Cosmopolitanism and statism represent the two dominant liberal theoretical standpoints in the current debate on global distributive justice. In this paper, I will develop a feminist argument that recommends that statist approaches be rejected. This argument has its roots in the feminist critique of liberal theories of social justice. In Justice, Gender, and the Family Susan Moller Okin argues that many liberal egalitarian theories of justice are inadequate because they assume a strict division between public and private spheres. I will (...) argue that this inadequacy is replicated in statist approaches to global justice. To demonstrate this, I will show how an analogue of Okin's critique of Rawls's A Theory of Justice can be extended to his The Law of Peoples. I will conclude that statist theories inevitably assume a strong divide between public and private spheres and that by doing so they allow for situations marked by gross injustice which anyone concerned with the welfare of the world's most vulnerable should find unacceptable. (shrink)

Philosophy Compass, Volume 17, Issue 4, April 2022. -/- In a moment where needs for care are acute and their provision precarious, feminist care ethics has gained new relevance as a framework for understanding and responding to necessary interdependence. This article reviews and evaluates two long-standing critiques of care ethics in light of this recent research. First, I assess what I call the pluralist feminist critique, or the dispute over the ability of care ethics to address the needs and histories (...) of a range of marginalized subjects. I identify two forms of this critique: the first disputes the biased starting points shaping the development of the theory, and the second concerns the weaponization of care in support of domination. Although these critiques are well-established, I draw attention to recent responses that move care theory in generative directions. I argue that the pluralist feminist critique demands both self-critical transformation in dialog with other feminist schools of thought and a robust account of care ethics' normative authority. I then take up critiques those levied by mainstream ethicists concerned with care theory's adequacy as an ethical approach. I show that recent work on normative authority, conceptual uniqueness, and the grounding of responsibility must be engaged before care theory can be dismissed as “under-theorized.” In articulating these two sets of critiques and evaluating recent rebuttals to them, I argue for a pluralist feminist theory of care within which strands informed by varying philosophical schools and methods can coexist. (shrink)

This article critiques Zimbabwe's refugee policy and practice context, with a focus on the ideological underpinnings of aided income generation activities in Zimbabwe's Tongogara refugee camp. We apply the lenses of Joan Tronto's political, or democratic ethics of care, and Fiona Robinson's critical ethics of care, to conduct an ideology critique of the aid agencies' expressed goal of refugees' economic ‘self-reliance’. We demonstrate that their underlying assumptions about ‘dependency’ and ‘autonomy’, in conjunction with Zimbabwe's policy of refugee encampment, are at (...) the heart of the income generation activities’ lack of sustainability. We argue further that all caring relationships are characterised by unequal power relations, and that this needs to be acknowledged in order to enable a shared commitment to equal participation, in a partnership towards agreed-upon development goals. Moreover, the ideologies of autonomy and self-reliance must be replaced with a policy commitment to fostering interdependence as the ontological condition under which income generating activities can evolve into sustainable livelihoods. We recommend that the critical ethics of care and the radical-democratic practices for which it calls, provide an apt framework within which to reconsider the policies governing refugee support and practices, so as to foster a caring context for human wellbeing. (shrink)

In her 2015 article, Helena Olofsdotter Stensöta notes that ‘the ethics of care is often used as a lens to dissect the current arrangement of care provision (or rather non-care provision) in polici...

The ethics of care and Confucian care ethics are both characterised by relations-based moral reasoning and decision-making. Acknowledging this similarity, this article compares and contrasts these two ethics, highlighting Western and Eastern moral concerns. One of the main differences between the two ethical theories is their different focus on vulnerability and inequality as factors in achieving equality in the ethics of care; another is the reciprocity, rather than equality, dimension in Confucian ethics. Both theories enshrine the view that the characteristics (...) of care offer scope for developing the capacity for judgement. However, a fundamental difference is revealed when considering that Confucian ethics emphasises care as a virtue in the cultivation of one's moral agency, whereas the ethics of care sees care as both a disposition and practice, and the caring relationship to be a primary means of moral evaluation. For the care ethicists, the practice of care embraces communicative morality, within fluid, dynamic interpersonal relationships - in sharp contrast to Confucian care practices, which are constructed within formal standards and fixed, role-based relationships. (shrink)

This article aims to initiate a discussion on the demarcation of the ethics of care. This discussion is necessary because the ethics of care evolves by making use of insights from varying disciplines. As this involves the risk of contamination of the care ethical discipline, the challenge for care ethical scholars is to ensure to retain a distinct care ethical perspective. This may be supported by an open and critical debate on the criteria and boundaries of the ethics of care. (...) As a contribution, this article proposes a tentative outline of the care ethical discipline. What is characteristic of this outline is the emphasis on relational programming, situation-specific and context-bound judgments, a political–ethical perspective, and empirical groundedness. It is argued that the ethics of care is best developed further by means of an intradisciplinary approach. Two intradisciplinary examples show how within the frame of one discipline, other disciplines are absorbed, both with their body of knowledge and their research methodology. (shrink)

This article argues that a state-centered theory of global justice exhibits an epistemic problem of perspective, and that this worry exhibits a gendered character. Within a liberal domestic theory of justice, the public/private distinction has been repeatedly shown to be bad for women because it creates a domain for injustice that becomes invisible to public policy and the law. This article argues that state-centered theories of global justice create an analogous space that is cut off from questions of global justice. (...) The article therefore suggests that this way of framing questions of global justice is problematic, and is problematic for women in particular. Just as the public/private distinction in liberal domestic justice leaves cases of injustice outside the vision of the law, the hard distinction between the domestic (state) sphere and the international realm of justice leaves cases of injustice invisible to international law. For the question of global justice, the privileging of sovereignty and non-intervention compromises the ability of the theory to achieve its purported goal of universal justice. (shrink)

This article offers an alternative approach to multicultural theories, called ‘caring multiculturalism’. It argues that, despite good intentions, multicultural theory reproduces rhetoric that constructs groups as substantive entities, which leaves little room to accommodate changing power relations. Caring multiculturalism, drawing on caring ethics, feminist critiques of multiculturalism and discursive social psychology, advocates instead the contextualisation of groups’ claims to diversity and of governments’ practices of multiculturalism. As a framework rooted in discursive psychology, caring multiculturalism sees individual and collective identities as (...) relational, negotiated and political, and therefore non-totalising and changeable. As a feminist approach to multiculturalism, it analyses and attempts to change gendered power asymmetries embedded in intra- and intergroup relations by advocating an attentive and responsive approach to the needs and claims of minority groups and of the individuals within them. The article outlines the main tenets of caring multiculturalism with illustrations from multicultural practices in three European municipalities. (shrink)

The ethical dimension of care work is less explored in Chinese long-term care (LTC) settings. This paper accentuates care ethics embodied by direct care workers (DCWs) from an ethnographic study of care at Sunlight Nursing Home in central China. I include the notion of xiao (filial piety) to construe care ethics by engaging both feminist and intersectional approaches. Empirical findings highlight the narrative of mei banfa (‘there is nothing you can do about it’) in revealing the complexity of caregiving in (...) a commercialised environment where both physical and emotional care intertwine. Mei banfa compels DCWs to invoke their agency in care practice despite inadequate support from the nursing home and negative social portrayals of care work. It is a cognitive coping strategy of DCWs to harness their energy in upholding care ethics for both the elderly residents and their own family members. Such commitment is unlikely to be sustained if structural barriers continue to impede the recognition of care labour as part of social production. Arguably, an ethically informed approach to both policymaking and care practice gives voice to human interdependency in care work and affords ways to reimagine a caring future. (shrink)