One of the reasons Safety does so poorly in understanding Ethics is because by nature, Ethics is a philosophical discipline. Philosophy is a discipline one benefits in learning through a Transdisciplinary approach to critical thinking https://safetyrisk.net/transdisciplinary-safety/ ).
Transdisciplinarity is a disposition that seeks to know and think ‘across’ the disciplines rather than assuming that one’s own knowledge culture (eg. safety) is all one needs to know. These days if I see safety as an adjective of something eg. ‘safety’ ethics, its fairly reliable that the discussion that follows is narrow, closed and ill-informed.The discipline of Philosophy is a discipline of seeking wisdom, this is the meaning of the word – ‘philo’ love of ‘Sophia’ – wisdom. Wisdom is not discussed in the Safety industry and has no mention in the AIHS BoK on Ethics. It is however central to the development of critical thinking, particularly in Ethics. Wisdom is not about finding ‘fixes’ but much more about not finding ‘fixes’. Safety also doesn’t want to know much about Wicked Problems (https://safetyrisk.net/risk-and-safety-as-a-wicked-problem/)
but Ethics is one of those Wicked Problem can-of-worms. Stenberg’s book on
Wisdom is certainly a good starting point.
One of the skills of Philosophy is that of defining terms and understanding assumptions. This is often undertaken by applying critical questions to a text using hermeneutical skills and focusing on how power, anthropology, personhood, methodology and culture are defined. Head-in-sand thinking or parrot–training are not learning and if one wants to understand Ethics one doesn’t get much from any safety text. Even confusing and not defining the language of morality and ethics, ethos and ethic demonstrate a poor understanding of Ethics. No wonder Safety thinks Zero is a good ideology!Most of the time we have a disagreement with someone, it is often about worldviews. Worldviews are often not declared and people in safety are rarely trained in how to discern worldviews. In this way people in safety often put forward various ideas and have little idea of the worldview (ideology) hidden in such discourse (The Bradley Curve is a classic example).
My map of safety
schools of thought (https://safetyrisk.net/a-great-comparison-of-risk-and-safety-schools-of-thought/)
was an attempt to show how worldviews are implicated for an understanding of risk. So in order to help understand Ethics I developed a similar map to help illustrate the various schools of Ethics (Figure 1. Schools of Ethics) and their implications for decision making.If you wish to understand an Ethic of Risk you are more than welcome to join us next week in Canberra in the two day workshop, An Ethic of Risk: https://spor.com.au/home/one-week-intensive-2-modules-february-2020/
Figure 1. Schools of Ethics.
Download a pdf copy here: Schools of Ethics 2
| Behaviourist | Care Feminist |
Existential Dialectic |
Deontological | Natural Law | Normative Constructive |
Pragmatic | Situational Relative |
Utilitarian | Virtue | |
| View of Humans | Sum of inputs and outputs | As Beings under power | Humans as Intersubjective | Humans under divine command | Humans under god’s law | Humans as instruments | Humans as rational, logical | Humans as not absolute, antinomian | Humans as utility | Humans as actors |
| Agents | Skinner Watson |
Carol Gilligan Nel Noddings |
Jacques Ellul Merleau-Ponty |
Kantian Ethics | Aquinas Hobbes, Locke |
Combination of any ethic of consequentialism |
John Dewey | Joseph Fletcher R.M. Hare Richard Rorty |
Bentham J.S.Mill Peter Singer |
Alasdair MacIntyre |
| Language | Positive and negative reward | Social action, rationality, embodied experience |
Interconnectivity Interaffectivity |
Obligation, duty, compliance | Jurisprudence self-evidence |
What is moral? | Science objectivism moral ecology |
Response to context, meta-ethics | Ends justifies the means | Human flourishing |
| Culture | Modification of behaviours. Science of action and controls |
Vulnerability to power | Ethics as experiences of worldview and ‘the other’ |
Motives, things intrinsically ‘good’ |
Human rights are natural and known, social contract |
Categorical imperatives, binding forces |
Inquiry and truth, rationality and good for society |
Greatest good for greatest number | Happiness for the majority | Exercise of skills and knowledge of virtue |
| Key Question | What is the behaviour? | Where is benevolence? | What and who is personhood? | What is the rule? | What should I do? | How should one act? | What is good for society? | What is good in time? | What is best for the majority? | What is virtuous? |
| Focus | Based on the assumption that humans as objects are the sum of inputs and outputs. A mechanistic ethic that has a trajectory of dehumanising others. |
Centers on interpersonal relationships and care or benevolence as a virtue. Feminist, post structuralist and awareness of power in relations. |
Founded in the dialectic between being, embodiment and not being, consciousness and unconsciousness. An experiential ethic established in i-thou and intersubjectivity |
Emphasizes generalizable standards, duties, rules and impartiality. Founded in the myth of verifiable scientific objectivity and Positivism. Consequentialism |
Based on the so called ‘laws of nature’ this ethic proposes an objective standard of being that all humans share (universal) and is ‘god given’. |
Based on rationality and what is deemed ‘normal’. |
Based on what people do. Therefore, an ethic is validated on what is dominant at the time of analysis. So, society by its actions declares morality. |
Takes into account the social-psychological and cultural context. This approach argues that there is no objective moral or universal standard. |
Decision based on the utility of the moment. Tends to view humans as objects in a system. The most common mantra for utilitarian ethics is ‘the end justifies the means’. |
Emphasis on ‘virtues’ and moral character. To be virtuous is to possess a certain mindset or disposition in relation to the world. |
| Solutions | Increase and decrease rewards | Make care normative | Living ethically through interconnectivity |
Make rules clear | Love god and obey His laws | Being disposed to moral good | The collective good | What is best moves in time, context and society |
Focus on happiness for the majority |
Be of good character |
Dr Rob Long
Latest posts by Dr Rob Long (see all)
- Safety Stole My Freedoms - September 27, 2020
- An Ethical Psychology of Risk - September 27, 2020
- Not a Profession’s Bootlace - September 24, 2020
- It’s Always a Number - September 18, 2020
- The Big Safety NON-Debate - September 12, 2020
bernardcorden says
It is quite fascinating to apply transdisciplinarity to the Hillsborough stadium disaster and the subsequent campaign for justice.
The Hillsborough Families Support Group was initially established and became embroiled in conflict with legal technicalities, objectivism and positivism. Indeed, it inadvertently generated a hierarchy of grief and several bereaved families were rusticated from the support group.
The campaign stagnated for almost a decade until the involvement of Reverend James Jones (Bishop of Liverpool). The Hillsborough Justice Campaign was eventually established and embraced a transdisciplinary approach with remarkable results.
It focussed on Basarab Nicolescu’s fecund hidden third between the object and the subject. This dynamic mediating force provided lubrication between internal and external worlds via the Hillsborough Independent Panel. Its impact was quite profound and the original coronial inquest findings of accidental death were quashed by the High Court and following a further inquest under coroner Sir John Goldring in 2016 a jury returned findings of unlawful killing.
Scientific theory is a contrived foothold in the chaos of living phenomena – Wilhelm Reich
Rob Long says
Bernard, an interesting observation.
I think the hidden third is an important dynamic as is made clear through phenomenology, existentialism, semiotics and transdisciplinarity. Not surprised that a theologian would make a good emissary for justice, fallibility is essential for empathy, just as Zero is the enemy of suffering. As long as Safety is locked into positivism it has no Hope.
bernardcorden says
I am rather surprised that the AIHS BoK Ethics and Professional Practice publication did not include Nicola Gobbo as a technical advisor.
bernardcorden says
I am rather surprised that the AIHS BoK Ethics and Professional Practice publication did not include Nicola Gobbo as a technical advisor.
bernardcorden says
It is quite fascinating to apply transdisciplinarity to the Hillsborough stadium disaster and the subsequent campaign for justice.
The Hillsborough Families Support Group was initially established and became embroiled in conflict with legal technicalities, objectivism and positivism. Indeed, it inadvertently generated a hierarchy of grief and several bereaved families were rusticated from the support group.
The campaign stagnated for almost a decade until the involvement of Reverend James Jones (Bishop of Liverpool). The Hillsborough Justice Campaign was eventually established and embraced a transdisciplinary approach with remarkable results.
It focussed on Basarab Nicolescu’s fecund hidden third between the object and the subject. This dynamic mediating force provided lubrication between internal and external worlds via the Hillsborough Independent Panel. Its impact was quite profound and the original coronial inquest findings of accidental death were quashed by the High Court and following a further inquest under coroner Sir John Goldring in 2016 a jury returned findings of unlawful killing.
Scientific theory is a contrived foothold in the chaos of living phenomena – Wilhelm Reich
Rob Long says
Bernard, an interesting observation.
I think the hidden third is an important dynamic as is made clear through phenomenology, existentialism, semiotics and transdisciplinarity. Not surprised that a theologian would make a good emissary for justice, fallibility is essential for empathy, just as Zero is the enemy of suffering. As long as Safety is locked into positivism it has no Hope.