When many people think of bioethics, they think of gripping issues in clinical medicine such as end-of-life decision-making, controversies in biomedical research such as that over work with stem cells, or issues in allocating scarce health-care resources such as organs or money. The term “bioethics” may evoke images of moral controversies being discussed on news programs and talk shows. But this “controversy of the day” focus often treats ethical issues in medicine superficially, for it addresses them as if they could (...) be examined and discussed in isolation from the context in which they are situated. Such a focus on the latest controversies fails to take into account that medicine is a social institution and that the controversies in bioethics often reflect deeper social and moral issues that transcend the boundaries of medicine and ethics. If one moves beyond the issue-of-the-day approach to bioethics, one can see that the field must address these deeper issues. (shrink)

The Covid‐19 pandemic highlighted the need to examine public trust in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) vaccine approval process and the role of political influence in the FDA's decisions. Ensuring that the FDA is itself trustworthy is important for justifying public trust in its actions, like vaccine approvals, thereby promoting public health. We propose five conditions of trustworthiness that the FDA should meet when it reviews vaccines, even during emergencies: consistency with rules, proper expert or political decision‐makers, proper (...) decision‐making and noninterference, connection to public preference, and transparency of both reasons and procedures. The five conditions provide a road map of procedural and substantive requirements, which the FDA has variably implemented, focused on ensuring appropriate influence of political interests. While being a trustworthy agency cannot guarantee the public's trust, implementing these conditions builds a groundwork for public trust. (shrink)

Steady progress toward justice is not evident within extant political systems. A good-faith commitment to justice therefore requires oppositional collective action. This paper articulates and defends a moral principle of “progressive solidarity” that guides oppositional political action. Solidarity requires us to work alongside others according to their choice of action, even if this requires doing what we believe unwise or immoral. Progressive solidarity requires deference to the decisions of the least well-off group. Although individual judgment is by no means suspended, (...) solidarity nonetheless challenges moral autonomy. The paper argues that working to alleviate others’ misery is neither necessary nor sufficient for solidarity; rather, solidarity accepts others’ own account of their interests – whether or not their analysis is correct – and contributes to their pursuit of their aims. After explicating the concept of progressive solidarity and contrasting it with sympathy, loyalty, generosity, and identification, the paper defends progressive solidarity in moral, epistemic, and strategic contexts. The final section responds to objections and suggests that the case for solidarity is strengthened by application to the contemporary world. (shrink)