PRINCIPLES > ACTIONS > OUTCOMES
Absolutist……………………Relativist
“it’s always wrong to steal”…….. “Robin Hood was Ethical.”
Absolutist and Relativist are two categories of ethical decision making:
Absolutist: Actions are ethical if they follow moral principles of right and wrong (e.g. the 10 commandments). The outcome of the decision is not considered. E.g. the statement, “It’s wrong to steal,” is following an absolutist approach to ethics.
Relativist: The outcome of a decision determines if it is ethical–principles are ignored. E.g “Robin Hood was Ethical–he stole from the rich, and gave to the poor.” No mention of principles, only the outcome–that he helped poor people. This is a relativist approach.
Deontological: This is in the absolutist category–ethics based on an “inner sense of duty” to follow a moral code. (Another absolutist approach would be the “normative” approach towards stakeholders, which also comes up in the exam.)
Teleological is in the relativist category (you could argue these terms are actually synonyms). What is ethical is either (a) what is best for me, or (b) what is best for society. (the instrumental view towards stakeholders is another example of a relativist approach).
You can explore these concepts more deeply by looking at Kant and other theorists. But for P1, it’s more important that you can dissect the case study and explain which of the characters is taking the absolutist approach, and which is taking the relativist approach, and why.
Copy Extracted & Retrieved from:
http://opentuition.com/topic/ethical-theories-2/
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