Moral Imagination

Volume 4 looks at the development of moral education with particular relation to the context of cultural pluralism. Taking a theoretical approach, it discusses philosophical issues of moral relativism as well as the application of theory to good practice.

Controversies about abortion, the environment, pornography, AIDS, and similar issues naturally lead to the question of whether there are any values that can be ultimately justified, or whether values are simply conventional. John Kekes argues that the present moral and political uncertainties are due to a deep change in our society from a dogmatic to a pluralistic view of values. Dogmatism is committed to there being only one justifiable system of values. Pluralism recognizes many such systems, and yet it avoids a chaotic relativism according to which all values are in the end arbitrary. Maintaining that good lives must be reasonable, but denying that they must conform to one true pattern, Kekes develops and justifies a pluralistic account of good lives and values, and works out its political, moral, and personal implications.

In this book an international team of philosophers and educationalists offers a variety of perspectives on some of the most fundamental questions about moral education.

Why do good people do ethically questionable things? Why do reputable businesses ignore the harmful consequences of their actions? These questions continue to challenge philosophers, legal scholars, and corporate leaders. In this pathbreaking book, Patricia Werhane sets forth a model that explains ethical failings in business and shows how to transcend them. Deleterious corporate actions are often attributed to simple greed, and regulations have traditionally been enacted to counter them. But Werhane argues that most corporate managers are not without moral sensibilities, nor are they motivated primarily by greed or self-interest. Indeed, companies themselves often attempt to improve ethical behaviour -- most American companies today have values statements, and ethics training is widespread -- but applying moral principles to practical decision-making has not been entirely successful. What is missing, according to Werhane, is a highly developed moral imagination that enables managers and the companies they run to be aware of, evaluate, and change the mental models that often constrict business behaviour. The development of moral imagination is not identified merely with increased sensitivity to the existence of ethical issues in business. It includes awareness of the mind-sets that govern managerial and corporate decision-making, the development of reasoning skills to evaluate and moderate these mind-sets, and creativity to ponder viable alternative solutions to what appear to be insoluble economic dilemmas. Unique in its sophisticated application of ethical reasoning to real day-to-day business problems, this book points the way to the exemplary moral leadership that will enable companies to flourish in the complex global economies of the twenty-first century.

As the popularity of William Bennett's Book of Virtues attests, parents are turning more and more to children's literature to help instill values in their kids. Now, in this elegantly written and passionate book, Vigen Guroian provides the perfect complement to books such as Bennett's, offering parents and teachers a much-needed roadmap to some of our finest children's stories. Guroian illuminates the complex ways in which fairy tales and fantasies educate the moral imagination from earliest childhood. Examining a wide range of stories--from "Pinocchio" and "The Little Mermaid" to "Charlotte's Web," "The Velveteen Rabbit," "The Wind in the Willows," and the "Chronicles of Narnia"--he argues that these tales capture the meaning of morality through vivid depictions of the struggle between good and evil, in which characters must make difficult choices between right and wrong, or heroes and villains contest the very fate of imaginary worlds. Character and the virtues are depicted compellingly in these stories; the virtues glimmer as if in a looking glass, and wickedness and deception are unmasked of their pretensions to goodness and truth. We are made to face the unvarnished truth about ourselves, and what kind of people we want to be. Throughout, Guroian highlights the classical moral virtues such as courage, goodness, and honesty, especially as they are understood in traditional Christianity. At the same time, he so persuasively evokes the enduring charm of these familiar works that many readers will be inspired to reread their favorites and explore those they may have missed.