Ethics (Essence of Ethics) by Manoj K. Jha

Model Answer

Question #1."Although approaches of religion and ethics differ, religions do provide a bedrock of values to develop an ethical framework." Reflect upon this statement.

Hints:

Ethics and religion

Historically, ethics has derived its content from religious tenets. This is so because both of them provide a blueprint for living a good life. No religion ordinarily teaches to steal, lie, kill etc. But it cannot be said that religion is ethics and ethics is religion. Though they are driven by same goal, their approach is different. The form in which they appear may also be different. Ethics approaches the question of “what is the right thing to do?” logically and rationally. It is a rational enquiry. On the contrary, religion expects its followers to have “faith” on its tenets. Religion provides ready-made answer for this questions and expects people to abide by it without much questioning. The intent of religious authority may or may not be good but reasoning is less in religion as compared to ethics. Ethics largely focuses on how to make a good social and public life but the focus of religion is other-worldly also. There is an element of superstition associated with religion while this is not so with ethics. Religion appears to take away the moral autonomy of the individual whereas ethics gives us some resources to reach to the answer of what is the right thing to do.

Religion as bedrock for ethics

All major religions of the world have tried to organize the society in a way and suggest how people should live their lives. In this process, they have postulated some codes of conduct also that people ought to follow. Christianity teaches us the moral values like forgiveness and charity. Protestant revolution also teaches us the spirit of achievement. Hinduism propagates the values of peace and harmony, universal brotherhood, unity in diversity etc. Mahabharata teaches us the essence of Dharma and Nickâma Karma.

Jainism teaches us about non-violence, compassion and asceticism. Buddhism teaches the virtues like compassion, mindfulness, compassion and balanced thinking. Islam brings in the idea of equality, self-restraint and self-sacrifice.

Conclusion

We see that religion provides us with values that also inform our ethical debates. Only thing is that ethics wants us to assume the authority of critical enquiry and grab moral autonomy and not believe on anything without reasoning. It helps us to separate good religious teachings from bad ones like animal sacrifice, witch burning etc.

Question #2."It is ethics in private relationships that ultimately determines ethics in public relationships." To what extent do you think this is correct?

Differentiating private and public life

Private and public life are two broader domains in which human life is divided. Private life entails to family, friends etc. public life entails to our engagement with government organizations, businesses, NGOs, media etc. Our conduct in these two realm are governed by different kinds of principles. The expectations from us are also different.

• Ordinarily, in private relationships, we enjoy more freedom and liberty as compared to public relationships.
• This also applies to flexibility in interpretation of rules. Public engagements are rather formal.
• Whereas we are responsible for what we do in private affairs, this is not so in public. In public, we are also held accountable for our actions. There is answerability involved to a larger audience.
• In public relations, our behavior is deemed to be uniform irrespective of whom we deal with but in private, people enjoy more autonomy in this regard. We can have different terms of engagement with different people.
• In private relations, we ordinarily keep our personal interests in mind whereas in public life, organizational interests are supreme.
• In private relations, people can afford to go by their individual beliefs and value system but in public life, we largely go by institutional rules and subordinate our personal beliefs.

Ethics in private and ethics in public: separate or related?

There are two lines of thinking on this question. One argues that there should be no linking between what people do in their private life and what they do in public life. These are two completely different domains and the criteria of judging one’s conduct should also be different. The private life is the life of freedom, autonomy and creativity. People should be allowed to live their life the way they want without being judged.

Second line of thinking believes that there is a connection between two domains of life and they cannot be seen in isolation. According to virtue ethics, human beings should be virtuous. A person cannot be virtuous in one domain and otherwise in a different domain. By the virtue of integrity, there should be consistency in human behavior in all situations. Hypocrisy is condemned. For instance, a person cannot be liberal in public life and conservative in private life. This will be incongruent. Attitude of a person cannot change in different domains of life.

Conclusion

Value system is a dynamic concept. People take time to change their outlook towards life. But legally or professionally, we are expected to behave in a certain way. That cannot be negotiated. For instance, a person can be a judge. Being an individual, that person may have certain outlook on patriarchy. But being a judge, he has to go by constitutional morality. The law of the land at that particular time has to prevail. Public decisions cannot be governed by personal prejudices. So that person has to tame down that instinct of patriarchy while giving verdict and constantly work towards changing his outlook internally also. However, we must also understand that he holds an office of responsibility and public repute. His conduct becomes a source of guidance for people. People look at such public figures as a role model. They set tone for conduct of ordinary people in society. For instance, we see that the President of the United States appear in public with their spouse and children and publicly celebrate their relationship.

This has a demonstration effect for the society. People get positive outlook towards a stable emotional relationship like marriage. If a teacher makes romantic relationship with one of their student, this can be justified on the grounds of privacy but it will be “unbecoming of a teacher”. Our conduct can be segregated in this way. We are social beings and as such we have social responsibility, more so when we hold position of responsibility and power. So yes, we conclude that there should be a consistency in our conduct in private and public relationships.