Global Ethics and Criticism of its Affirmative Approaches

Global ethics is a branch of social ethics which finds the “ethical commonalities” among religions and creeds, and calls people for an understanding and recognizance of it. Realities and challenges of the contemporary world make the global ethics an inevitable necessity. Thus, the representatives of the world religions endorsed the declaration of global ethics in 1993. Ethical commonalities can be recognized through inductive and deductive ways. Inductive approach is related to the study of ethical schools of thought and creeds and also case study of ethical commonalities; because it is not biased in favor of any specific school, it is accepted more ubiquitously. However, it faces criticisms such as not being definite, not explicating the causal relations between ethical phenomena, and not providing a solution for ethical contradictions. Deductive approach is based on the theory of innate disposition, and identifies the public and widespread ethical virtues through innate requirements. Despite having an epistemological value and providing definite results, deductive approach lacks generalization. This is because ethical non-realists and also those who deny the innate disposition do not accept this approach. The global ethics needs to follow both of these approaches which complement each other.