherents with moral reasons for endorsing those terms.

Abortion (Moran, 2006)

The author discusses Rawls’ theory in the light of the criticism expressed by former pope John Paul II that our current pluralistic, liberal society, which according to him is based on moral relativism, is in need of a transformation with regard to issues like abortion and euthanasia. Moran uses a revised version of Rawls’ notion of overlapping consensus to show that one need not embrace relativism in order to defend liberalism. Although severely revised compared with Rawls’ own idea of overlapping consensus, Moran’s idea can be considered an application or elaboration of Rawls’ original ideas. The main objective of the article is to justify procedural argumentation.

Technical and technological innovations in sport (Sheridan, 2007)

Sheridan explores the use of WRE as a possible decision-making method for rational evaluation of technical and technological innovations in sporting practices. The paper describes the implementation of a new seeding system in male tennis at the Wimbledon championships. The WRE method was not used to justify the new seeding rules but only to hypothetically describe how the process of coming to these new rules might have developed.

Notes

• 1 In the remainder of the text the references to Rawls’ work will be denoted by the acronyms ToJ, PL, JaF, CP, RH, and PR referring to A Theory of Justice (Rawls, 1999 [1971]), Political Liberalism (Rawls, 1993), Justice as Fairness (Rawls, 2001), Collected Papers (Rawls, 1999), and the papers “Political Liberalism: Reply to Habermas” (Rawls, 1995) and “The Idea of Public Reason revisited” (Rawls, 1997), respectively.

• 2 For a description of other approaches see Molewijk et al. (2004). For elaborate description of the main points of criticism on the use of empirical data in ethics the reader is referred to Elster (1992), Schmidt (1994), Birnbacher (1999).

• 3 However, as one of the reviewers correctly pointed out, ultimately a decision proposed by one of the stakeholders may be chosen as the most favourable. In that sense, one could argue that in fact priority is given to that particular stakeholder. However, this is justified only if the decision fits within each individual’s WRE. The priority is then a posteriori, after the deliberative process of constructing WRE.

• 4 Rawls seems somewhat ambiguous at this point. On the one hand, WRE serves as an individual justification criterion. As such the inclusion of convictions held by others is part of systematizing one’s own relevant convictions into “one unified, plausible conception of justice” (Pogge, 2007, pp. 166–167). Part of this coherence is to pay attention to the thoughts of others, “whose intelligence, integrity and life experience I have learned to respect” (p. 167). This aim of WRE fits well with Rawls’ view on citizens as reasonable persons. On the other hand, confrontation with others forms on important motive for seeking WRE in the first place. As such, WRE is sought “not merely as a guide for conduct but also to show others that I am genuinely concerned with matters of justice and hence willing to restrain my conduct in accordance with firmly held and enduring principles” (ibid.).

• 5 Note that this is not to say that this general reflective equilibrium is shared by all. It is only with regard to the political conception of justice as fairness that the general reflective equilibrium is a shared wide reflective equilibrium.

• 6 Rawls provides a threefold meaning for public reason: “it is the reason of the public; its subject is the good of the public and matters of fundamental justice; and its nature and content is public, being given by the ideals and principles expressed by society’s conception of political justice” (PL 213). He explicitly rejects the distinction public–private in the context of political liberalism, because there is no such thing as private reason involved. Besides public reason there is social reason, concerned with associations in society, and there is domestic reason, concerned with families as small groups in society. Citizens participate in all these kinds of reason (PL 220; fn 7).

• 7 A word of caution is due here. With the introduction of Rawlsian approaches to the field of applied ethics, we extend the application domain beyond the political. Moreover, for Rawls the concepts were used mainly hypothetically with the purpose of developing a theory of justice. In applied ethics actual decision problems are at stake, which calls for other than merely hypothetical considerations. This necessarily implies that different versions of the original method are being used, depending on the issue at stake. A certain pragmatic stance is therefore required in using Rawlsian approaches (Van der Burg and Van Willigenburg, 1998).

• 8 Note that this is exactly the point where Rawls has attracted most criticism. Opponents argue that it is intrinsically impossible to fairly derive procedurally neutral principles for the political domain and at the same time endorsing a comprehensive view of how those principles are to be substantiated. There seems to be an unbridgeable gab between a political doctrine of liberalism (i.e. to be tolerant towards non-liberal comprehensive doctrines) and endorsing political liberalism as a comprehensive doctrine at the same time (cf. Tan, 1998).

• 9 The thin–thick distinction is often made with regard to liberalism. A thin conception of liberalism is primarily aimed at tolerance towards other comprehensive doctrines. No single comprehensive doctrine can have the ultimate authority in political debate. Thick liberalism is itself a comprehensive doctrine with a particular view on the good life in which the values of autonomy and individuality extend into most areas of life.

• 10 For the sake of analytical clarity the way the three kinds of justification are approached is slightly different from Rawls’ approach.

• 11 Other sources for papers on WRE/overlapping consensus applications are available but the objective of this research is not give a complete inventory of all applications of WRE/overlapping consensus. Rather, the objective is to obtain a random sample of applications of Rawlsian approaches.

• 12 The term “overlapping consensus” seemed to be a microbiological term as well, referring to a particular genetic phenomenon.

• 13 March did in fact not refer to wide reflective equilibrium but to reflective equilibrium, leaving the question whether this is a wide or narrow equilibrium open.

• 14 Although practice is not part of Rawls’ own vocabulary, it is a notion often used by communitarians to refer to the MacIntyrian idea of socially-established co-operative human activity. Because these practices are constitutive for the good life, it would be wrong to demand that people detach themselves from a practice and the motives, considerations, and interests that follow from being part of it. The full definition of MacIntyrian practice reads as follows: a practice is “any coherent and complex form of socially established co-operative human activity through which goods internal to that form of activity are realized in the course of trying to achieve those standards of excellence which are appropriate to, and partially definitive of, that form of activity, with the result that human powers to achieve excellence, and human conceptions of the ends and goods involved, are systematically extended” (MacIntyre, 1984 [1981], p. 187).

• 15 Van der Burg and Van Willigenburg use the word bias instead of arbitrariness. I prefer the latter since bias indicates a systematic selectivity, which does not necessarily have to be the case. The point is that every selection implies a line to be drawn between what to include and what not. The drawing of such a line is intrinsically selective. This selectivity may, but does not necessarily have to be, biassed also.