ETHICS IN HARD TIMES

THE HASTINGS CENTER SERIES IN ETHICS

ETHICS TEACHING IN HIGHER EDUCATION Edited by Daniel Callahan and Sissela Bok

MENTAL RETARDATION AND STERILIZATION A Problem of Competency and Paternalism Edited by Ruth Macklin and Willard Gaylin

THE ROOTS OF ETHICS: Science, Religion, and Values Edited by Daniel Callahan and H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr.

ETHICS IN HARD TIMES Edited by Arthur L. Caplan and Daniel Callahan

VIOLENCE AND THE POLITICS OF RESEARCH Edited by Willard Gaylin, Ruth Macklin, and Tabitha M. Powledge

WHO SPEAKS FOR THE CHILD: The Problems of Proxy Consent Edited by Willard Gaylin and Ruth Macklin

A Continuation Order Plan is available for this series. A continuation order will bring delivery of each new volume immediately upon publication. Volumes are billed only upon actual shipment. For further information please contact the publisher.

ETHICS IN HARD TIMES Edited by Arthur L. Caplan and Daniel Callahan The Hll5lings Center, Ht/stings-on-Hudson, New York

PLENUM PRESS • NEW YORK AND LONDON

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Main entry under title:

Ethics in hard times.

(The Hastings Center series in ethics) Includes bibliographies and index. 1. Political ethics-Addresses, essays, lectures. 2. Social ethics-Addresses, essays,

lectures. 3. Social justice-Addresses, essays, lectures. I. Caplan, Arthur L. II. Callahan, Daniel. 1930 . III. Series. JA79.E825 172 ISBN-13: 978-1-4684-4024-9 e-ISBN-13: 978-1-4684-4022-5 DOl: 10.1007/978-1-4684-4022-5

© 198 I The Hastings Center Softeover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1981 Institute of Society, Ethics, and the Life Sciences 360 Broadway Hastings-on-Hudson, New York 10706

Plenum Press, New York A Division of Plenum Publishing Corporation 233 Spring Street, New York, N.Y. 10013

All rights reserved

81-17728 AACR2

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming. recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher

CONTRIBUTORS

DANIEL CALLAHAN, Director, The Hastings Center, Insti­tute of Society, Ethics, and the Life Sciences, 360 Broadway, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York

ARTHUR L. CAPLAN, Associate for the Humanities, The Hastings Center, Institute of Society, Ethics, and the Life Sciences, 360 Broadway, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York

ROBERT A. GOLDWIN, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1150 17th Street, Northwest, Wash­ington, D.C.

ROBERT LEKACHMAN, Department of Economics, Herbert H. Lehman College, City University of New York, Bronx, New York

JONATHAN LIEBERSON, Center for Policy Studies, The Population Council, 1 Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, New York, New York

JAMES RACHELS, Office of the Dean, School of Humanities, University of Alabama in Birmingham, Birmingham, Ala­bama

v

vi CONTRIBUTORS

THOMAS C. SCHELLING, John F. Kennedy School of Gov­ernment, 79 Boylston Street, Harvard University, Cam­bridge, Massachusetts

PETER SINGER, Department of Philosophy, Monash Uni­versity, Clayton, Victoria, Australia

SHELDON S. WOLIN, Department of Politics, 206 Corwin Hall, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey

A.D. WOOZLEY, University Professor of Philosophy and Law, 521 Cabell Hall, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ix by Arthur L. Caplan and Daniel Callahan

Chapter 1 / CAN ETHICS PROVIDE ANSWERS? 1 by James Rachels

Chapter 2 / THE CONCEPT OF MORAL STANDING 31 by Peter Singer

Chapter 3 / WHY SHOULD WE BE MORAL? 47 by Jonathan Lieberson

Chapter 4 / ECONOMIC JUSTICE IN HARD TIMES 91 by Robert Lekachman

Chapter 5 / RIGHTS VERSUS DUTIES: No CONTEST 117 by Robert A. Goldwin

Chapter 6 / LAW AND THE LEGISLATION OF MORALITY 143 by A. D. Woozley

Chapter 7 / ANALYTIC METHODS AND THE ETHICS OF POLICY 175 by Thomas C. Schelling

vii

vtii CONTENTS

Chapter 8 / THE AMERICAN PLURALIST CONCEPTION

OF POLITICS 217 by Sheldon S. Wolin

Chapter 9 / MINIMALIST ETHICS: ON THE PACIFICATION

OF MORALITY 261 by Daniel Callahan

INDEX 283

INTRODUCTION

There is widespread agreement among large segments of western society that we are living in a period of hard times. At first glance such a belief might seem exceedingly odd. After all, persons in western society find themselves living in a time of unprecedented material abundance. Hunger and disease, evils all too familiar to the members of earlier generations, although far from eradicated from modern life, are plainly on the wane. Persons alive today can look forward to healthier, longer, and more comfortable lives than those of their grand­parents. Nevertheless, the feeling that life today is especially difficult is rampant in government, in the media, in popular books, and in academic circles. Western society is perceived in many quarters as wracked by crises of all sorts-of faith, of power, of authority, of social turmoil, of declining quality in workmanship and products, and of a general intellectual malaise afflicting both those on the Left and the Right. A tone of crisis permeates the language of public life. Editorials in major newspapers are full of dire warnings about the dangers of unbridled egoism, avarice and greed, and the risks and horrors of pollution, overpopulation, the arms race, crime, and indulgent lifestyles.

Many of the social institutions that have historically served as the glue of modern social existence-the church, the family, local government, the schools, the armed forces,

ix

x INTRODUCTION

the police-have been diagnosed as seriously ailing or certi fied as dead by countless publications, studies, commissions, and panels. Science, medicine, and technology, once the hope of an entire generation of young idealists, are now viewed as pernicious practices whose fruits are bitter and toxic. The quality of life in large urban centers today has led many cul­tural commentators to recall Hobbesian descriptions of life grown brutish, nasty, and short. The language of triage, of lifeboat ethics, of belt tightening, of conservation, of battening down the hatches is now the argot of policy makers, bureau­crats, and politicians. Quality not quantity has become the criterion by which life in advanced modem society is mea­sured. Although no single indicator has gained universal as­sent as the appropriate index of the quality of personal life, there seems to be a universal consensus that most of the available signs and indices are pointing in a negative direc­tion.

Ironically, one symptom of the view that we are living in a period of hard times is the frequency with which con­temporary debates about public and private matters are pep­pered with references to ethics and morality. Many of the debates and disputes current in contemporary society are con­ducted in the language of ethics. Talk of rights, justice, virtue, freedom, duties, and liberty is widespread. Indeed, it would not be unfair to sum up the popular opinion about why these are hard times with the phrase "moral crisis." We have an abundance of knowledge and material goods, yet we seem uncertain about how to use these goods, about who should benefit from them, even about whether these goods are really goods at all.

Talk of ethics is not a new phenomenon in periods of hard times. In nineteenth-century England legislators and academicians, appalled by the hard times brought on for

INTRODUCTION xi

many by rapid industrialization, turned to ethics for answers. The 1834 Royal Poor Law Commission for Inquiring into the Administration and Practical Operation of the Poor Laws con­cluded that poverty was a condition that resulted from the moral inferiority of afflicted individuals. Similarly, in the United States during the 1840s and 1850s, waves of German and Irish immigrants were divided into the morally "worthy" rich and "unworthy" poor. The hard life borne by these new immigrants was diagnosed as resulting from a failure of moral nerve and congenital defects in moral character. New immi­grants simply lacked the necessary moral resources to raise themselves from poverty, unemployment, and hard times. This tendency to attribute the new immigrant's harsh life to defects in moral character is still manifest today in editorial complaints about crime and poverty among Haitians, Cubans, and Vietnamese in America, and among Pakistanis, Trini­dadians, and Surinamese in Europe.

In hard times ethics is often thought to be useful not only in diagnosis but also in therapy. Utilitarianism, for example, clearly arose as a nineteenth-century moral response to hard times. Social welfare efforts for the poor and the disabled were closely tied to moral theorizing about benefiting the great­est number. Prisons and asylums were also defended on these same moral grounds.

Those who do work in the humanities are often quick to scold those in other fields, professions, and walks of life for ignoring their social and political roots. Indeed, entire schol­arly industries have arisen in the humanities to chart the history and social context of the sciences. Unfortunately, hu­manists in general and moral philosophers in particular have not been as quick to look at the historical and social roots of their own theories and views. When one looks in this direc­tion, it becomes obvious that ethical theorizing is not at all

xii INTRODUCTION

immune to hard times. As the case of utilitarianism shows, war, poverty, and economic vicissitudes are powerful motives to philosophizing about morality.

This book represents an effort to see what the current perception of hard times means for ethical inquiry. Is ethics a place to turn for answers to hard questions of the sort now confronting technologically advanced societies? Is the current perception of hard times fueled by a perceived failure in mod­ern morals, and, if so, is the perception valid? And if cultures, as they have in the past, turn in hard times to ethics for help, what has contemporary inquiry into morality to offer in the way of diagnoses and solutions? The essays assembled here are intended to illustrate that inquiry into moral issues can provide some relief for hard times.

The essays fall into three general categories. Rachels, Singer, and Lieberson concern themselves with the scope, content, and purpose of ethics. Rachels argues that ethics ought to be conceived as an autonomous subject matter, re­lated to but not reducible to psychology, sociology, or an­thropology. The strict exercise of what he terms "rational methods" will improve the quality and, more importantly, the efficacy of moral argument. Ethics can give answers if we realize that these answers are only useful in proportion to the information and self-understanding available to anyone who formulates them. Rachels maintains that the methods of ethics are only as valid as the factual evidence on which they de­pend.

Singer argues that certain plain facts about sentience and suffering must force a reevaluation of our current thinking about moral standing. According to Singer, the ability to feel and suffer is sufficient for conferring moral standing on an entity. If this is so, since we now use such a criterion for conferring moral status upon children, the retarded, the men­tally ill, and the senile, then we must include most animals

INTRODUCTION xiii

in the sphere of our moral concerns as well. If, as Rachels notes, consistency is a central norm of ethical method, then babies and baboons deserve equal consideration as, and only as, sentient beings.

Ironically, whereas Singer's sentience standard leads him to argue for extending our traditional sphere of moral concern, Lieberson finds himself arguing against those who would limit the boundary of moral concern to our own bodies. Lieberson argues that current fascinations with egoism and self-advan­tage are conceptually muddled. The notions of self used by those who preach the glories of raw egoism are petty and static. Lieberson is in agreement with Rachels and Singer that the demands of morality in good times and bad require us to do more rather than less in overcoming our desires for short­term personal security and comfort.

Lekachman, Goldwin, and Woozley address themselves to the issue of the role of the state vis-a.-vis the citizen in hard times. Lekachman notes that American society is currently divided as to the optimal mode for achieving justice for its citizens between providing equal opportunity for all and strict equality in the resources and goods that all persons in fact possess. He argues that libertarian minimalism in the distri­bution of goods is not likely to nourish the desires and hopes of the general population for long. On Lekachman's view of equality we must not settle for anything less than an economic system that promises to provide more to the poor and dis­advantaged at the expense of the rich-no matter what the opinion of the rich might be.

Goldwin addresses himself to an issue of central moral importance to any society-the duties of citizenship. Goldwin cautions that the hope of helping others, of benefiting the poor and the disadvantaged, should not fool us into undercutting our notion of civic duty by claims about individual rights. In contrast to Lekachman, he argues that the protection of liberty

xiv INTRODUCTION

and the recognition of civic duty are the best prophylactks against the totalitarian impulses present in government dur­ing hard times.

Woozley addresses himself to another issue of vital im­portance in citizen-state relations: the role of law in regulating personal and public behavior. Woozley argues that the law should be coextensive in its concern with the immoral. If morality tries, as Rachels, Singer, and Lieberson all suggest, to protect and advance interests, then the state has no choice but to enforce sanctions against immorality. The law must serve as a societal standard of minimally acceptable and max­imally desirable conduct. Woozley concurs with Goldwin that the law should not be a vehicle for moral change, but rather is dependent on moral motives for its existence. Both Goldwin and Woozley trust to individual good sense and sensitivity as the ultimate guardians of civility and stability in hard times. Lekachman, although less sanguine about the overlap of read­ings among individual moral barometers, believes that the sentiment for equity in the distribution of resources will ul­timately prevail over all others.

The essays by Schelling, Wolin, and Callahan address themselves to a particularly timely concern in hard times: How should a society as pluralistic as America's come to grips with the need to establish unanimity concerning moral choices in a period of hard times? Schelling addresses the question of how the supposedly neutral or "disinterested" policy sci­ences can grapple with a broad range of ethical opinions about divisive social issues. He notes the unexpected pernicious effects meliorative social programs have had and can have in rewarding risky personal behaviors. He argues that those in­volved in the policy sciences can best protect the greatest number of human interests by honestly attempting to cal­culate the relative costs to individuals of following various policy alternatives, and by leaving the ultimate policy choice to those concerned enough to care.

INTRODUCTION xv

Wolin worries about the power implicit in obeisance to a principle of the inviolability of pluralism. Powerful groups within society are able to get their way, he warns, both by maintaining the illusion of pluralism-that no common in­terests exist-and by defending the morality of tolerating plu­ralism. Unlike Schelling, Wolin believes that "disinterested" expertise is not to be trusted since technical solutions are most attractive to those well placed enough to utilize them.

Callahan argues that current popular conceptions of mo­rality that tout the virtues of liberty and autonomy are not sufficient to glue together a society faced with hard times. Like Goldwin, he looks toward the articulation of a communitarian or civic ethic based on duty, obligation, and trust to rectify the "moral anemia" of contemporary society. Callahan agrees with Wolin that mere tolerance for tolerance's sake is not the optimal solution for a pluralistic society looking for solutions and options in hard times. And, like Rachels, Callahan be­lieves that morality and pluralism could better be reconciled with less attention to tolerance and more attention to common interests.

The disposition to philosophize may show itself most in hard times. But in times such as these, that disposition cannot flourish without financial aid and support. Thus we must warmly thank the Rockefeller Foundation for their generous support of the Humanities Program at the Hastings Center, under whose auspices these essays were produced. We must also thank Elizabeth Bartelme, Mary Gualandi, and Bonnie Baya whose editorial and typing skills contributed mightily to making the production of this volume a pleasant task de­spite the rigors of the times.

ARTHUR L. CAPLAN

DANIEL CALLAHAN