Universalism vs. Relativism: – Relativism Introduced

ER 11, Gov E-1040Spring 2012

Our question:

• have introduced different ways of supporting idea of human rights

• “human” rights are universal: apply even to cultures that reject them

• Does this not conflict with appropriate respect owed to different cultures?

Strictly speaking, this has already been answered!

Relativism: the vague idea first

“Values depend on the culture. There are no universal values.”

Relativism: Attractions• easily motivated: “different peoples live according to different

norms; when in Rome do as the Romans do”

• “aims that guide the life of every people are self-evident in their significance to that people” (AAA, p 542)

• “What is held to be a human right in one society may be regarded as anti-social by another people” (p 542)

• “who is to judge:” enlightened, appropriately modest

American Anthropological Association (1947)

• Principle 3: Standards and values are relative to the culture from which they derive so that any attempt to formulate postulates that grow out of the beliefs or moral codes of one culture must to that extent detract from the applicability of any Declaration of Human Rights to mankind as a whole. (p 542)

Moral Doctrine of Diversity?

Relativism: Intuitive Problems

• cannot bring up any moral criticism of other cultures or even assess changes within our own: remember the Kuk

• Could assess what is right or wrong just by consulting standards of our “moral network”

Connection to tolerance/endorsement of diversity tenuous

Just a minority losing out?

Just a minority losing out?

Nothing right or wrong here?

Remember

Moral Disagreement – utterly irrational?

Clarification

• The vague idea: “Values depend on the culture. There are no universal values.”

• To reach more precision, must distinguish between cultural and moral/normative relativism

Anthropological thesis: cultural relativism

“different cultures have different moral codes”

Moral/Normative Relativism

• fundamental values and ethical beliefs are culture-bound in a sense that does not allow for critical engagement with people who do not belong to that culture, and makes it the case that there is no right and wrong, but merely a “right for” and “wrong for”

• Universalism holds that there are values that apply across cultures – even if cultures themselves do not accept them

• “fundamental” values or beliefs – see beginning of Harman’s “What is Moral Relativism?”

And: relativity of simultaneity

Cultural relativism does not imply moral

relativism

And: relativity theory has no

bearing on value matters

Harman on “Inner Judgments”

• restricted case for moral relativism

• in terms of what he calls “inner judgments” – moral ought-to-do judgments

• compatible with there being a theory of justice or of desirability of states of affairs that is universally valid

• but no universal ought-statements can be derived

Inner Judgments

• imply that agent has reason to do something

• imply that speaker endorses those reasons and expects audience to do the same

• ought-to-do judgments are of that sort; judgments of something’s being evil are not

Illustration• telling member of crime family he ought not do carry

out assignment would be misuse of moral vocabulary

• Lacks motivational structure to find reason not to

• if I say you ought to do such an such, I am saying you are sharing basic components of motivational structure; in light of that you should act a certain way

Morality• appeal to network of conventions we have reason to

keep as long as everybody around us (!) does

• Not matter of explicit endorsement, but of implicit adjustments

• forming intentions that end up in an equilibrium

• Illustration in terms of positive/negative duties

Morality, Cont.

• network of conventions leads to motivational structure in which some people have reasons to do something

• Others may disobey command without being ignorant, without any form of irrationality, stupidity, confusion, or mental illness

Morality, Cont.

• not moral skepticism -- thesis that there is no sense in which anybody ought to do anything does not apply

• Benign relativism recognizes that we are social creatures living in societies, subject to norms

Moral Engagement

• Recall that one worry about relativism was that it makes nonsense of moral disagreement

• Here: disagreement is about creating coherence

• Animals; abortions; death penalty

Ghost of Relativism

Does Harman’s view of morality – his relativism – fundamentally threaten the human rights movement?

Very non-Kantian

Illustration: Slave Holder Societies

• American South in 1850

• Compare Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, 1963: “a tension in the mind”

• Slavery in Greece, 500 BC

Not Subject to Reductio ad absurdum

(a) There are no universal principles. (b) One ought to act in accordance with the principles of one’s

own group.(c) Principle (b) is a universal moral principle

• No incoherence emerging because no commitment to (b) is required. Harman needs to take no stance on that issue. Instead:

(a) There are no universal principles. (b) People think they ought to act in accordance with the

principles of their own group. (c) (a) and (b) are consistent.