Hutchings - Global ethics : an introduction

Copyright Kimberly Hutchings 2018

The right of Kimberly Hutchings to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2018 by Polity Press

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ISBN-13: 978-1-5095-1394-9

ISBN-13: 978-1-5095-1395-6 (pb)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Hutchings, Kimberly, 1960

Title: Global ethics : an Introduction / Kimberly Hutchings.

Description: Second edition. | Cambridge ; Meford, MA : Polity, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017054074 (print) | LCCN 2018000699 (ebook) | ISBN 9781509513987 (Epub) | ISBN 9781509513949 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509513956 (paperback)

Subjects: LCSH: International relations--Moral and ethical aspects. | Globalization--Moral and ethical aspects. | Political ethics. | BISAC: PHILOSOPHY / Ethics & Moral Philosophy.

Classification: LCC JZ1306 (ebook) | LCC JZ1306 .H88 2018 (print) | DDC 172/.4--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017054074

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I am grateful to several people and groups of people for enabling me to write this book. Thanks are due to David Held for encouraging me to do it, and to the two anonymous readers at Polity who gave me valuable feedback on the original proposal and on a draft of the text. Particular thanks are due to Joe Hoover and Henry Radice, who very kindly gave up their time to read and comment on a full version of the manuscript. Above all, I am grateful for the feedback of the many students I have taught on courses on global and international ethics over the years at Wolverhampton, Edinburgh and, most recently, the London School of Economics. Without what I have gained from all of those classes and tutorials, this book would not have been possible. Needless to say, any faults and errors are my responsibility alone.

Kimberly Hutchings

July 2009

In the eight years since writing the first edition of this book, Global Ethics has become much more established as a field of ethical inquiry. The Journal of Global Ethics has become a key forum for the development of debates within the field, and several books and collections with the term Global Ethics in their title have been published. Nevertheless, many of the fundamental arguments explored in the first edition remain foundational for work in Global Ethics. In preparing the second edition, I have introduced new material only when it reflects innovative theoretical developments, such as the growth of work in non-western, postcolonial and decolonial ethics, or where treatment of the literatures on particular topics, such as the ethics of climate change, migration or war, was in need of expansion. It remains the case that there are important topics within Global Ethics, such as trade, finance, digital communication, bioethics or health, that are not treated here. This is an introductory volume, a starting point for ethical thinking about an ever-broadening range of ways in which commonalities and interconnections are growing in the contemporary world. Such a book cannot be exhaustive in its coverage.

I am grateful to my students at Queen Mary University of London. The breadth of experience that they bring to thinking about Global Ethics has taught me a great deal in the last three years.

Kimberly Hutchings

October 2017

The words global and ethics are familiar to most English-speaking people from everyday conversations about public events and private behaviour. Weve all heard, read or used expressions such as global warming or globalization in the context of discussions about the environment or the world economy. Weve all heard, read or used terms such as ethical and unethical in the context of peoples actions in their personal or professional lives. But what does the Global Ethics in the title of this book mean? Global Ethics (always capitalized when used in this sense) is a field of theoretical inquiry that addresses ethical questions and problems arising out of the global interconnection and interdependence of the worlds population.

In contrast to other fields of theoretical inquiry that come under the broad heading of Applied Ethics, which are usually clear about the nature and reality of the field of application (for example, Professional Ethics, Environmental Ethics, Medical Ethics), within Global Ethics the term global is deeply contested. Not only is its meaning debatable, but scholars also differ over whether it refers to something, i.e. globalization, which actually has happened or is happening. This means that theorists engaged in Global Ethics do not just disagree about ethical theory but also about what significance, if any, is to be attached to the term global. The purpose of this chapter is to sketch out the terrain, and some of the defining disagreements, of Global Ethics as a field of theoretical inquiry. Subsequent chapters will flesh out the arguments touched on here in much more depth and detail. The first part of the chapter will focus on the constituent terms of Global Ethics. First, we will examine debates over the meaning of global. Second, we will examine the term ethics, the distinction between Ethics as a mode of philosophical inquiry and ethics as sets of substantive principles and values, and the relation and distinction between ethics and morality, ethics and politics. Having done this, we will look briefly at the variety of understandings of Global Ethics and of the range of questions and issues that come within its scope. On this basis we will arrive at a working definition of the field of Global Ethics and its key concerns. We will then examine how world religions claim to provide answers to the questions raised by Global Ethics. We will conclude, however, that the questions and issues identified as the subject matter of Global Ethics cannot be resolved on the basis of religion. The chapter will end with an outline of the rest of the book and some advice on how to use this book as an aid to learning.