The ethic of care as complementary to the ethic of

Vreeke (1991) claims that there are two interpretations of the fundamental relationship between the ethics of care and justice:

(1) they represent the same form of reasoning but differ in content and alternatively (2) they represent different forms of moral reasoning, giving rise to two different developmental paths. The first interpretation has dominated the field. Many of characteristics of care Gilligan defines as distinctive can be also found in Kohlberg’s theory. Thus, it means that care judgments can be interpreted in terms of Kohlberg’s model (Jaffee & Hyde, 2000), and care might even represent a sequence of substages within it (Kohlberg & al., 1983). Considerations of care, as far as these concepts are used prescriptively (telling what one ought to do) are regarded as moral, and accordingly can be scored at each stage within the recent scoring system (Kohberg & Kauffman, 1987).

The complex scoring system allows content of moral reasoning to be classified in four different moral orientations that describe motives behind moral judgments, being sort of personal moral philosophies. The perfectionist orientation emphasizes perfection

of the self and others as moral beings, attainment of dignity and autonomy, good conscience and motives, harmony with self and others, akin to Aristotle’s and Plato’s virtue ethics. The utilitarian orientation defines morality as the maximization of welfare and happiness consequences, akin to the moral philosophy of utilitarianism. Judgments of justice are more explicit in the normative order orientation, defining rightness as the adherence to prescribed rules and roles (akin to Kantian ethics), and the most explicit in the fairness orientation, emphasizing reciprocity, equality and equity (close to Rawls’s moral philosophy).

Judgments of care fall into the perfectionist and utilitarian orientations, and therefore, they implicitly represent justice reasoning. The utilitarian principle of maximizing welfare consequences requires that each individual or life is to count as one, implying the concept of equality, whereas perfectionist orientation is centred on treating self and others as not means but as ends, fellow men, avoiding exploitation of others and trying to benefit them (Kohlberg & al., 1983.)

Yet, empirical studies (Pratt & al., 1984, 1988; Walker, 1991) do not support the assumption that perfectionist and utilitarian orientations can be equated with care orientation. Moreover, Jaffee and Hyde (2000) concluded that studies on Kohlberg’s orientations did not demonstrate a significant gender difference. Snarey and Keljo (1991) proposed that Gilligan brilliantly identified the missing voice but inappropriately linked it to gender, instead of culture. Their review of cross-cultural differences, based on 54 samples from 9 countries, revealed that many care-based judgments, voiced by representatives of communitarian-oriented societies and working class, could not be scored within Colby & al.’s (1987) manual. This Gemeinschaft voice “has tended to be heard as a Stage 3 construction, but under more detailed scrutiny, reveals evidence of reasoning at higher stages” (p. 418). Snarey and Keljo concluded that even if Kohlberg’s claim for the universality of his theory holds true, the current theory and scoring system does not recognize all cultural variants of postconventional reasoning. Similarly, Iwasa (1992) found that some of Japanese participants’ postconventional judgments, oriented to maintaining and improving relationships and social harmony could not be rated within the scoring system. A Polish study (Czyzowska &

Niemczynski, 1998) points out that Stage 4 is also deflated in this sense.

Polish participants expressed judgments viewing society in terms of

interpersonal relations. ”What is right is what establishes, support and deepens bonds between people as members of a society. People should undertake actions that support or create a good atmosphere and protect social integrity. These actions should be aimed at social welfare and the welfare of members of society as well as at harmony between all of them” (p. 449).

To conclude, Kohlberg’s theory, at least the scoring system, seems to be biased against social conceptualizations of care. Stage 4 emphasizes formal and legal aspects of the functioning of society, and Stage 5 emphasizes individual autonomy and freedom, “ignoring the fact that no human being can exist outside of a human relationship and forgetting the fact that too much emphasis on individual freedom and autonomy can lead to the breakdown of stable relationships” (Iwasa, 1992, p. 10).

Similarly, Shimizu (2001) pointed out that Japanese adolescents consider care as a communal responsibility and a normative voice of a larger society, rather than as individual feelings and subordinate to justice voice. In order to revise the scoring system, Stage 4 should be supplemented by the judgments stressing the importance of relationships and affiliation values within society as a whole, and postconventional stages should be supplemented by the judgments expressing the

“connected” aspect of human existence (Czyzowska & Niemczynski 1998; Iwasa, 1992). The bias in the scoring system might partly be due to the fact that most match examples were derived from American participants’ interviews who are conceivably most familiar with liberalist-utilitarian ideologies. Kohlberg’s bias towards Rawlsian and Kantian moral philosophies is widely acknowledged (Rest & al., 1999).

Given that care reasoning can be placed into the Kohlberg’s model, we can then ask what might be its position and function there. Nunner-Winkler (1984), using Kant’s conceptualization, argues that the ethics of care and justice constitute different kind of duties. Justice judgments constitute perfect duties, universally shared and obligatory for all to follow, whereas judgments of care represent imperfect, super-categorical duties that are not obligatory and morally binding, and have no moral standards, but only formulate a maxim to guide action. Imperfect duties complement perfect duties, and similarly the ethic of care deepens the ethic of justice. Both kind of duties constitute the unity of morality, which ultimately requires more than giving equal respect

and refraining from unduly interfering with others, that is, responding to need (Little 1998).

Nunner-Winkler redefines Gilligan’s claim of genderized moralities to mean that women feel more obligated to fulfill imperfect duties than men do. Kroeger-Mappes (1994) makes a similar point and asserts that the ethic of care, while experienced morally binding by others (women), tends to be seen as morally deficient by those (men) who do not feel bound by it in the dominating context of justice. Thus, the ethic of care is relegated into the secondary position. Moreover, Kohlberg et al.’s (1983) assumption that “morally valid forms of caring and community presuppose prior conditions and judgments of justice” (p. 92), defines justice as the primary ethic also for the individual’s psychological makeup (Flanagan & Jackson, 1987). This assumption suggests that there are no persons who are caring but deficient in their judgments of justice, which is unlikely. Flanagan and Jackson (1987) argue that despite the seemingly equal conceptualization of care and justice as moralities, Kohlbergian framework regards care, as well as other virtues of morality, inferior to justice, offering them a secondary, complementary position.²⁶ To crystallize Kohlbergian view on the ethic of care here, the following quotations from Kohlberg, Levine and Hewer (1983) are helpful.

In our view, special obligations of care presuppose but go beyond the general duties of justice, which are necessary but not sufficient for them. Thus special relationship dilemmas may elicit care responses, which supplement and deepen the sense of general obligations of justice... We believe that what Gilligan calls an ethic of care is, in and of itself, not well adapted to resolve justice problems; problems which require principles to resolve conflicting claims among persons, all of whom in some sense should be cared about (pp. 20-21.)… Gilligan’s emphasis on the care and response orientation has broadened the moral domain beyond our focus on justice reasoning. However, we do not believe that there exist two distinct or polar orientations or

26Blum (1988) analyzed Kohlberg’s views on care ethics, and found out five different, incompatible positions that regard care more or less inferior to justice.

two tracks in the ontogenesis of moral structures... It remains for Gilligan and her colleagues to determine whether there are, in fact, ‘hard’ stages in the care orientation. If she wishes to claim that there are stages of caring in a Piagetian sense of the word stage, she will have to demonstrate the progressive movement, invariant sequence, structured wholeness, and the relationship of thought to action for her orientation in a manner to the similar way Kohlberg has demonstrated such ontogenetic characteristics for the justice orientation ( p. 139.)

3.3 The ethic of care as a different form from