Analyzing Ethical Issues

Analyzing Ethical Issues: A Simple Method

The following is not to be construed as a “formula” for generating responses to ethical problems. Use it instead as a general guideline or as a suggested series of questions that may (or may not) be relevant to the particular case at issue.  The various steps are meant to help you “think through” or “analyze” a case. Use these questions to organize your thoughts (and notes) before you start writing an essay.

 

Step 1: Study the details and determine the relevant facts of the case

  • What are the relevant facts of the case?
  • What are the preferences of the primary agentsinvolved?
  • What are the preferences of other principal parties, if any?
  • What are the relevant contextual featuresof the case (financial concerns, managed care requirements, etc.), if any?
  • Is this case relevantly similar to other “already-decided” cases?  How so?
  • Is there any information missing that would be relevant and seems crucial to your moral deliberation?  What might that be?  How would the analysis change with this information?
  • Is there anything that you’ve read or learned from your own experience that offers insight or contributes to an understanding of the context of the relevant facts?

 

Step 2: Identify the relevant moral criteria (values; “Goods vs. Bads”)

Obligations (or principles of duty)

  • What does the principle of respect for persons imply about this case?
  • What are the relevant role-specific obligations of the agents involved in the case, if any?

Virtues (moral ideals or principles of excellence of character)

  • What are the relevant ideals(virtues of character) involved, if any?
  • What would contribute to the flourishing or well-being of each of those concerned?

Consequences (principles of utility)

  • What are the beneficial and/or harmful effects in each of the possible alternatives for those involved?

Other Values

  • What are the relevant professional codes involved in the case, if any?
  • What are the relevant legal statutes or and/or court opinions, if any?
  • What are the relevant cultural norms or traditions, if any?

 

Step 3: Identify the value conflicts

  • What makes this case controversial?
  • Which of the above values conflict with one another?  Describe the nature of the conflict?
  • Which conflict is primary (i.e. the most important)?

 

Step 4: Determine the possible courses of action

  • Are there practical alternatives that could be employed that would preclude the ethical issue(s) from arising?  Is there a way to “dissolve” the problem?
  • What possible alternative courses of action are available to the agent(s) in question? What are the relevant consequences of each of these alternatives?  Whom will they affect?  In what way(s)?
  • Are there any new moral criteriathat are relevant to these alternatives?  What are they?

 

Step 5: Choose the best (or, in other words, the most ethically justifiable) course of action

  • Is your position consistent with the Principle of Right Desire?
  • Is your position consistent with the Principle of Non-Contradiction?
  • What course of action do the results of the first four steps bring you to? Why?
  • Who are the parties responsible for this course of action?
  • What would be the implications of this course of action to those carrying it out?

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Adapted from the following:

Louis A Day, “Ethics and Moral Reasoning,” in Ethics in Media Communications. Second edition.  Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1997, pp.5-70.

Eric Gample, “A Method for Teaching Ethics.”  Teaching Philosophy, v.19, n.4, December 1996, pp.371-383.

Albert R. Jonsen, Mark Siegler, William J. Winslade, Clinical Ethics.  Fourth edition.  McGraw-Hill, 1998, p.13.

Vincent Ryan Ruggiero.  “The Basic Criteria,” in Thinking Critically About Ethics.  Fourth edition.  Mayfield Publishing Company, 199.