Conventionalist Ethics: Relativism and Subjectivism

Conventionalist Ethics: Relativism and Subjectivism

I am an ethical relativist with a subjectivist orientation. This no doubt comes from my location in a postmodern, diverse society, where many different people hold many different values, depending on their upbringing. Ethical standards have shifted so much throughout history, even during my short lifetime, it is difficult for me to believe that any ethical standards exist 'for all time,' in such a manner that is distinct from culture and context. We may 'feel' that individualism is important, and talk about innate human rights, but these feelings are the product of our own cultural teaching and 'moment.' When Thomas Jefferson declared "we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal," he reflected his society's male bias, and could not have predicted that in the nation he founded, women could become viable presidential and vice-presidential candidates.

Consider the institution of slavery as an example of how morality and society have changed seismically over time. What could seem a more horrifying example of a moral wrong to us today? Yet one of the greatest moral philosophers of ancient Greece, Aristotle, justified both slavery and the inferior status of women as a social good. Slavery was an accepted institution in almost every civilization of the ancient world. It was taken for granted a necessary evil and no one believed it was so unethical society should eradicate it. Treating slaves poorly was considered wrong, and grateful masters freed their slaves upon their death, but no one questioned, by and large, the necessity of slavery for society to function. Gradually in the 19th century, calls to liberate slaves increased. First these voices of abolition were regarded as radical and even slightly mad. Then the volume and the number of these calls for justice increased, with shifts in ideology and also the world economy. Over time, the agrarian American South became isolated from the rest of the nation and world, as one of the few places besides tsarist Russia that allowed sine form of enslavement. Russia's allowance of serfdom and despotic monarchy is another example of how what was once accepted, namely the absolute power of a king, became increasingly questioned. This highlights the relative nature of ethics -- if my neighbor or neighboring nation is doing the same thing I am less likely to view my own customs and schema of behavior as unethical. This can be seen manifest even in recent American history -- as pointed out by Malcolm X, the great civil rights leader of the 1960s, America condemned South Africa in the United Nations for enforcing apartheid, even while our own nation effectively enforced such a system within its borders. British abolitionists condemned American slavery and Russian serfdom, and ignored the class-bound economy of their own nation.

The difficulty of gauging our own morality in an absolute sense can be seen even in petty ethical rationalizations we make our own lives -- we may state that stealing is wrong, for example, but pocket the change a clerk accidentally gives to us, rationalizing that the company can afford to lose this sum. Even if we are vaguely aware the clerk may be charged -- it is his or her mistake, we say to ourselves. We think we have absolute ethical standards, but we function on a case-by-case basis when making decisions in reality. Does this mean, however, that absolute ethical standards are required to weigh against the negative consequences of relativism? Firstly, these examples highlight the difficulty of living by absolute standards, and how if standards are too inflexible, they may result in no standards at all. Even religions with strict universal standards often must have a lay and clergy distinction because it is so impossible to live by the standards of the faith, 'perfectly' according to their anti-materialist rules. Abstinence-only sexual education that does not acknowledge deviations from 'perfect' behavior might be the most ineffective pregnancy prevention program of all.

Acknowledging the subjective and relativistic nature of ethical schemas does not mean that one should not try to create personal or societal standards, but to understand that these standards are culturally bound and contextual, and what is right for us, at a moment in time, may not be right later on or for another society. For example, given the societal history of racism in the United States, the technically discriminatory practice of affirmative action may be wise, even necessary to erase the history of racial oppression in the nation, but years from now, this method of enforcing diversity may not be desirable. Viewing individuals independent of their ethnic background when creating a constitution may have proved a beneficial in the U.S., but ignoring racial or religious history when creating a government and refusing to allow proportional representation of different groups may not work in regions of the world, such as the Middle East or Eastern Europe, where these ties have such an important role in defining an individual's sense of identity.