Understanding Communitarianism: Principles and Applications
Understanding Communitarianism
Communitarianism focuses on the idea of belonging to a community. It seems contrary to the liberal ideal, but let’s examine the question deeper.
It emphasizes the importance of community in the functioning of political life and in the analysis and evaluation of political institutions. The State cannot be ethically neutral, since it must provide a policy of common good, appropriate to the way of living of the community, which is the basis of the rules and political and legal procedures for communitarians. As a consequence, the common good takes precedence over individual rights.
The community also gains great importance in understanding human identity and well-being. This philosophy believes that a person’s social identity and personality are largely molded by community relationships, with individualism having less importance in the person’s development. In addition, self-realization only has meaning within a community.
As a social interaction system, it encourages active citizenship participation in public discussion and gives great importance to culture, traditions, and the development of virtues.
However, we can say that in order to guarantee ethical social interaction, it must also incorporate some aspects of liberalism. The problem arises if we consider communities as small; there would appear several interpretations of justice and other values, which seems contrary to the aim of this philosophy. Communitarianism can also be dangerous in terms of limiting the autonomy of individuals and breaking the principle of non-maleficence under the premise that the good is above individual rights and that by harming those rights, it would be acting with beneficence as it is for the benefit of the community.
Different communities must find some basis, principles, or rules that they can share in order to avoid ethical problems. If this is achieved, three main changes will take place: both diversity and equal individual dignity will be respected, solidarity will be generated, and the ethics of justice and ethics of care will be integrated.
Case Study: Ethical Decision-Making
- Determine which facts are relevant: Accurate description.
- Identify ethical problems: Differentiate questions not connected with morality. Take into account:
- Systemic problems (changing socio-economic systems, markets, policies…)
- Organizational problems (policies, practices, culture)
- Individual problems (Privacy, autonomy, individual employee’s responsibility)
- Think of different alternative solutions
- Identify stakeholders
- Assess the alternatives from an ethical viewpoint: Determine rights and duties involved; Estimate foreseeable consequences of different alternatives considered
- Anticipate practical difficulties:
- Decide the course of action
Ethical Perspectives
- Deontological Perspective: Mainly alludes to the study of duties. It focuses on what people do, not the consequences of their actions. Emphasizes the rightness or wrongness of actions. An action will be considered morally good when some characteristics of the action itself are right, not because the outcome of the action is good. The relationship between duty and the morality of the action must be regarded in order to determine if the action is right or wrong.
- Utilitarian Perspective: Advocates maximizing utility. Velasquez states “an action is right from an ethical POV, if the total utilities produced by that act (subtracting the cost) > total of utilities produced by any other act the agent could have performed. Utility for all people involved!” Only direct and immediate consequences. Assumes that benefits produced by an action can be measured somehow and compared with harms produced. It’s intuitive. To choose the morally right conduct we should identify alternatives, establish possible outcomes, weight benefits and costs and then finally, choose.