care ethics

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

a moral theory developed primarily by feminist philosophers — most influentially Carol Gilligan and Nel Noddings — that grounds ethical life in relationships of care, responsiveness to particular others, and the maintenance of the web of attachments and dependencies that constitute human social existence; care ethics arose as a critique of justice-based moral theories (both Kantian and utilitarian) that focus on abstract universal principles and impartial reasoning, arguing that they marginalise the particularist, relational, and emotionally engaged moral knowledge that arises from caregiving; care ethics emphasises vulnerability, interdependence, and the moral significance of context and relationship, and has been applied to nursing ethics, political theory, international relations, and environmental philosophy