Module 4

Culture, Moral Behavior and the Moral Agent

OBJECTIVES:
• Examine the critical role as well as challenges posed by culture in ethical reasoning
• Examine the role of emotions and feelings in moral decisions
• Understand the different stages of moral development

Relativism, Cultural and Ethical Relativism, Ethical Pluralism and the Moral Agent
Relativism (excerpt from Baghramian and Carter, 2019)
Relativism, roughly put, is the view that truth and falsity, right and wrong, standards of reasoning, and
procedures of justification are products of differing conventions and frameworks of assessment and
that their authority is confined to the context giving rise to them. More precisely, “relativism” covers
views which maintain that – at a high level of abstraction – at least some class of things have the
properties that they have (e.g., beautiful, morally good), but relative to a given framework of
assessment (e.g. local cultural norms, individual standards), and correspondingly, the truth of claims
attributing these properties holds only once the relevant framework of assessment is specified or
supplied.
Cultural Relativism
This is the view that ethical and social standards reflect the cultural context from which they are derives.
Cultural relativists uphold that cultures differ fundamentally from one another, and so do the moral
frameworks that structure relations within different societies. The rightness or wrongness of an action is
evaluated according to the ethical standards of the society within which the action occurs. The
debate in cultural relativism is whether value judgments can be made across cultures.
Ethical Relativism (excerpt from Velasquez et al, 1992)
Ethical relativism is the theory that holds that morality is relative to the norms of one’s culture. That is,
whether an action is right or wrong depends on the moral norms of the society in which it is practiced.
The same action may be morally right in one society but be morally wrong in another. For the ethical
relativist, there are no universal moral standards – standards that can be universally applied to all
people at the same time. The only moral standards against which a society’s practices can be judged
are its own. If ethical relativism is correct, there can be no common framework for resolving moral
disputes or for reaching agreement on ethical matters among members of different societies.
Most ethicists reject the theory of ethical relativism. Some claim that while the moral practices of
societies may differ, the fundamental moral principles underlying these practices do not. For example,
in some societies, killing ones parents after their reached a certain age was common practice,
stemming from the belief that people were better off in the afterlife if they entered it while still physically
active and vigorous. While such a practice would be condemned in our society, we would agree with
these societies on the underlying moral principle – the duty to care for parents. Societies, then, may
differ in their application of fundamental moral principles but agree on the principles.
Ethical Pluralism (Butts and Rich, 2008)
Pluralism is an alternative to monism and relativism. Rejecting the monist view that there is only one
correct answer in ethics, pluralists also reject the relativist claim that there can be no right answer.
Instead, moral pluralists maintain that there is a plurality of moral truths that cannot (perhaps
unfortunately) be reconciled into a single principle.
Moral Agency
A moral agent is a person who has the ability to discern right from wrong and to be held accountable
for his or her own actions. Moral agents have a moral responsibility not to cause unjustified harm.
Traditionally, moral agency is assigned only to those who can be held responsible for their actions.
Children, and adults with certain mental disabilities, may have little or no capacity to be moral agents.
Adults with full mental capacity relinquish their moral agency only in extreme situations, like being held
hostage.
By expecting people to act as moral agents, we hold people accountable for the harm they cause
others.

References:
• Baghramian, M & Carter, J. A. (2019). Relativism. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia
of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/cgibin/encyclopedia/archinfo.cgi?entry=relativism
• Velasquez, M.et al., 1992. Ethical Relativism.
https://www.scu.edu/ethics/ethicsresources/ethical-decision-making/ethical-relativism/

The Moral Agent: Moral Development

Kohlberg's (1958a) core sample was comprised of 72 boys, from both middle- and lower-class families
in Chicago. They were ages 10, 13, and 16. He later added to his sample younger children,
delinquents, and boys and girls from other American cities and from other countries (1963, 1970).
Kohlberg made use of a dilemma and ask several questions during the interview
The Dilemma: Heinz Steals the Drug
In Europe, a woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the
doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had
recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what
the drug cost him to make. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the
drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he
could only get together about $ 1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife
was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: "No, I discovered
the drug and I'm going to make money from it." So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's
store to steal the drug-for his wife. Should the husband have done that? (Kohlberg, 1963, p. 19)
Kohlberg is not really interested in whether the subject says "yes" or "no" to this dilemma but in the
reasoning behind the answer. The interviewer wants to know why the subject thinks Heinz should or
should not have stolen the drug. The interview schedule then asks new questions which help one
understand the child's reasoning. For example, children are asked if Heinz had a right to steal the
drug, if he was violating the druggist's rights, and what sentence the judge should give him once he
was caught. Once again, the main concern is with the reasoning behind the answers. The interview
then goes on to give more dilemmas in order to get a good sampling of a subject's moral thinking.
Once Kohlberg had classified the various responses into stages, he wanted to know whether his
classification was reliable. In particular, he wanted to know if others would score the protocols in the
same way. Other judges independently scored a sample of responses, and he calculated the
degree to which all raters agreed.
KOHLBERG’S STAGES OF MORAL DEVELOPMENT
LEVEL I: PRECONVENTIONAL MORALITY
Stage 1: Obedience and Punishment Orientation
• The child assumes that powerful authorities hand down a fixed set of rules which he or she
must unquestioningly obey. To the Heinz dilemma, the child typically says that Heinzwas wrong
to steal the drug because “it’s against the law” or “it’s bad to steal” as if this were all there
were to it.
Stage 2: Individualism and Exchange
• At this stage, children recognize that there is not just one right view that is handed down by
the authorities. Since everything is relative, each person is free to pursue his or her individual
interests. One boy said that Heinz might steal the drug if he wanted his wife to live, but that he
doesn’t have to if he wants to marry someone younger and better looking (Kohlberg, 1963:
24)What is right for Heinz, then, is what meets his own self-interests.
LEVEL II: CONVENTIONAL MORALITY
Stage 3: Good Interpersonal Relationship
• At this stage, children – who are by now usually entering their teens – see morality as more
than simple deals. They believe that people should live up to the expectations of the family
and community and behave in „good‟ ways. Considering the other people around you, such
as your family members and close friends, one should make real efforts in trying to help the
other person.
Stage 4: Maintaining the Social Order
• The respondent becomes more broadly concerned with society as a whole. Now the
emphasis is on obeying laws, respecting authority, and performing one’s duties so that the
social order is maintained. What would happen if we all started breaking the laws whenever
we felt we had a good reason? The result would be chaos; society couldn’t function.
LEVEL III. POSTCONVENTIONAL MORALITY
Stage 5: Social Contract and Individual Rights
• At this stage, people want to keep society functioning. However, the smooth functioning
society is not necessarily a good one. At stage 5, people begin to ask, “What makes for a
good society?” They begin to think about society in a very theoretical way, stepping back
from their own society and considering the rights and values that a society ought to uphold.
Stage 6: Universal Principles
• This is the higher stage which defines the principles by which we achieve justice. The principles
of justice are universal; they apply to all. Thus, for example, we would not vote for a law that
aids some people but hurts others.
https://www.cs.umb.edu/~hdeblois/285L/Kohlberg'sMoralStages.htm

Reference:
• Crain, W. C. (1985). Theories of Development. Prentice-Hal